For dispute resolution practitioners familiar with the concept of the seat of arbitration, it may come as a surprise that the new UN Convention on International Settlement Agreement Resulting from Mediation does not include provisions in relation to the ‘seat’ of mediation. Why, you may ask? The Convention includes no provisions on ‘seat’ simply because…

Having looked at The Rise of Co Mediation in Mega Mediations last month and the challenges such cases pose for mediators, let’s get a little closer to the inner workings of these mediations, especially at the intake stage. So many moving parts – the people, the paper, the posturing –  like a long haul plane sitting…

More than 1,400 years ago, Japan codified Confucian and Buddhist approaches to governing in Prince Shotoku’s Constitution, whose first article provides that “[h]armony should be valued, and quarrels should be avoided.” The underlying principle, wa (harmony), was promoted and reflected in the fabric of Japanese society and may have contributed to a persistent preference for…

Over recent years the number of (mainly law) student mediation moots around the world has increased at a remarkable rate. In addition to well-known venues in Paris, Vienna, and Goa, I have heard of events in Bangalore, Bhopal, Chicago, Hanover, São Paulo, Sydney … and Hamburg. There will be more. This is a bug that…

Savvy litigators often tell their clients that “a bad settlement always beats a good litigation”. That may be partly because there is embarrassingly scant guidance in the literature, or even in the world’s law schools, on how lawyers can help their clients settle well rather than badly. I recently had the honor of writing the…

The European Company Law Special Issue on mediation and corporate disputes focuses on the law and practice of mediation for corporate disputes in different European countries (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, The Netherlands, Spain and the UK). Contributors are both academics and experienced practitioners active in the field of mediation. They are: • for Austria:…

This blog comes (almost live) from the Berlin Global Pound conference, held on 24 March 2017. This was the 13th in a series of 39 coordinated events on commercial dispute resolution mechanisms around the world. The name goes back to the 1976 Pound conference in St. Paul, which marked a key moment in the advent…

In the past few years Singapore has been busy revising, refining and extending its dispute resolution offerings in cross-border litigation, arbitration and mediation. In 2017 Singapore offers international parties a full suite of dispute resolution services for commercial cross-border disputes. The Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) is well-established, having been founded in 1991, and Singapore…

Raymond Williams, Resources of Hope (published posthumously in 1989), p. 118 I write and will upload this blog on the eve of my departure for Paris and the ICC’s 12th International Commercial Mediation Competition. On the ‘due date’ for this blog, I’ll be somewhere between Auckland and London. Again, it will be my huge pleasure…