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Adr: The New Equity, Thomas O. Main

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This article joins an important conversation about the proper role of alternative dispute resolution (“ADR”) in the administration of civil justice. Both ADR and formal adjudication are being reconceptualized as ADR matures into an alternative system, and as ADR methods and methodology are incorporated into formal adjudication. Professor Main invokes the history of Equity, another “alternative” system, to inform our understanding of the forms and limits of ADR. He envisions ADR and formal adjudication as dual systems of dispute resolution, and uses the Equity analogue as a template to develop a theory of ADR.