Striking a Regulatory Bargain. The Legal Profession, Associations and the State in South Africa

This article examines the regulation of the legal profession in South Africa from colonial times, through apartheid and into the post-apartheid period. It narrates the changing relationship between professional associations and the state, locating these events within the debates on professional self-regulation. Taking the view that professional self-regulation is as a result of “an arrangement” between professions and the state it explores the regulatory bargain struck between associations and the state. The paper demonstrates that during the apartheid period the profession utilised apartheid legislation to exclude black legal professionals. However, in the post-apartheid period, when the state proposed legislative interventions in order to enable access to both the profession and justice, a new regulatory bargain had to be negotiated.