State courts should strip bar associations of some regulatory functions to spur innovation and lower the cost of legal services, according to a new paper from a Stanford Law center. State bar associations have a conflict of interest in their oversight of who is allowed to provide legal services, because most of the organizations also represent the professional interests of lawyers.

Shifting some of their regulatory responsibilities to lawmakers or newly created entities would allow bar associations to focus squarely on the oversight of lawyers and open the door to non-traditional and lower cost legal services providers, according to the paper, authored by Rhode Center Executive Director Lucy Ricca and Thomas Clarke, a former administrator with the National Center for State Courts.

Only a handful of states allow non-lawyer ownership of legal service providers or so-called “legal paraprofessionals” who are authorized to provide legal services in a limited capacity with the aim of improving access to justice. Even though many Americans can’t afford a lawyer, “most state bar associations have refused to substantively re-think how legal services could be delivered to better serve more people,” the white paper reads.

The report offers five different options of how state courts can restructure legal practice regulation to minimize bar associations’ conflicts of interest and bolster innovation.

The least dramatic proposed change involves leaving state bars in charge of regulation but expanding the types of entities allowed to operate to include legal paraprofessionals or legal services entities. A bigger possible change would be to task state lawmakers with the regulation of legal service providers while leaving lawyer regulation to bar associations or creating new entities to oversee any non-lawyer legal services. This is a significant challenge but not an impossible one.