The eruption in the early 1990s of highly visible humanitarian crises and exceedingly bloody civil wars in the Horn of Africa, imploding Yugoslavia, and Rwanda, set in motion a trend towards third party intervention in communal conflict in areas as far apart as the Balkans and East Timor. However haltingly and selectively, that trend towards extra-systemic means of managing ethnic and national conflict is still discernible, motivated as it was in the 1990s by the inability of in-house accommodation methods to resolve ethno-political conflicts peacefully and the tendency of such conflicts to spill into the international system in the form of massive refugee flows, regional instability, and failed states hosting criminal and terrorist elements. In its various forms, third party intervention has become a fixed part of the current international system Our book examines the various forms in which that intervention occurs, from the least intrusive and costly forms of third party activity to the most intrusive and expensive endeavors. More specifically, organized in the form of overview essays followed by case studies that explore the utility and limitations, successes and failures of various forms of third party activity in managing conflict, the book begins by examining diplomatic intervention and then proceeds to cover, in turn, legal, economic, and military instruments of conflict management before concluding with a section on political tutelage arrangements and nation/capacity building operations. The chapters themselves are authored by a mix of contributors drawn from relevant disciplines, both senior and younger scholars, academics and practitioners, and North Americans and Europeans. All treat a common theme but no attempt was made to solicit work from contributors with a common orientation towards the value of third party intervention. Nor were the authors straight-jacketed with heavy content guidelines from the editors. Their essays validate the value of this approach. Far from being chaotic in nature, they generally supplement one another, while offering opposing viewpoints on the overall topic; for example, our Italian contributor who specializes in non-government organizations offers a chapter illustrating their utility under certain conditions, whereas the chapter from an Afghan practitioner notes the downside of too much reliance on NGOs in nation-building operations. The essays also cover topics not often treated, and are written from the viewpoint of those on the ground. The chapter on creating a police force in post-Dayton Bosnia-Herzegovina, for example, reads much like a diary from the American colonel who was sent to Bosnia in early 1996 charged with that task.

Ending identity conflicts through negotiated agreements is an intractable process that is embedded complexly in the nation-building process. Ariel Hernandez looks on the complexity of the nation-building process in the Philippines and how its social and political context constrains the achievement of a peace agreement that would withhold new challenges as the process unfolds. Mediation as one of the possible modes of intervention to resolve identity conflicts is taken as the self-evident instrument to end the 40 year old conflict between the Filipino society at large and the Bangsamoro. The analysis confirms that mediation and other types of intervention are contributing to the intractability of identity conflicts by bringing in further complexities in the negotiation process. The conceptualization of “stumbling blocks” may provide knowledge based resources to develop strategies to “facilitate” the mediation process that allows negotiating parties to cope with the complexity of the bargaining table.

"Introduces an innovative, practical approach to resolving an enduring issue: How can conflicts be resolved in polarized societies and fragile states?"--

International Mediation in Venezuela analyzes the effort of the Carter Center and the broader international community to prevent violent conflict, to reconcile a deeply divided society, and to preserve democratic processes. From their perspective as facilitators of the intervention and as representatives of the Carter Center, Jennifer McCoy and Francisco Diez present an insider account of mediation at the national and international level.

Despite the wealth of research on external interventions and practices of Western peacebuilding, many scholars tend to rely on findings in the so-called 'post-agreement' phase of interventions. As a result, most mainstream peacebuilding literature pays limited or no attention to the linkages that exist between mediation practices in the negotiation phase and processes in the post-peace agreement phase of intervention. By linking the motives and practices of interveners during negotiation and implementation phases into a more integrated theoretical framework, this book makes a unique contribution to the on-going debate on the so-called Western 'liberal' models of peacebuilding. Drawing upon in-depth case-studies this innovative volume examines a variety of political motives behind third party interventions, thus challenging the very founding concept of mediation literature. ... [from the publisher]

This cutting-edge book illuminates the key characteristics of inclusivity in mediation during armed conflicts and post-conflict peacebuilding. Daisaku Higashi illustrates the importance of mediators taking flexible approaches to inclusivity in arbitration during armed conflicts, highlighting the crucial balance between the need to select conflicting parties to make an agreement feasible and the need to include a multiplicity of parties to make the peace sustainable. Higashi also emphasizes the importance of inclusive processes in the phase of post-conflict peacebuilding.

The application of construction dispute procedures has changed dramatically in the last decade. This has resulted in an increased use of Alternative Dispute Resolution in many countries, and mediation in particular. Construction is one of the major industries using mediation, in the UK and in many other countries such as the US, China, Australia and New Zealand. This expansion in mediation has been helped by encouragement from governments, although it takes diverse forms in different legal jurisdictions, for example: court rules to encourage this use (as in the US and UK); the courts’ own mediation schemes or programmes, or legislation-backed programmes; or the use of industry driven mediation clauses in standard form contracts. These developments have taken place extremely rapidly. They represent significant changes to the legal environment within which the international construction industry conducts its business but, to date, there has been little research on their impact. All these initiatives have inevitably led to a developing legal jurisprudence concerned with the validity of contract clauses or with providing statutory interpretation of the rules requiring or governing practice. This has important consequences for the construction industry because legal uncertainty increases the likelihood of dispute, which is not only costly for the disputants but can be damaging to national and global economies. This book identifies the emerging international practices within construction mediation, and seeks solutions to the many legal and commercial challenges which they pose. It presents an international collection of reviews by experts, and allows a comparative commentary on the practice of construction mediation and the legal challenges facing its development.