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Full-Text Articles in Law
Reshaping Third-Party Funding, Victoria Sahani
Reshaping Third-Party Funding, Victoria Sahani
Faculty Scholarship
Third-party funding is a controversial business arrangement whereby an outside entity—called a third-party funder—finances the legal representation of a party involved in litigation or arbitration or finances a law firm’s portfolio of cases in return for a profit. Attorney ethics regulations and other laws permit nonlawyers to become partial owners of law firms in the District of Columbia, England and Wales, Scotland, Australia, two provinces in Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and other jurisdictions around the world. Recently, a U.S.-based third-party funder that is publicly traded in England started its own law firm in England. In addition, some U.S. …
Arbitrator Bias, William W. Park
Arbitrator Bias, William W. Park
Faculty Scholarship
Seeking to bring arbitration into disrepute, an evil gremlin might contemplate two starkly different routes. One route would tolerate appointment of pernicious arbitrators, biased and unable to judge independently. An alternate route to shipwreck, also reducing confidence in the integrity of the arbitral process, would establish unrealistic ethical standards that render the arbitrator’s position precarious and susceptible to destabilisation by litigants engaged in dilatory tactics or seeking to annul unfavourable awards. To reduce the risk of having cases decided by either pernicious or precarious arbitrators, those who establish and apply ethical guidelines walk a tightrope between the rival poles of …
Integrating "Alternative" Dispute Resolution Into Bankruptcy: As Simple (And Pure) As Motherhood And Apple Pie?, Nancy A. Welsh
Integrating "Alternative" Dispute Resolution Into Bankruptcy: As Simple (And Pure) As Motherhood And Apple Pie?, Nancy A. Welsh
Faculty Scholarship
Today, there can be little doubt that “alternative” dispute resolution is anything but alternative. Nonetheless, many judges, lawyers (and law students) do not truly understand the dispute resolution processes that are available and how they should be used. In the shadow of the current economic crisis, this lack of knowledge is likely to have negative consequences, particularly in those areas of practice such as bankruptcy and foreclosure in which clients, lawyers, regulators, and courts work under pressure, often with inadequate time and financial resources to permit careful analysis of procedural options. Potential negative effects can include: (1) impairment of a …