Who Advises Governments in 2026: Disputes and Public Law, Not M&A

A general counsel who picks law firms for government agencies is buying a different product from the one a corporate legal department buys. Sartori & Partners data show 852 government and public sector deals in the 12 months to October 2026, and disputes and investigations were 44.6% of them. Across the whole deal market the same type was 25.0%. M&A, the core of most corporate panels, was 3.3% of public sector deals against 19.3% of all deals. This report sets out what public bodies actually buy from outside counsel, which practices do the work, which firms appear most often, and how a legal head should build a panel around that mix.

Disputes and investigations run at 1.8 times their market share in this sector. The figure covers litigation, regulatory investigations and arbitration in which a public body is a party or the authority, the matters a state or agency cannot avoid. Deals for individual clients lean harder still, with the type at 91.2%. The asset-heavy sectors that deal with the state look nothing like it. Disputes were 4.8% of infrastructure deals and 6.7% of utilities, water and waste deals, where the state shows up mostly through financings.

Capital markets is the second type, at 27.2% of public sector deals against 25.7% market-wide, a gap of 1.5 points. For a public issuer that work is mostly bond issues, so it is the one part of the mix that resembles corporate work. For the reader the consequence is plain: a public body's outside counsel spend is first a disputes budget, and the litigation bench of a firm deserves more scrutiny than its transaction record.

Sorting the same deals by practice shows who does the work. Public Law & Government lawyers were credited on 21.5% of public sector deals, against 1.8% of all deals, a rate 11.9 times higher. International Arbitration & Public International Law shows the same pattern on a smaller base: 3.1% of the sector's deals, against 0.2% market-wide. Treaty claims, investment arbitration and state-to-state matters sit here, and few firms staff them in depth.

Deals with individual clients carry public law at a similar rate, 18.7%, because claims against the state often start with a person. The shares overlap, since one deal can involve several practices, so they cannot be added into a split of the work. Employment & Labor lawyers appear on 4.3% of public sector deals, against 0.7% of all deals, which reflects the public body's role as a large employer. A panel review should test each firm on public law and arbitration depth by name, not on headcount.

Public bodies rarely buy or sell companies, and the numbers confirm it. M&A was 3.3% of government and public sector deals, against 19.3% of the whole market, so the sector carries the type at 17.1% of its market weight. Infrastructure, a sector full of state counterparties, carries M&A at 15.7%, and utilities at 13.9%. The practice view agrees: Corporate & M&A lawyers were on 4.1% of public sector deals, against 23.3% of all deals. A firm's M&A league position says little about how it will serve an agency. When a privatization or a stake sale does come, it is an occasional mandate, better bought for that deal than held on a standing panel.

In the Sartori & Partners deal records, the eight most active advisers to public bodies each worked on 21-40 of the sector's deals, and no firm stands clear of the rest. Linklaters, Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton, Clifford Chance, A&O Shearman and White & Case head the list by rank, and the next three firms share the same band. The ranks inside one band do not separate the firms, so a public body should treat all eight as peers and judge them on the team proposed for its own matters.

The work is spread thin across firms. The sector counted 390 distinct clients on 852 deals, and the busiest adviser sat in the 21-40 band. Infrastructure has fewer deals, 585, yet its busiest adviser sat in the 41-60 band. For a public body that means real choice: no single firm holds the market, and a tender can draw several credible bidders from this list.

Value was disclosed on 22.3% of public sector deals, and the median of those was $1,000 million. Infrastructure discloses more often, on 39.3% of its deals, at a lower median of $850 million; utilities sit at $802.5 million. Deals for individual clients, also heavy on disputes, have a median of $18.8 million. Dispute values are rarely made public, so the median reflects the financing side of the sector far more than its litigation.

Volume did not move much. Government and public sector deals held flat (+5.1%), from 811 to 852 in the settled 12-month window, while the whole deal market rose 10.6%, from 43,590 to 48,216. Demand from public bodies is steady rather than cyclical, which suits multi-year panel terms.

Build the panel around disputes first. With disputes and investigations at 44.6% of the sector's deals, the lead firm should be chosen on litigation and investigation capacity, with public law depth as the second test. Sartori & Partners figures put Public Law & Government lawyers on 21.5% of public sector deals, so ask each bidder to name the public law partners who will staff the work. Keep arbitration and public international law as a named lot, since it sits on 3.1% of the sector's deals and few firms carry it. Leave M&A off the standing panel and buy it deal by deal. Finally, use the spread: with the busiest advisers sharing one band, a tender can price several firms of similar weight against each other.