The Street of a Thousand Blossoms by Gail Tsukiyama tells the story of a family living in Tokyo over 30 years. Two brothers, one a sumo wrestler and the other a maker of Noh theater masks, are forced to adapt their lives to changes in society in order to succeed in their traditional professions. In an…
Note: This was co-authored with Samuel Teo and I would like to acknowledge his significant contributions to the preparation of this entry. In past entries, I have highlighted a peer mediation initiative called the Peacemakers Conference which seeks to teach 13-16 year olds how to resolve conflicts amicably in a workshop cum competition format. As…
Covid is the gift that keeps on giving. It has provided a wonderful focus for blame that has let us off the hook for a lot of things. It has coincided with significant changes in our mediation experiences and again has been seized on as the culprit when mediation sessions go ‘off piste’. The new…
‘The world is made, not found’ (W. Barnett Pearce) (1) I just spent an intensive weekend on Zoom with my students, helping them navigate their early steps into mediation practice. So much has changed. I have never met most of them face to face; we sit at home on our screens; there are no coffee…
In 2015, I retired as an American law professor. For most of my career, I used some of the basic concepts of our field such as negotiation, BATNA, positional vs. interest-based negotiation, and facilitative vs. evaluative mediation. I wasn’t always comfortable with these terms, but I used them because I couldn’t imagine shifting to alternatives….
The introduction of the Singapore Convention on Mediation (SCM) last year has intensified the long-standing debate on professional mediator standards. A previous blog post called for China to streamline its legislation on commercial mediation, and another spoke of the prospects of proliferating and harmonizing standards in the Middle East. The idea of a global mediator…
Hot off the heels of the Singapore Convention, The Singapore International Mediation Centre (SIMC) and the Japan International Mediation Center (JIMC) on 12 September 2020 signed a Memorandum of Understanding to operate a joint protocol that provides cross-border businesses, including companies along the Singapore-Japan corridor, with an economical, expedited and effective route for resolving commercial…
On this day, the Singapore Convention on Mediation comes into force. You can view the ratification ceremony here.. At the time of writing, there are 53 State Parties to the Convention, six of which have ratified it (Singapore, Fiji, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Belarus and Ecuador). Qatar was the third signatory State Party to deposit its…
I wrote this piece for Strathclyde Mediation Clinic after a series of conversations with new and learner mediators. Some surprised me with their passivity in the face of parties’ lack of knowledge or understanding. After some probing I learned that many new mediators recognise the problem but believe the model they were taught prohibits them…
In recent years, mediation has been actively discussed for the investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) regime, particularly as a means of reducing costs and delays. This interest is one reaction to growing discontent about the option of investor-state arbitration (ISA) typically offered by host states in international investment treaties, to make substantive commitments (like non-discrimination) more…
