Law Commons^™

Confidential Settlements For Professional Malpractice, Sande L. Buhai

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

A lawyer representing a plaintiff in a professional malpractice case advises her client not to file a complaint with the state regulatory body—the state bar, the medical board, or some other pertinent body—until later. The lawyer explains that she can offer to settle the case more favorably, more quickly, and at lower cost if they promise that, as part of the settlement, defendant’s malfeasance will never be reported to the state regulatory body responsible for ensuring professional competence in the area. This tactic may allow the client to negotiate a larger settlement because the defendant should be willing to …

The Negotiator-As-Professional: Understanding The Competing Interests Of A Representative Negotiator, Trevor C. W. Farrow

Trevor C. W. Farrow

This article is about lawyers as negotiators, and in particular, it is about identifying and understanding the influential and potentially competing interests that are - or at least should be - in the minds of lawyers (and potentially other third party representatives) during the overall negotiation process. While there continues to be an increasing amount of literature on the mechanics and strategies of negotiation, the underlying interests that are typically at stake in representative negotiations from the perspective of representatives - particularly negotiations involving lawyers - have not been adequately studied. And until all interests are identified and placed squarely …

When Bad Guys Are Wearing White Hats, Catherine A. Rogers

Catherine Rogers

Allegations of ethical misconduct by lawyers have all but completely overshadowed the substantive claims in the Chevron case. While both sides have been accused of flagrant wrongdoing, the charges against plaintiffs’ counsel appear to have captured more headlines and garnered more attention. The primary reason why the focus seems lopsided is that plaintiffs’ counsel were presumed to be the ones wearing white hats in this epic drama. This essay postulates that this seeming irony is not simply an example of personal ethical lapse, but in part tied to larger reasons why ethical violations are an occupational hazard for plaintiffs’ counsel …

Lawyers Without Borders, Catherine A. Rogers

Catherine Rogers

Professional regulation of attorneys is still attempting to catch up with the burgeoning international legal profession, which until recently has been wholly unregulated. The primary effort has been through revisions to Model Rule 8.5 to extend the reach of the Rule to international cases and professional activities in foreign countries. Because Rule 8.5 was drafted for domestic multi-jurisdiction practice, however, it is based on assumptions about territoriality and the historical relationship between the jurisdiction of tribunals and the licensing of attorneys that are simply inapposite in international settings. As a result, applying Rule 8.5 to international tribunals and international advocacy …

Fit And Function In Legal Ethics: Developing A Code Of Conduct For International Arbitration, Catherine A. Rogers

Catherine Rogers

In this Article, I develop a methodology for prescribing the normative content of a code of ethics for international arbitration, and in a forthcoming companion article, I propose integrated mechanisms for making those norms both binding and enforceable. In making these proposals, I reject the classical conception of legal ethics as a purely deontological product derived from first principles. I argue, instead, that ethics derive from the interrelational functional role of advocates in an adjudicatory system, and that ethical regulation must correlate with the structural operations of the system. The fit between ethics and function, I will demonstrate, not only …

Context And Institutional Structure In Attorney Regulation: Constructing An Enforcement Regime For International Arbitration, Catherine A. Rogers

Catherine Rogers

The question that looms large over the future of international arbitration is: How much should states yield to the international arbitration system? This Article attempts to answer the question as it applies to the specific context of regulating attorney conduct.

Equality Of Arms In Arbitration: Cost And Benefits, William W. Park

Faculty Scholarship

Depending on context and content, a regulatory framework can either help or hinder efforts to enhance aggregate social and economic welfare. Lively debate has arisen with respect to the net effects of two recent sets of directives for lawyer comportment in cross-border arbitration, the first being Guidelines adopted by the International Bar Association, the second contained in new arbitration rules promulgated by the London Court of International Arbitration. Each instrument aims to promote a more level playing field on matters where legal cultures differ, such as document production and counsel independence. Each has caused thoughtful commentators to question the need …

