Legal Ethics and Professional Responsibility Commons^™

Employment Arbitration Agreements: The Case For Ethical Standards For Dispute Resolution System Designers, Michael L. Russell

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

Dispute resolution design is an emerging field, both academically and professionally. Attorneys, mediators, and arbitrators, the other roles in the alternative dispute resolution process, have codes of ethics which guide their conduct. Dispute resolution designers, however, have no such guidelines. This article uses the example of mandatory arbitration agreements in the employment context to illustrate why this lack of ethical guidelines for dispute resolutions designers is problematic. In recent years, mandatory arbitration agreements significantly impacted employment law and litigation. The two most problematic provisions that often appear in mandatory arbitration agreements in the workplace context are cost sharing provisions and …