By Justice Rangajeeva Wimalasena The American lawyer and statesman Daniel Webster said almost two centuries ago that “most good lawyers live well, work hard, and die poor”. Although this statement may not accurately reflect every aspect of the modern legal profession, the fact that lawyers work hard under demanding and stressful conditions remains a universal [...]
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The American lawyer and statesman Daniel Webster said almost two centuries ago that “most good lawyers live well, work hard, and die poor”. Although this statement may not accurately reflect every aspect of the modern legal profession, the fact that lawyers work hard under demanding and stressful conditions remains a universal reality…
The legal profession supplies members to the judiciary, prosecution services, legal aid institutions, corporate legal departments, legislative drafting offices and many other public and private institutions, while many other lawyers practise at the private Bar.
In the administration of justice legal practitioners are expected to discharge their duties with the utmost integrity, professionalism, discipline, diligence, and competence.
Well-being in the legal profession becomes especially relevant in this context, as legal practitioners often work long hours, face demanding deadlines, deal with stressful disputes between parties, and are frequently exposed to traumatic or disturbing material
A legal practitioner who is persistently exhausted, overworked, anxious, traumatised, or unsupported, or who is at times subjected to bullying, harassment, or discrimination, may be unable to discharge the duties of the profession with the level of competence, diligence and judgment expected of the role.
Well-being in the legal profession is not an optional or fashionable slogan, nor is it merely a matter of personal care. It is a fundamental aspect of a sustainable, efficient, and healthy justice system that upholds the rule of law and ensures the proper administration of justice. Poor well-being among legal professionals can compromise the effectiveness and proper functioning of the justice system.
Conversely, international research demonstrates that working within a justice system that is itself under sustained strain may have lasting adverse effects on the health and well-being of legal professionals. The International Bar Association’s global study reported that one third of legal practitioners who responded to the survey believed their legal work had a negative or extremely negative effect on their mental well-being. Nearly half of all legal professionals surveyed indicated that a fear of the impact on their career would put them off speaking about their mental wellbeing.
A study of lawyers in Washington State found that 18% were classified as problem drinkers and identified chronic overcommitment, court-imposed deadlines and the demands of legal practice as possible contributors to psychological distress.
Although these international findings may not be directly applicable to the legal profession in Sri Lanka, there is presently insufficient empirical data to provide a clear, research-based understanding of the well-being of Sri Lankan legal practitioners. In the absence of such local evidence, international research on lawyer well-being may nevertheless offer valuable insights into the importance of prioritising the well-being of legal professionals in Sri Lanka.
A recent Australian study Lawyer Wellbeing, Workplace Experiences and Ethics involving 1,890 lawyers across Victoria, New South Wales and Western Australia found that approximately 30% of participants reported symptoms indicating an elevated risk of an anxiety or depressive condition. The study also found that 32% of women experienced workplace incivility at least weekly, compared with 20% of men. It measured positive well-being through factors including positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, accomplishment, physical health, mindset, environment, and economic security. It found that supportive relationships at work and the belief that one’s work was valuable and worthwhile were especially important.
Therefore, it is clear that lawyer well-being is not merely about the health of individuals. It is also about creating conditions in which legal practitioners experience purpose, dignity, connection, and professional fulfilment.
The International Bar Association’s report, Us Too? Bullying and Sexual Harassment in the Legal Profession, based on a global survey of nearly 7,000 legal professionals from 135 countries, found that one in three female respondents had experienced sexual harassment in a work-related context. The problem was also seriously underreported, with 75% of sexual harassment incidents never formally reported, often because of the status of the perpetrator, fear of professional repercussions and the perception that such behaviour was endemic within the workplace. Sexual harassment has consequences extending beyond the immediate incident. The report links sexual harassment with reduced job satisfaction, commitment, and productivity, deteriorating workplace relationships, absenteeism, and withdrawal from the workplace. It may also contribute to anxiety, depression, and other health problems.
Sexual harassment appears to have a particularly serious impact on women lawyers, affecting their well-being, dignity, job satisfaction, career progression and continued participation in the profession. In some male-dominated legal workplaces, inappropriate sexual advances or requests for sexual favours may be normalised as part of workplace culture.