The Moral Lawyer And The Machiavellian Nature Of Law Practice, David Barnhizer

David Barnhizer

In Western culture the name Niccolo Machiavelli has become Machiavellianism, a pejorative signifying the willingness to do anything to achieve desired ends. American lawyers do have limits, however, and are expected to operate according to an ethical code that is at least intended to prevent the worst abuses. The effectiveness of this ethical code has often been questioned, as have the questionable efforts of the organized bar to enforce its rules, but on the surface it differentiates law practice from hand-to-hand combat and military struggles. Even though I have sometimes used the concepts of the warrior lawyer, the general and …

When Bad Guys Are Wearing White Hats, Catherine A. Rogers

Journal Articles

Allegations of ethical misconduct by lawyers have all but completely overshadowed the substantive claims in the Chevron case. While both sides have been accused of flagrant wrongdoing, the charges against plaintiffs’ counsel appear to have captured more headlines and garnered more attention. The primary reason why the focus seems lopsided is that plaintiffs’ counsel were presumed to be the ones wearing white hats in this epic drama. This essay postulates that this seeming irony is not simply an example of personal ethical lapse, but in part tied to larger reasons why ethical violations are an occupational hazard for plaintiffs’ counsel …

Let's Put Ourselves Out Of Business: On Respect, Responsibility, And Dialogue In Dispute Resolution, Jonathan R. Cohen

Jonathan R. Cohen

This Essay works in two steps. I want to daydream with you about the future, or what I hope will someday be the future, of our dispute resolution movement. I want to then use these imaginings to reflect upon where we are today. I want to suggest something that may at first seem odd: Our ultimate goal should be to put ourselves, or virtually put ourselves, out of business. Eventually, I hope the time will come when we live in a society where the expert services of dispute resolution professionals, including not only lawyers and judges but also mediators and …

The Culture Of Legal Denial, Jonathan R. Cohen

Jonathan R. Cohen

The goals of this essay are twofold. The first is to examine critically the practice of lawyers assisting clients in denying harms they commit and suggest some ways of changing that practice. Lawyers commonly presume that their clients' interests are best served by denial. Yet such a presumption is not warranted. Given the moral, psychological, relational, and sometimes even economic risks of denial to the injurer, lawyers should consider discussing responsibility taking more often with clients. The second is to explore several structural or systemic factors that may reinforce the practice of denial seen day in and day out within …

When People Are The Means: Negotiating With Respect, Jonathan R. Cohen

Jonathan R. Cohen

Most scholarship on negotiation ethics has focused on the topics of deception and disclosure. In this Article, I argue for considering a related, but distinct, ethical domain within negotiation ethics. That domain is the ethics of orientation. In contrast to most forms of human interaction, a clear purpose of negotiation is to get the other party to take an action on one's behalf, or at least to explore that possibility. This gives rise to a core ethical tension in negotiation that I call the object-subject tension: how does one reconcile the fact that the other party is a potential means …

The Immorality Of Denial, Jonathan R. Cohen

Jonathan R. Cohen

This article is the first of a two-part series critically examining the role of lawyers in assisting clients in denying responsibility for harms they have caused. If a person injures another, the moral response is for the injurer actively to take responsibility for what he has done. In contrast, the common practice within our legal culture is for injurers to deny responsibility for harms they commit. The immoral, in other words, has become the legally normal. In this Article, Professor Cohen analyzes the moral foundations of responsibility-taking. He also explores the moral, psychological, and spiritual risks to injurers who knowingly …

The Negotiator-As-Professional: Understanding The Competing Interests Of A Representative Negotiator, Trevor C. W. Farrow

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

This article is about lawyers as negotiators, and in particular, it is about identifying and understanding the influential and potentially competing interests that are - or at least should be - in the minds of lawyers (and potentially other third party representatives) during the overall negotiation process. While there continues to be an increasing amount of literature on the mechanics and strategies of negotiation, the underlying interests that are typically at stake in representative negotiations from the perspective of representatives - particularly negotiations involving lawyers - have not been adequately studied. And until all interests are identified and placed squarely …

