The professional and institutional groupthink endemic to legal communities, where adherence to procedural formalism, precedent, and adversarial tactics overrides considerations of justice, ethics, or common sense. This mindset enforces a shared language and logic that can seem alien to outsiders, prioritizing "winning" within the rules of the game over achieving a fair or sensible outcome. It creates a collective blind spot where legal professionals—judges, lawyers, clerks—can unanimously agree on a course of action that is legally coherent but morally absurd or socially destructive, as the framework of the law itself becomes the only permissible reality.
Legalothinking / Legal Groupthinking Example: In a corporate law firm, a team debates how to help a client avoid environmental liability. Legalothinking takes over: they spend hours strategizing on jurisdictional loopholes and procedural delays, all while tacitly agreeing not to question the client's destructive practices. The shared goal becomes crafting the most technically defensible argument, not preventing environmental harm. The group's moral compass is recalibrated to point only toward legal victory.
by Dumuabzu February 5, 2026
Get the Legalothinking / Legal Groupthinking mug.