Mediation is often portrayed as a useful vehicle for disputes between equals, where parties can be expected to speak for themselves and neither has significant power over the other. Critics, and even supporters, become more sceptical when it comes to less symmetrical situations. Complaints against professionals are one such category. The professional is seen to…

(Foreign) investor – (host) State disputes are for many reasons an intriguing and fast developing part of legal and dispute resolution practice. Since the late 1990s, the number of such disputes has increased sharply: In 1997, 19 known cases were brought against states. By 2007, there were over 250 known cases, and more than 450…

Over the past few weeks I have been following a discussion on LinkedIn around mediator certification which has been going on non-stop for no less than four months. The question of whether the regulation of mediators is good, bad or indifferent seems to go straight to the heart of issues surrounding our identity as mediators…

The Report on the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on online dispute resolution for consumer disputes (Regulation on consumer ODR) (COM(2011)0794 – C7-0453/2011– 2011/0374(COD)) has been published by the Internal Market and Consumer Protection Committee (IMCO) of the European Parliament. IMCO has been working on two legislative proposals…

On Friday 22 June 2012, the National Council of Bhutan unanimously enacted the Alternative Dispute Resolution Bill. As a result, the Kingdom of Bhutan joined the group of jurisdictions with a mediation/ADR-friendly regulatory framework. Bhutan is a small country, located on the southern slopes of the eastern Himalayas, populated by only approx. 700,000 people. Bhutanese…

This month I want to share with you a little gem of a mediation book, published late last year by the Irish state-funded Family Mediation Service (FMS). I wanted to review this book for two reasons – first of all, because it is an excellent publication which, though written in the context of the 25th…

As you would expect, judges are appointed for their ability to adjudicate, often untested at the time of elevation to the Bench. Once appointed, many jurisdictions around the world then ask their judges to suspend their adjudication skills in favour of mediating controversies coming before the court, often in an effort to reduce backlogs. And it seems…

Even if in most jurisdictions it is still rarely practiced, a few areas of law exist in which mediation may provide as many benefits as it does in bankruptcy. A drastic increase in the amount of bankruptcy filings during the recent financial crisis has forced bankruptcy judges and attorneys to seek and employ various methods…

Quality standards for the mediator? What conditions are needed for the successful outcome of a mediation? Without parties’ commitment to really resolve the conflict and settle the case, no success is possible. So commitment of the parties is a sine qua non. Still, we must also look at the mediator, who may be essential for…