Collaborative Lawyers' Duties To Screen The Appropriateness Of Collaborative Law And Obtain Clients' Informed Consent To Use Collaborative Law, John M. Lande, Forrest Steven Mosten

Faculty Publications

Collaborative Law (CL) is an innovative dispute resolution process that offers significant benefits but also poses significant non-obvious risks. This Article provides a systematic analysis of these possible risks as identified in books written by CL experts, CL practice group websites, social science research, and bar association ethics opinions. In CL, the lawyers and clients sign a "participation agreement" promising to use an interest-based approach to negotiation and fully disclose all relevant information. A key element of CL is the "disqualification agreement" signed by parties (and sometimes by attorneys) which provides that both CL lawyers would be disqualified from representing …

Lawyers Without Borders, Catherine A. Rogers

Journal Articles

Professional regulation of attorneys is still attempting to catch up with the burgeoning international legal profession, which until recently has been wholly unregulated. The primary effort has been through revisions to Model Rule 8.5 to extend the reach of the Rule to international cases and professional activities in foreign countries. Because Rule 8.5 was drafted for domestic multi-jurisdiction practice, however, it is based on assumptions about territoriality and the historical relationship between the jurisdiction of tribunals and the licensing of attorneys that are simply inapposite in international settings. As a result, applying Rule 8.5 to international tribunals and international advocacy …

Lawyers Without Borders, Catherine A. Rogers

Journal Articles

Professional regulation of attorneys is still attempting to catch up with the burgeoning international legal profession, which until recently has been wholly unregulated. The primary effort has been through revisions to Model Rule 8.5 to extend the reach of the Rule to international cases and professional activities in foreign countries. Because Rule 8.5 was drafted for domestic multi-jurisdiction practice, however, it is based on assumptions about territoriality and the historical relationship between the jurisdiction of tribunals and the licensing of attorneys that are simply inapposite in international settings. As a result, applying Rule 8.5 to international tribunals and international advocacy …

The Immorality Of Denial, Jonathan R. Cohen

UF Law Faculty Publications

This article is the first of a two-part series critically examining the role of lawyers in assisting clients in denying responsibility for harms they have caused. If a person injures another, the moral response is for the injurer actively to take responsibility for what he has done. In contrast, the common practice within our legal culture is for injurers to deny responsibility for harms they commit. The immoral, in other words, has become the legally normal. In this Article, Professor Cohen analyzes the moral foundations of responsibility-taking. He also explores the moral, psychological, and spiritual risks to injurers who knowingly …

The Culture Of Legal Denial, Jonathan R. Cohen

UF Law Faculty Publications

The goals of this essay are twofold. The first is to examine critically the practice of lawyers assisting clients in denying harms they commit and suggest some ways of changing that practice. Lawyers commonly presume that their clients' interests are best served by denial. Yet such a presumption is not warranted. Given the moral, psychological, relational, and sometimes even economic risks of denial to the injurer, lawyers should consider discussing responsibility taking more often with clients. The second is to explore several structural or systemic factors that may reinforce the practice of denial seen day in and day out within …

Learning From Practice: What Adr Needs From A Theory Of Justice, Kate Kruse

Faculty Scholarship

Adding to the impressive body of work that has made her a leading voice in the fields of both alternative dispute resolution and professional responsibility, Carrie Menkel-Meadow's Saltman Lecture connects the theoretical exploration currently occurring on two parallel tracks: (1) theories of justice that investigate the ideal of a deliberative democracy; and (2) theories of alternative dispute resolution arising from its reflective practice. As she notes, theorists on both tracks are grappling with similar questions about the processes or conditions that will best bring together parties with widely divergent viewpoints to consensus-building dialogue around contested issues.