The well-being of legal practitioners is both an individual and an institutional responsibility. Ethical professional conduct, together with respectful relationships among legal practitioners, clients, court staff and, particularly, the Bench, plays an important role in maintaining a healthy legal profession. Bullying and harassment may occur within the profession and, at times, may also arise from the Bench.
A judge who is fatigued, stressed, overwhelmed by an excessive workload, or affected by unaddressed health or psychological difficulties may become impatient or shorttempered. If such pressures are not properly managed, the judge’s conduct may create a hostile and intimidating courtroom environment, making the daily professional lives of legal practitioners unnecessarily difficult. The consequences of such conduct can be serious and far-reaching.
In one reported case in Western Australia, a 22-yearold Legal Aid lawyer died by suicide shortly after being publicly berated by a magistrate. The incident highlights the potentially harmful effects of public humiliation and the importance of ensuring that legal practitioners are treated with dignity, fairness, and respect. A judge who berates persons appearing before the court abuses a position of power because those persons are ordinarily unable to respond on equal terms. Lawyers may refrain from reporting judicial misconduct because they regularly appear before the judge and fear retribution. Reporting may require “significant courage”. Judicial bullying can harm clients and the justice system, leave lasting impressions of unfairness, and discourage lawyers from advancing legitimate but novel arguments.
On the other hand, judges themselves experience considerable stress arising from heavy workloads, uncooperative or inadequately prepared lawyers, systemic shortcomings, and a perceived lack of transparency in matters such as promotions, transfers, and the handling of judicial grievances. A survey of Caribbean judicial officers, reported in Exploring the Wellbeing of Caribbean Judicial Officers, found that only 30% of respondents felt happy or fulfilled very or extremely often, while one quarter stated that they never or only rarely experienced such feelings, indicating a significant proportion of judicial officers were experiencing low levels of happiness and fulfilment in their professional lives.
The importance of promoting well-being for prosecutors must also not be overlooked. Institutional culture, excessive workloads, emotional pressure, and cognitive bias may cause prosecutors to become unnecessarily adversarial or punitive. Some may become vulnerable to the “hunt mentality” fostered by an aggressive prosecutorial culture. A workplace that measures professional success principally by conviction rates may encourage a “winner takes all” mentality in which obtaining a conviction becomes the primary objective.
Such a culture may lead prosecutors to view accused persons as opponents to be defeated rather than as individuals whose guilt must be established fairly and according to law.
A qualitative study of New Zealand Crown prosecutors found that repeated exposure to traumatic evidence, serious violence and the experiences of complainants placed prosecutors at risk of vicarious trauma and other forms of psychological distress. Participants described experiences including intrusive thoughts, sleep difficulties, depression, anxiety, increased cynicism and fear, an inability to leave work behind, and adverse effects on their personal relationships.
The study also found that prosecutors sometimes normalised these effects as merely “part of the job” or attempted to cope through emotional suppression and desensitisation, highlighting the need for supportive workplace cultures and appropriate professional assistance10. Failure to address these issues may adversely affect the fairness, judgment and ethical conduct expected of prosecutors, as well as the administration of justice more broadly.
Well-being is also linked to the independence of lawyers. The IBA Standards for the Independence of the Legal Profession contain protections closely connected to lawyers’ well-being, professional independence, and security. They require that lawyers be able to act freely and fearlessly without harassment or improper pressure, while also placing responsibility on lawyers’ associations to promote the welfare of members of the profession and to assist their families in appropriate cases.
This gives bar associations a clear institutional mandate to engage with well-being. Counselling services, peer support, mentoring, emergency assistance and protection against professional intimidation are consistent with the traditional responsibilities of an independent bar.
Furthermore, the United Nations Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers contain protections relevant to lawyer well-being by requiring equal access to, and continued participation in, the legal profession without discrimination. They further require that lawyers be able to discharge their duties without intimidation, harassment, or improper interference, and that they receive adequate protection whenever their security is threatened because of the performance of their professional functions.
