{"id":1938,"date":"2017-06-24T14:21:00","date_gmt":"2017-06-24T18:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/?p=1938"},"modified":"2017-06-24T14:21:00","modified_gmt":"2017-06-24T18:21:00","slug":"how-mediation-works","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/2017\/06\/how-mediation-works\/","title":{"rendered":"“How Mediation Works”"},"content":{"rendered":"

A collection of Blaise Pascal\u2019s letters, published in 1657, included a letter that contained the apology, \u201dJe n\u2019ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n\u2019ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte.”<\/em>\u00a0 That is to say, \u201cI wrote a longer letter than usual because I did not have time to make it shorter.\u201d\u00a0 The recently published book, tersely titled How Mediation Works<\/em><\/a>, must have taken the authors quite a bit of time.<\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n

The bulk of the non-bulky (111-page) volume is written by three seminal leaders of the ADR movement:\u00a0 Stephen B. Goldberg<\/a>, Jeanne M. Brett<\/a> and Beatrice Blohorn-Brenneur<\/a>.\u00a0 A chapter on \u201cMediation and the Law\u201d is contributed by Professor Nancy Rogers<\/a> of Ohio State.\u00a0 The result could be compared to those condensed \u201c\u2026for Dummies<\/em>\u201d series, except that the precision of thought, clarity of writing and general excellence prompts me to subtitle it \u201cMediation for Smarties.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

Reading the book is like brushing away cobwebs and seeing a room clearly.\u00a0 The authors start off by distinguishing between \u201cconflicts\u201d \u2013 the collision of differing viewpoints \u2013 and \u201cdisputes\u201d \u2013 a subset of conflicts in which one party makes a claim upon another, who rejects it.\u00a0 Then they divide the process of resolving disputes into three broad categories:\u00a0 processes relying on power and coercion (like boycotting a segregated restaurant), processes relying on rights (like appealing to an authoritative decision-maker to apply applicable principles and declare which party should prevail), and processes relying on interests (like engaging to reconcile priorities and effect trade-offs, resulting in an imperfect but acceptable outcome).\u00a0 Then they define mediation as \u201cnegotiation with the assistance of a neutral third party.\u201d\u00a0 That gets us to page 7.<\/p>\n

In keeping with their rigorous discipline of thought, the authors walk us through the role of a mediator in convening the parties, explaining the process, developing potential resolutions, and concluding the process.\u00a0 In a 17-page chapter worth the price of the entire book they opine on common party-related obstacles during mediation, such as the urge for rights-based vindication, prevarication, or exploitation.\u00a0 And they are admirably frank in the final chapter, titled \u201cSo You\u2019d Like to Be a Mediator?\u201d\u00a0 This is, I\u2019m pretty sure, the only mediation book I\u2019ve read that includes in the index the entry \u201cDay job, don\u2019t quit, 104.\u201d<\/p>\n

The book is steadfastly mainstream.\u00a0 The authors accept without challenge that a mediator should be \u201cneutral,\u201d for example \u2013 a proposition that a great number of sophisticated parties, including Asian disputants and many Western companies, would contest in a number of contexts.\u00a0 It\u2019s a little weak on recent scholarship and resources; the list of recommended mediation demonstration DVDs, for example, is pretty dated, and the suggested reading on impasse-breaking consists of only two items, the most recent six years old.\u00a0 At the same time, aspects are quite contemporary; readers are provided a compilation of ADR blogs that includes this one \u2013 evidence of the authors\u2019 profound discernment, if ever I saw it. \u00a0And the book is available in digital as well as hardcopy format.<\/p>\n

Buy several copies of the book. \u00a0Share it, and give copies as presents to clients, counsel and your mediator buddies.\u00a0 It really is that brief and it really is that good.<\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New book on mediation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,14,26],"tags":[41,15,27],"class_list":["post-1938","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-conflict-resolution","category-mediation","category-teaching","tag-book-review","tag-mediation","tag-teaching"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1938","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1938"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1938\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1939,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1938\/revisions\/1939"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1938"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1938"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1938"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}