Since Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, hundreds of the world’s leading companies, from investment banks to consumer goods, have shuttered their Russian operations and undone decades of investments in a matter of days. These firms are incurring large costs and taking real risks to avoid aiding the Russian war effort. But law firms have been slower to respond.

“When McDonald’s shuts its doors in Moscow, it does not mail burgers from London. By contrast, law firms can and do serve Russian interests from afar. The point is not where service professionals work, but whether they’re helping to strengthen the Russian economy,” says Robert Daines, Pritzker Professor of Law and Business, associate dean for global programs, and senior faculty member of the Rock Center for Corporate Governance.

A new project called Law Firms and Russian Profits launched in March by Daines and faculty and research staff from Harvard, Stanford, and Yale law schools is tracking the AM Law 100 firms and, with significant help from students from Cambridge Law Society, the UK Top 100 firms to see which firms have publicly committed not to profit from work that props up the Russian war effort. Highlighting law firm positions on taking on new work for Russian clients or withdrawing from existing engagements, the project shows some law firms continue to work for large Russian firms and banks. To learn more, go to https://law.stanford.edu/law-firms-and-russian-profits/. SL