Law Commons^™

The Center Of The Center For Alternative Dispute Resolution, Wayne Brazil

Wayne Brazil

Hawaii was one of the first states to establish within its judiciary a Center for Alternative Dispute Resolution. The Center's mission is: to mediate major public policy disputes and to facilitate policy formulation dialogues, to design and help implement mediation and other ADR programs for state and local governmental agencies, to provide education about and training in mediation for the public and for employees of state and local government, and to oversee the extensive network of community mediation centers that provide grass-roots mediation services throughout the Islands. In November of 2005 the Center celebrated its 20th anniversary by sponsoring various …

Online Dispute Resolution (Odr) Within Developing Nations: A Qualitative Evaluation Of Transfer And Impact, Doug Leigh, Frank Fowlie

Doug Leigh

The field of online dispute resolution (ODR) is developing both as practice and a profession. Evidence of this includes a growing community of scholars and practitioners. A Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) grant permitted 16 practitioners from developing countries to attend the 2008 ODR Forum in Victoria, British Columbia. In the year following the Forum, an evaluation was conducted to identify changes among these practitioners’ behaviors, knowledge, skills, abilities and credibility. Results indicate that ODR practitioners in developing countries are engaged in a wide range of activities, many of which are technologically and logistically complex. These practitioners also face a …

Individual Employment Rights Arbitration In The United States: Actors And Outcomes, Alexander Colvin, Mark Gough

Alexander Colvin

The authors examine disposition statistics from employment arbitration cases administered over an 11-year period by the American Arbitration Association (AAA) to investigate the process of dispute resolution in this new institution of employment relations. They investigate the predictors of settlement before the arbitration hearing and then estimate models for the likelihood of employee wins and damage amounts for the 2,802 cases that resulted in an award. Their findings show that larger-scale employers who are involved in more arbitration cases tend to have higher win rates and have lower damage awards made against them. This study also provides evidence of a …

The Icsid Effect? Considering Potential Variations In Arbitration Awards, Susan Franck

Susan D. Franck

The legitimacy of the World Bank's dispute resolution body - The International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) - is a matter of heated debate. Some states have alleged that ICSID is biased, withdrawn from the ICSID Convention, and advocated creating alternative arbitration systems. Using pre-2007 archival data of the population of then- known arbitration awards, this Article quantitatively assesses whether ICSID arbitration awards were substantially different from arbitration awards rendered in other forums. The Article examines variation in the amounts claimed and outcomes reached to evaluate indicators of bias. The results indicated that there was no reliable …

The Diversity Challenge: Exploring The "Invisible College" Of International Arbitration, Susan Franck

Susan D. Franck

As diversity can affect the perceived legitimacy of a state’s dispute resolution system and the quality of judicial decisions, diversity levels in the national bench and bar have been an area of transnational concern. By contrast, little is known about diversity of adjudicators and counsel in international arbitration. With a lack of accurate, complete, and publicly available data about international arbitrators and practitioners, speculation about membership in the “invisible college” of international arbitration abounds. Using data from a survey of attendees at the prestigious and elite biennial Congress of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration permitted one glimpse into the …

The Evolution And Decline Of The Effective-Vindication Doctrine In U.S. Arbitration Law, Okezie Chukwumerije

OKEZIE CHUKWUMERIJE

This article offers information on the history, significance and role of the effective-vindication doctrine in U.S. arbitration law in promoting access to justice. It analyzes the significance of broad policy implications regarding the interpretation of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) by the Court facilitating the arbitration of commercial disputes and protecting the statutory rights of consumers in the context of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Green Tree Financial Corp. v. Randolph.

International Law And The Use Of Force: Cases And Materials, Mary Ellen O'Connell

Mary Ellen O'Connell

This casebook may get more attention today than ever before in its history. From the Russian invasion of Georgia to the on-going detentions at Guantanamo Bay, the use of suicide bombs, to the workings of the United Nations Security Council in a crisis like Darfur, some of the most pressing legal issues of the day are found in this branch of international law. The book: Brings together cases and materials on both the law governing the resort to armed force (jus ad bellum) and the law governing the conduct of force (jus in bello) Provides a dynamic introduction for students, …

Awareness And Ethics In Dispute Resolution And Law: Why Mindfulness Tends To Foster Ethical Behavior, Leonard Riskin

Leonard L Riskin

This paper is an extended version of a luncheon presentation given at the Symposium, Ethics in the Expanding World of ADR: Considerations, Conundrums, and Conflicts, sponsored by South Texas College of Law in Houston, Texas, on Nov. 2, 2007.

Mindfulness: Foundational Training For Dispute Resolution, Leonard Riskin

Leonard L Riskin

This Article addresses the problem of mindlessness in counseling, negotiating, and mediating, and offers potential solutions and recommendations for developing foundational capacities through training in mindfulness meditation.

Mandatory Arbitration For Customers But Not For Peers: A Study Of Arbitration Clauses In Consumer And Non-Consumer Contracts, Theodore Eisenberg, Geoffrey Miller, Emily Sherwin

Emily L Sherwin

We conducted a study of contractual practices by well-known firms marketing consumer products, comparing the firms' consumer contracts with contracts the same firms negotiated with business peers. The frequency of arbitration clauses in consumer contracts has been studied before, as has the frequency of arbitration clauses in non-consumer contracts. Our study is the first to compare the use of arbitration clauses within firms, in different contractual contexts.

The results are striking: in our sample, mandatory arbitration clauses appeared in more than three-quarters of consumer contracts and less than one tenth of non-consumer contracts (excluding employment contracts) negotiated by the same …

Between Law And Religion: Procedural Challenges To Religious Arbitration Awards, Michael Helfand

Michael A Helfand

This Essay presented at the Sharia and Halakha in America Conference explores the unique status of religious law as a hybrid concept that simultaneously retains the characteristics of both law and religion. To do so, the Article considers as a case study how courts should evaluate procedural challenges to religious arbitration awards. To respond to such challenges, courts must treat religious law as law when defining the contractually adopted religious procedural rules and treat religious law as religion when reviewing precisely what the religious procedural rules require. On this account, constitutional and arbitration doctrine combine to insulate religious arbitration awards …

Arbitration's Counter-Narrative: The Religious Arbitration Paradigm, Michael Helfand

Michael A Helfand

Arbitration theory and doctrine is dominated by an overarching narrative that conceptualizes arbitration as an alternative to litigation. Litigation, one the one hand, is more procedurally rigorous, but takes longer and costs more; arbitration, on the other hand, is faster and cheaper, but provides fewer procedural safeguards. But notwithstanding these differences, both arbitration and litigation ultimately serve the same purpose: resolving disputes. Indeed, this narrative has been pervasive, becoming entrenched not only in recent Supreme Court decisions, but also garnering support from both arbitration critics and supporters alike.

This Article, however, contends that this exclusive focus on arbitration’s standard narrative …

Negotiation: Strategy, Style, Skills, Kenneth Fox, Nadja Alexander, Jill Howieson

Kenneth H Fox

Negotiation: Strategy Style Skills, 3rd ed. provides the reader with the tools to confidently engage in constructive and principled negotiation practice. Negotiation is the principal day-to-day activity of most professionals.