Law Commons^™

You've Got Your Mother's Laugh: What Bankruptcy Mediation Can Learn From The Her/History Of Divorce And Child Custody Mediation, Nancy A. Welsh

Faculty Scholarship

Due to our current deep economic woes, growing bankruptcy filings, and apparent legislative unwillingness to expand the number of judges, bankruptcy courts are exploring the use of mediation to help resolve adversary proceedings, negotiate elements of reorganizations, and deal with claims that cannot be heard directly in bankruptcy proceedings. In addition, mediation advocates have been consistent in urging greater use of the process to reduce debtors’ and claimants’ costs, bridge the jurisdictional and standing challenges that bankruptcies can pose, and offer claimants the opportunity to be heard and determine their own resolution of claims. At this point, the relatively few …

A Bankruptcy Court’S “Preference” Towards Mandatory Mediation, Seth Meyer

Bankruptcy Research Library

(Excerpt)

Mediation has gained general acceptance in the legal community but has been slow to take root in bankruptcy. See generally Geetha Ravindra, Reflections on Institutionalizing Mediation, 14 DISP. RESOL. MAG. 28, (Spring/Summer 2008). Over the past 20 years, mandatory bankruptcy mediation has become a feasible alternative to traditional litigation of adversary proceedings. In the beginning, creditors and debtors would mediate only if they agreed to mediate. As statutory authority for court ordered mediation strengthened, bankruptcy courts ordered parties to mediate with more regularity. Presently, mandatory mediation is statutorily authorized and bankruptcy courts have institutionalized the use of mandatory bankruptcy …