Mediation is about giving everyone a chance to share their stories, balancing power dynamics and leveling the playing field. But what if the ground on which we presume to build the field has holes too big to backfill sufficiently?
Those issues that lend themselves most to mediation in the court setting disproportionately impact (more…)
As a follow-up to last week’s post about interpreter services being required for all mediations, I’d like to pass along a fascinating article titled The Politics and Power of Plain Language by Jane M. Siegel, a professor at Thomas M. Cooley Law School (hat tip to Richard Zorza for highlighting this article in his recent post). Siegel references The Plain Writing Act of 2010, which requires federal agencies to write all new informational or filing documents, including (more…)
Prof. Susan Raines of Kennesaw State University is seeking examples of instruments used by mediation programs to screen for domestic violence. She writes:
“As Georgia considers revising its screening tools and policies for domestic violence in mediation, I am seeking examples from other jurisdictions within and outside the United States. As a researcher at Kennesaw State University’s Conflict Management Master’s Program, it is my hope that any changes to Georgia’s DV screening and policies will reflect the current state of knowledge on the subject as well as best practices from our peer courts.”
If your state or program has tools to share please send them to Susan (sraines@kennesaw.edu). She may also conduct a small number of interviews with court staff, judges, or mediators in other states. If Susan’s name sounds familiar, it may be because she is the editor of Conflict Resolution Quarterly, where she does a great job juggling lots of potential articles and putting together a quality publication.
How many of us in the mediation field have said that educating people about alternative approaches to dispute resolution is essential to changing the way that conflicts are addressed? For those of us who work in court ADR, the continuing development of law school ADR coursework in particular is a cause for optimism that the practice of law increasingly will encompass skilled use of ADR.
In a recent pro bono case I mediated, I had an experience that affirmed this belief. The defendants were represented by a skilled, young volunteer lawyer who was an able advocate for his client in mediation. He asked good questions of the other side, was dogged but gracious in pursuing his clients’ interests, and took a constructive, problem-solving approach. After the mediation, he asked opposing counsel and me about how this case relates to others of this type, as this had been his first one in this area. He said that he had taken a mediation course in law school and had mediated actual court cases through the clinic, so he felt prepared for the process, but wanted to learn more about this particular application.
Isn’t this what we have been hoping would happen? Law school mediation training is preparing strong, capable advocates in mediation.
An interesting study written up in Psychology, Public Policy, and Law found that lawyers are not good at predicting case outcomes. They tend to be overconfident in predicting how cases will turn out and, even when considering how their cases went in retrospect, they think they turned out better than they did.
Lawyer overconfidence may not seem like news, but whether lawyers have an accurate sense of how their cases will turn out determines how they handle the case, what resources are used, and eventually how satisfied their clients are with their lawyers and the judicial system. So, while it is not news, the question of what to do about it is worth considering.
Interestingly, this propensity to be overconfident does not vary based on years of experience of the lawyer. (more…)