Legal practitioners in Sri Lanka experience many of the pressures commonly associated with legal practice. These include intense workloads, demanding deadlines, poor work-life balance, competitive professional environments, financial pressures, and inadequate institutional support. They also practise within a distinct social and historical context. Sri Lankan society has been shaped by armed conflicts, cycles of political violence and vengeance, institutional corruption, natural disasters, terrorist attacks, economic instability and, more recently, a civil uprising. The extent to which these broader conditions affect the health and well-being of legal professionals has yet to be determined through systematic, evidence-based research.
A 2010 report in The Lancet described the mental-health burden facing Sri Lanka shortly after the war. It recorded accounts of continuing fear of loud noises, nightmares, anxiety, hopelessness, grief, and guilt among persons affected by the conflict. It observed that geographical distance and the passage of time did not necessarily remove the emotional consequences of war. The report also identified cultural stigma and the reluctance to discuss mental health openly in both Sinhala and Tamil communities.
The stigma surrounding help-seeking remains one of the most significant challenges in promoting both judicial and lawyer well-being. The Nauru Declaration on Judicial Well-being recognises that treating judicial stress as a sign of weakness can add isolation and shame to the pressures of judicial work, discourage help-seeking and impede recovery. Although directed specifically to the judiciary, the principle of de-stigmatisation is equally relevant to the wider legal profession.
The World Health Organisation’s Mental Health Atlas 2024 also reveals continuing systemic limitations. The Sri Lankan profile reports that no national mental-health survey had been conducted during the preceding ten years, that there was no specific anti-stigma strategy, and that no work-related mental-health programme was recorded. It reports a limited mental-health workforce, including approximately 0.5 psychiatrists and a very small number of psychologists per 100,000 people.
The importance of lawyer well-being is reflected, although indirectly, in Sri Lanka’s professional conduct framework. The Supreme Court Rules require Attorneys-at-Law to accept only work that they can undertake with due diligence and to discharge their duties with skill, care, and professionalism. The Rules recognise the essential elements of an ethical and supportive professional culture by prohibiting insulting or degrading conduct and requiring courtesy, respect and fairness among members of the profession. Compliance with these standards can help reduce hostility and humiliation within legal practice while promoting a professional culture that protects the dignity and well-being of legal practitioners.
Although the Supreme Court Rules provide an important ethical foundation for the conduct of lawyers, considerably more must be done to promote lawyer well-being in Sri Lanka. Discussing the well-being of legal practitioners should neither be regarded as taboo nor treated as a marginal concern. It deserves recognition alongside popular themes such as access to justice and the rule of law because the health of the legal profession directly affects the quality and integrity of the justice system.
The effects of work-related stress, excessive workloads, bullying and harassment, together with Sri Lanka’s particular socioeconomic conditions, remain largely unknown and have been overlooked for far too long. As a matter of priority, Sri Lanka requires a coordinated and evidence-based approach involving the Bar Association, courts, law firms, government legal departments, universities, and mental-health professionals. Priorities should include a confidential national survey of psychological well-being and workplace conditions, independent counselling and referral services, leadership training on workload management and responses to distress, the integration of wellbeing and trauma awareness into legal education, and effective mechanisms to address bullying and harassment.
The legal profession cannot serve justice effectively while neglecting the people who sustain it. Well-being is not inconsistent with hard work, accountability, or professional excellence. A healthy profession is not one in which no lawyer ever experiences distress, but one in which distress may be acknowledged without shame, assistance may be sought without fear of professional consequences, and institutions accept responsibility for the environments they create.
(Justice Rangajeeva Wimalasena is a Judge of the National and Supreme Courts of Papua New Guinea and a Justice of Appeal in Nauru, Kiribati, and Solomon Islands. He is also an Adjunct Professor at the Thomas More Law School, Australian Catholic University. He received the 2026 GG2 Outstanding Achievement in Law Award in the United Kingdom in recognition of his leadership in drafting the Nauru Declaration on Judicial Well-being and initiating the process that led the United Nations to proclaim 25 July as the International Day for Judicial Well-being.)
Print Edition – The Sunday Times, Sri Lanka
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