{"id":2037,"date":"2019-03-09T03:58:45","date_gmt":"2019-03-09T08:58:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/?p=2037"},"modified":"2019-03-11T06:09:15","modified_gmt":"2019-03-11T10:09:15","slug":"26th-uia-mediation-forum-developments-in-switzerland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/2019\/03\/26th-uia-mediation-forum-developments-in-switzerland\/","title":{"rendered":"26th UIA Mediation Forum: Developments in Switzerland"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The UIA World Mediation Forum convened its 26th<\/sup> meeting in Zurich on March 8-9, 2019.  As usual, however interesting the many presentations were, the meeting was especially marked by the opportunity to continue friendships with mediators from around the world, and to forge new relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Appropriately, the first session set forth the \u201cSwiss Dispute Resolution Landscape.\u201d\u00a0 Forum President Fabienne van der Vleugel moderated a panel of regional leaders.\u00a0 Jean-Christophe Barth is by profession a banker and by inclination Co-President of the Swiss Chamber of Commercial Mediation.\u00a0 The Chamber was established in 1997 and has 230 commercial mediators.\u00a0 \u00a0He notes that 98% of the Swiss economy are SMEs, and it is a formidable task to introduce them to the relatively unconventional method of amicable dispute resolution.\u00a0 Court rules introduce mediation as an option, but the culturally fragmented nature of Swiss society, as well as the efficiency of business courts, militate against broad up-take of commercial mediation.\u00a0 He proposed that mediation is an \u201cunrecognized value driver\u201d to businesses.\u00a0 Andrea Staubli, President of the Swiss Federation of Mediation Associations (SDM-FSM), described the consolidation of various mediation associations under the common umbrella of the Federation and the institution of quality training protocols.\u00a0 There are now 1,500 mediations among the 22 associations in the Federation.\u00a0 These include commercial, family, construction and other mediation focuses, in various languages and approaches.\u00a0 The Federation accredits and certifies both training courses and individual mediators.\u00a0 Among the metrics she offered were that 70% of mediations settle, and that 80% of mediations extend over 1-5 sessions.\u00a0 Urs Weber-Stecher, a member of the SCAI Arbitration Court, reported on that organization\u2019s efforts in mediation.\u00a0 He reviewed the benefits of the SCAI Rules of International Arbitration, including an arbitration-friendly judicial system (resulting in vacatur in only 7% of appeals).\u00a0 He decried the traditional disconnect among commercial mediators and commercial arbitrators, suggesting that benefits might accrue from more cooperation among these professional communities, including hybrid processes. \u00a0SCAI reports 70-80 arbitrations and 7-10 mediation cases per year. Finally, Roman Manser, President of the Mediation Commission of the Swiss Bar Association (SAV-FSA), explained that mediation \u2013 regulated in Germany and Austria \u2013 is not centrally regulated in Switzerland, placing on professional associations the responsibility to promulgate rules and competency guidelines.\u00a0 The Swiss Bar Association issues certification to mediators after the completion of certain hours of training.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This year the SCAI releases its new revision of Swiss Rules\nof Commercial Mediation.  SCAI Executive\nDirector and General Counsel Caroline Ming joined attorney Kirstin Dodge of\nHamburger AG to explain these new Rules. Revisions were meant to simplify and\nabbreviate the document itself; to clarify the system of fees owing to the\ninstitution and to the mediators; to address to possibility of hybrid\n(Arb-Med-Arb) processes; to satisfy international demands for certified\nmediated agreements; and for other reasons. \nThe Swiss Rules designate a \u201cseat of mediation,\u201d similar to\ninternational arbitration, designating the law that interprets the mediated\nagreement.  Interestingly, the Rules\nprovide for entry of an agreement as an arbitral award, but only if the\narbitration commenced prior to arriving at the agreement (in order that the\narbitral award issue at the time a controversy is active).  The new Rules provide for a simplified\nprocedure for matters involving less than CHF 50,000; certificates of mediation\nand of settlement agreements; and an advisory council to recommend outcomes of\ncosts disputes or future modifications to the Rules. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The UIA World Mediation Forum convened its 26th meeting in Zurich on March 8-9, 2019.  As usual, however interesting the many presentations were, the meeting was especially marked by the opportunity to continue friendships with mediators from around the world, and to forge new relationships. Appropriately, the first session set forth the \u201cSwiss Dispute Resolution …<\/p>\n

MORE<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[43,15],"class_list":["post-2037","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-international","tag-mediation"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2037","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=2037"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2037\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2041,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2037\/revisions\/2041"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2037"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2037"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.businessconflictmanagement.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2037"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}