PROFESSIONAL INTEGRITY OF FUTURE LAWYERS: FROM ACADEMIC INTEGRITY TO ETHICAL STANDARDS OF THE LEGAL PROFESSION

Abstract

The article is devoted to a theoretical and legal understanding of the formation of the professional integrity of a lawyer in the context of the interaction of moral, legal, educational and professional-ethical regulators. It examines the mechanisms through which values and rules acquired in the course of legal education are transformed into stable orientations of professional conduct, and analyses the relationship between academic integrity, professional legal consciousness and professional identity as interrelated elements of the professional socialization of future lawyers. The study distinguishes legality, professional ethics and integrity as different levels of regulation of professional activity and demonstrates that formal compliance with legal norms does not exhaust the content of proper professional conduct under conditions of normative uncertainty, information asymmetry and limited external control. The role of professional legal consciousness as an integrative mechanism for combining normative requirements with an individual’s value orientations is substantiated. The study demonstrates that the academic environment constitutes an initial stage in developing a responsible attitude towards information, authorship, independence, accuracy and the outcomes of one’s own activities. On this basis, the concept of value-normative continuity is proposed as a process through which acquired norms and values are gradually transformed into internal attitudes, professional identity and standards of conduct. It is established that the key mechanisms of this transition are the internalization of norms, professional reflection and their transfer into the sphere of legal practice. Particular attention is paid to the impact of the digital environment and generative artificial intelligence on the reconsideration of requirements concerning accuracy, authorship, independence and professional responsibility.

It is concluded that the formation of professional integrity is a continuous process of moral, legal and professional socialization, while effective legal education should ensure not only the acquisition of rules of conduct but also the development of the ability to apply value-based orientations in professional situations. The practical significance of the findings lies in their potential application to the improvement of legal education programmes, the development of practice-oriented assignments, the modelling of ethical dilemmas and the formation of digital information culture among future lawyers. Prospective areas for further research include empirical verification of the relationship between academic practices and the professional conduct of graduates, development of criteria for assessing the level of professional integrity formation, and comparative legal analysis of models for its development across different legal systems.