Clifford Chance takes steps to remove gendered language from legal drafting

Magic circle firm Clifford Chance has announced its plans to eliminate gendered language in its legal templates as part of its “ambitions to be a force for change” in the legal industry.

After removing gendered salutations (ie, Dear Sirs) from its global English language template, the firm is now requesting that all practice areas and offices remove gendered terms or gender-specific pronouns from their templates.

The firm’s best delivery team will then use a tool to identify and remove any remaining gendered terms (eg, chairman) from its templates.

Clifford Chance said using gender-neutral language in drafting legal documentation “has multiple benefits for equality and inclusion in our firm and across the wider industry”, including promoting gender equality, challenging unconscious assumptions about gender roles, and recognising that not everyone identifies as male or female.

In a statement, the firm added: “The words and language we use matter greatly. They send a signal of our values and can have both a positive and negative impact on others and on our culture. Removing gendered language from our communications is a subtle but impactful way of demonstrating what we stand for, and we're delighted to see these steps taken in our firm.”

The 2019 guide to gender-neutral drafting published by the Government Legal Department and Office of the Parliamentary Counsel outlines several ways that gendered language can be avoided, including repeating the noun (eg, person), changing the pronoun to ‘they’, or rephrasing a sentence to avoid the need for a noun or pronoun. Other suggestions include replacing gender-specific pronouns such as ‘chairman’ and ‘policeman’ with ‘chair’ or ‘police officer’, as well as avoiding feminine suffixes (eg, actor/actress).