From Courtrooms to Courier Routes: How China’s Legal Professionals Are Abandoning the Law
In contemporary China, the image of a lawyer once a symbol of justice, intellect, and civic responsibility is quietly being replaced by something far more sobering: a food delivery rider. The shift is not anecdotal. It reflects a deeper malaise in the country’s legal profession, one that speaks volumes about the broader failures of state policy, economic planning, and the commercialization of public service sectors.
Over the past two decades, the legal landscape in mainland China has undergone a transformation so severe that many veteran practitioners now describe it as a descent into darkness. The judiciary, once cautiously optimistic about reform, has become increasingly opaque and politicized. Simultaneously, the economic environment has grown hostile to independent professionals, especially those who rely on merit, ethics, and legal rigor rather than connections or commercial gimmicks.
The consequences are stark. Young lawyers, even those graduating from elite institutions like Nankai University or Renmin University, are finding themselves locked out of meaningful employment. The path from law school to courtroom has become riddled with obstacles, unpaid internships, exploitative firms, and a shrinking pool of legitimate cases. Many are forced to abandon their legal aspirations altogether, turning instead to manual labour jobs such as food delivery, ride-hailing, or factory work. What was once a profession rooted in justice now resembles a survival game.
One such story, shared by a senior lawyer, involves a graduate from a prestigious 211 university who returned to his hometown of Tanzhin after failing to secure an internship in a major city. His experience at a local law office was emblematic of the broader decay: long hours, verbal abuse, and no salary. After 18 months of unpaid labour, he became an assistant earning a paltry Yuan 3,000–4,000 per month. Even then, the workload was gruelling and the prospects grim. Attempts to go independent yielded no clients. Eventually, he joined the ranks of food delivery workers, a decision driven not by choice but by the absence of alternatives.
Such cases are no longer isolated. In December 2023, a legal practitioner with a master’s degree and a valid license from Renmin University chose food delivery over legal practice, citing workplace toxicity and a desire for mental peace. Another lawyer in Beijing, unable to secure cases, found solace in the camaraderie of fellow riders and began sharing legal knowledge informally. In Jiangsu, a legal worker admitted to doing the same, describing the work as exhausting and poorly paid.
The erosion of the legal profession cannot be divorced from the broader economic and political context. China’s economic slowdown has tightened job markets across sectors, but the legal field has been uniquely affected by the state’s failure to protect professional integrity. Commercialization has infiltrated law firms, turning them into profit-driven entities where sales people not lawyers close contracts. These intermediaries often make unrealistic promises, violating ethical boundaries and leaving clients defrauded. In some cases, contracts worth hundreds of thousands of Yuan were signed for lawsuits that were never filed.
Online promotion law firms have emerged, mimicking the tactics of medical scalpers. Individuals posing as lawyers lure clients, only to pass cases to actual practitioners for reduced fees. The result is a race to the bottom, where honest lawyers are edged out by aggressive marketers and unethical operators. Lawyer Woo noted that both case volume and fees have dropped by nearly 50 percent, with most clients now searching for legal help online. The profession, once defined by its intellectual rigor, increasingly resembles physical labour.
Despite years of state-led expansion in higher education, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has failed to create meaningful employment pathways for highly qualified professionals. In the legal sector, many trained lawyers now resort to menial jobs or self-promotion on social media, while others abandon the profession entirely. Commercialization has hollowed out the field, replacing civic purpose with profit motives. Regulatory bodies increasingly equate legal competence with revenue generation, even tolerating firms involved in fraud as long as taxes are paid. The politicization of professional associations has eroded their autonomy, turning once-principled institutions into instruments of compliance. What remains is a system where talent is wasted, dignity eroded, and citizens left vulnerable an indictment of a governance model that prioritizes control over competence.
At its core, this crisis is not merely about lawyers. It is about the Chinese government’s failure to create an environment where professional qualifications translate into meaningful employment. The state’s emphasis on control, commercialization, and political loyalty has undermined merit-based professions. Legal practitioners, once pillars of civil society, are now casualties of a system that rewards compliance over competence, profit over principle.
As more lawyers trade their robes for delivery uniforms, the question arises: what happens to justice in a society where its defenders are forced to abandon the fight? The answer, it seems, lies not in the courtroom but on the streets, where the sound of motorbikes now drowns out the silence of a profession in decline.
