Lawyers must pass the legal professional qualification examination and obtain the lawyer's practice certificate according to law before they can practice. According to the nature of work, lawyers can be divided into full-time lawyers and part-time lawyers; According to the scope of business, lawyers can be divided into civil lawyers, criminal lawyers and administrative lawyers; According to clients and working status, lawyers can be divided into social lawyers, corporate lawyers and public lawyers. Lawyer's business is mainly divided into litigation business and non-litigation business.
On August 20th, 2002/KLOC-0, the 30th session of the 13th the National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC) passed the Law of People's Republic of China (PRC) on Legal Aid, and all grassroots legal services are obliged to provide legal aid according to law.
As far as the qualifications of "lawyer" are concerned, they include: first, they have certain legal knowledge, and according to the provisions of the current Lawyers Law, they have legal knowledge of "bachelor degree or above in law major in colleges and universities" or "bachelor degree or above in other majors in colleges and universities"; Secondly, pass the national "legal professional qualification examination"; The third is to obtain a practicing certificate with the approval of the national judicial administrative department; Fourth, provide legal services to the society and take it as a profession.
Therefore, a lawyer refers to a practitioner who has passed the national legal professional qualification examination, obtained a lawyer's practice certificate according to law, accepted entrustment or designation, and provided legal services to the parties. The nature of a lawyer is to provide legal services for the society, and he is a professional legal service worker.
Among the above four basic characteristics, the first one or two are possessed by other legal workers, such as law enforcement workers, judicial trial workers (judges) and judicial procuratorial workers (prosecutors); The latter two items are unique to lawyers.
Lawyers must pass the national judicial examination and obtain the legal professional qualification certificate. People who do not have a lawyer's practice certificate, but are engaged in legal affairs, are generally grassroots legal service workers, and hold a legal service worker's practice certificate issued by the Judicial Bureau. There are also some people who engage in legal affairs without a license or proper occupation, commonly known as "black lawyers", and are not real lawyers.