ABSTRACT
The explanation for Chinese lawyers' aversion to representing workers with labor grievances focuses on their own working conditions, on the organization of their legal labor, and on their evaluations of the moral character of prospective clients. This chapter demonstrates lawyers' screening methods: by defining legal reality in strategic and often misleading ways, lawyers use the law as a weapon against the interests of the individuals who seek their help. All the foregoing the solo character of legal practice, the scarcity of resources supplied by most law firms, the pressure to meet minimum billing quotas, and lawyers' extreme dependence on the goodness of the client to pay the agreed-upon legal fee—encourages lawyers to screen out commercially undesirable cases. To lawyers concerned about how they will collect their fee, the paper value of a case is less important than the amount of cash it will generate.
