"In a world where the borders of the global community are fluid, and where disputants manifest increasingly diverse attributes and needs, mediation ? for decades hovering at the edge of dispute resolution practice ? is now emerging as the preferred approach, both in its own right and as an adjunct to arbitration. Mediation processes are sufficiently flexible to accommodate a range of stakeholders (not all of whom might have legal standing) in ways the formality of arbitration and litigation would not normally allow. Among mediation?s many advantages are time and cost efficiencies, sensitivity to cultural differences, and assured privacy and confidentiality. This book meets the practice needs of lawyers confronted with cross-border disputes now arising far beyond the traditional areas of international commerce, such as consumer disputes, inter-family conflicts, and disagreements over Internet-based transactions. The author takes full account of mediation?s risks and limitations, primarily its lack of finality and uncertainty in relation to enforceability issues which will persist until the advent of appropriate international regulation."--Publisher's website.

Provides a comprehensive global survey on multi-tier dispute resolution, examining its trends, its strengths and weaknesses, and the way forward.

This treatise describes the practice of international commercial arbitration with reference to the major international treaties and instruments, arbitration rules and national laws. It provides an analysis of the interaction between party autonomy and arbitration practice.

In its first edition, Global Trends in Mediation was the first book to concentrate on mediation from a comparative perspective - reaching beyond the all-too-familiar Anglo-American view - and as such has enjoyed wide practical use among alternative dispute resolution (ADR) practitioners worldwide. This new edition has not only been updated throughout; it has also added two new jurisdictions (France and Quebec) and a very useful comparative table summarising the salient points from each of the fourteen jurisdictional chapters. Each jurisdictional chapter addresses critical structural and process issues in alternative dispute resolution such as the institutionalisation of mediation, mediation case law and legislation, the range and nature of disputes where mediation is utilised, court-related mediation, mediation practice standards, education, training and accreditation of mediators, the role of lawyers in mediation, online dispute resolution and future trends. All the contributors are senior dispute resolution academics or practitioners with vast knowledge and experience of dispute resolution developments in their countries and abroad.

This book explores the EU’s effectiveness as an international mediator and provides a comparative analysis of EU mediation through three case studies: the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia, and the Geneva International Discussions on South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The book starts from the observation that the EU has emerged as an important international provider of mediation in various conflicts around the world. Against this background, the author develops an analytical framework to investigate EU mediation effectiveness that is then applied to the three cases. The main finding of the book is that EU mediation has a stabilising effect on conflict dynamics, making renewed escalation less likely and contributing to the settlement of conflict issues. At the same time, the EU’s effectiveness depends primarily on its ability to influence the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise through conditionality and diplomatic pressure.

Conflicts in the international system, both among and within states, bring death, destruction, and human misery. Understanding how third parties use mediation to encourage settlements and establish a durable peace among belligerents is vital for managing these conflicts. Among many features, this book empirically examines the history of post-World War II mediation efforts to: Chart the historical changes in the types of conflicts that mediation addresses and the links between different mediation efforts across time. Explore the roles played by providers of mediation in the international system - namely, individuals, states, and organizations - in managing violent conflicts. Gauge the influence of self-interest and altruism as motivating forces that determine which conflicts are mediated and which are ignored. Evaluate what we know about the willingness of parties in conflict to accept mediation, when and why it is most effective, and discuss the future challenges facing mediators in the contemporary world. Drawing on a wide range of examples from the Oslo Accords and Good Friday Agreement to efforts to manage the civil wars in Burundi, Tajikistan, and Bosnia, this book is an indispensable guide to international mediation for students, practitioners, and general readers seeking to understand better how third parties can use mediation to deal with the globe’s trouble spots.

Comparative Dispute Resolution offers an original, wide-ranging, and invaluable corpus of chapters on dispute resolution. Enriched by a broad, comparative vision and a focus on the processes used to handle disputes, this study adds significantly to the discourse around comparative legal studies. Chapters present new understandings of theoretical, comparative and transnational dimensions of the manner in which societies and their legal systems respond to difficulties in social relations.