Diversity dips at US firms as recession hits ethnic minority lawyer headcounts

New research reveals falling proportions of minority lawyers at leading US law firms

The number of ethnic minority lawyers in US firms has fallen for the first time in nine years, with large firms losing 9% of minority lawyers, according to research by Legal Week sister title The American Lawyer.

The findings, based on statistics from 202 participating firms including Baker & McKenzie and Latham & Watkins, suggest that minority lawyers were disproportionately affected by job cuts at US firms over the last year.

While big firms shed 9% of minority lawyers between 2008 and 2009, this compared with only a 6% cut of their overall lawyer numbers. Minority lawyers made up 13.4% of all lawyers across the group in 2009, down from 13.9% in 2008.

African American lawyers saw the largest decline, with the number of black lawyers falling by 13% (462), while the number of black non-partners slid by 16% - meaning that almost one in six African American non-partners left the surveyed firms in the space of a year, without being replaced.

The drops were not evenly spread across firms, with one third seeing no decrease in minority lawyer numbers, while 31 firms saw drops of 20% or more. The biggest decliners, such as Fried Frank Harris Shriver & Jacobson, Kilpatrick Stockton and Milbank Tweed Hadley & McCloy, lost more than one third of their minority lawyers.

Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati held onto its number one spot in the rankings, while many others fell, including Sidley Austin, which dropped from number 45 to 62 and Mayer Brown, which fell from 81 to 98.

Several firms bucked the trend including White & Case, which rose from number nine to number four, and Weil Gotshal & Manges, which moved from 23 to 20.

Reasons cited for the percentage decreasing for the first time in a decade include the recession, scaled-back sponsorship of diversity groups and a reduced number of newly-qualified minority lawyers, as well as reduced recruiting during the downturn.

Arin Reeves (pictured), diversity consultant for law firms at The Athens Group in Chicago, said: "My fear is that even though it is a half-percentage point decline, it is a half-percentage point that will not correct itself, and it will increase over the next two years."

Venu Gupta, executive director of the Chicago Committee on Minorities in large law firms, said: "The way that law firms beefed up their diversity numbers was really to have a lot of diverse associates in the first and second-year classes. If a firm didn't hold on to its minority associates - and many didn't - it was relatively easy to hire more in the next recruiting session."

The American Lawyer is a US sister title of Legal Week.