While Menkel-Meadow focuses on …

Learning From Practice: What Adr Needs From A Theory Of Justice, Katherine R. Kruse

Scholarly Works

Adding to the impressive body of work that has made her a leading voice in the fields of both alternative dispute resolution and professional responsibility, Carrie Menkel-Meadow's Saltman Lecture connects the theoretical exploration currently occurring on two parallel tracks: (1) theories of justice that investigate the ideal of a deliberative democracy; and (2) theories of alternative dispute resolution arising from its reflective practice. As she notes, theorists on both tracks are grappling with similar questions about the processes or conditions that will best bring together parties with widely divergent viewpoints to engage in consensus-building dialogue around contested issues.

However, while …

Let's Put Ourselves Out Of Business: On Respect, Responsibility, And Dialogue In Dispute Resolution, Jonathan R. Cohen

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Essay works in two steps. I want to daydream with you about the future, or what I hope will someday be the future, of our dispute resolution movement. I want to then use these imaginings to reflect upon where we are today. I want to suggest something that may at first seem odd: Our ultimate goal should be to put ourselves, or virtually put ourselves, out of business. Eventually, I hope the time will come when we live in a society where the expert services of dispute resolution professionals, including not only lawyers and judges but also mediators and …

Possibilities For Collaborative Law: Ethics And Practice Of Lawyer Disqualification And Process Control In A New Model Of Lawyering, John M. Lande

Faculty Publications

This article assesses the possibilities for collaborative law (CL) to promote problem-solving negotiation and analyzes the operation and effect of the CL disqualification agreement (DA), which CL leaders hold as essential to the process. In CL, the lawyers and clients agree to negotiate from the outset of the case using a problem-solving approach. Under CL theory, the process creates a metaphorical "container" by using a DA disqualifying both lawyers from representing their clients if either party chooses to proceed in litigation. This article argues that much CL theory and practice is valuable, including protocols of early commitment to negotiation, interest-based …

Context And Institutional Structure In Attorney Regulation: Constructing An Enforcement Regime For International Arbitration, Catherine A. Rogers

Journal Articles

The question that looms large over the future of international arbitration is: How much should states yield to the international arbitration system? This Article attempts to answer the question as it applies to the specific context of regulating attorney conduct.

Fit And Function In Legal Ethics: Developing A Code Of Conduct For International Arbitration, Catherine A. Rogers

Journal Articles

In this Article, I develop a methodology for prescribing the normative content of a code of ethics for international arbitration, and in a forthcoming companion article, I propose integrated mechanisms for making those norms both binding and enforceable. In making these proposals, I reject the classical conception of legal ethics as a purely deontological product derived from first principles. I argue, instead, that ethics derive from the interrelational functional role of advocates in an adjudicatory system, and that ethical regulation must correlate with the structural operations of the system. The fit between ethics and function, I will demonstrate, not only …

When People Are The Means: Negotiating With Respect, Jonathan R. Cohen

UF Law Faculty Publications

Most scholarship on negotiation ethics has focused on the topics of deception and disclosure. In this Article, I argue for considering a related, but distinct, ethical domain within negotiation ethics. That domain is the ethics of orientation. In contrast to most forms of human interaction, a clear purpose of negotiation is to get the other party to take an action on one's behalf, or at least to explore that possibility. This gives rise to a core ethical tension in negotiation that I call the object-subject tension: how does one reconcile the fact that the other party is a potential means …

Adr And The Professional Responsibility Of Lawyers, Jacqueline M. Nolan-Haley, Robert F. Cochran Jr., Stephen K. Huber, Kimberlee K. Kovach

Fordham Urban Law Journal

Should the meaning of "ethical" lawyering change in the ADR context? This article contains several essays arguing that change is needed, that current ethics rules and codes must be adjusted, and new rules must be drafted that respond to the subtleties and complexities of the issues raised in ADR legal practice. Professor Carrie Menkel-Meadow provides an overview of the major ethical issues facing lawyers in ADR practice and reviews the current ethics rules landscape in ADR. Professor Robert Cochran offers a proposal to amend the current professional responsibility rules to include a mandate for advising clients of ADR options. Professor …

Preserving The Integrity Of Mediation Through The Adoption Of Ethical Rules For Lawyer-Mediators, Maureen Laflin

Articles

No abstract provided.