About us

ECLA was created in 1983. It is an international non-profit association governed by Belgian law.
The Articles of Association  were approved by Royal Decree on 25 June, 1990.
Click here for ECLA's brochure

ECLA is the umbrella organisation for 22 company lawyers associations in Europe. Through its members ECLA represents more than 33,000 company lawyers in 22 countries.

Membership is open to company lawyers associations only. While individuals are not members of ECLA directly, each company lawyer, who is a member of a national company lawyer association, can benefit from ECLA’s activities. The many benefits include discounts to conferences, legal education training, free publications and more. 

During the past 20 years, ECLA has gained recognition as the leading European representative of European company lawyers associations and their individual members. It is the unrivalled position of ECLA as Europe 's biggest and leading association for European in-house lawyers that ensures it has a platform to respond to and influence the European inhouse corporate counsel network, European organisations and policy making bodies.

ECLA’s programme expands the scope of
ECLA's activities beyond seeking legal privilege for
in-house lawyers in the context of European competition proceedings.

The ECLA programme includes:
 - Recognition of the profession of company               lawyer      
- Legal professional privilege
- Continuing legal education
- Networking opportunities
- Liaison with other associations in the legal arena

The primary goal is to remain the number one In-House lawyer association in Europe.
In order to achieve this goal, ECLA’s programme includes:
- Increasing the number of sponsors and partners  
- Expanding ECLA’s membership particularly 
  in Eastern European countries 
- Providing real and visible benefits to members
- Increasing ECLA’s visibility to the external world