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Brilliant piece on de-escalating conflict over at Tammy Lenski's Conflict Zen this morning.  Teaser and link below:  

The friendly bailiff unlocked the small courtroom. After telling me to make myself at home, he pointed to a small red button on the wall. “If you need me, just press that button and I’ll be in here faster than you can blink and eye. It’s an emergency button.”

“Ok, thanks,” I replied, and began to unpack my briefcase.

“I mean it,” he said. “Just press the button. Maybe you should set up your chair so you’re near it.”

I gave him a long look. “You seem to want me to know about that button. Is there something else you want to tell me?”

Continue reading here.

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I'm asked this morning by an ADR colleague whether we can criticize diversity without sounding like racists.  The question itself is problematic because it not only assumes a racial divide, it places "us" on the "white" side of it. 

The question arose from a recent press release by local mediator Elizabeth Moreno -- Is Mediation Losing Its Effectiveness:  Lack of Diverse Mediators.  The release describes an ADR diversity initiative being pursued by Shell Oil.  Shell, noted Moreno, is  

 introducing supplier diversity to the ADR profession [by] extend[ing] business opportunities to certified minority and women ADR neutrals. These efforts, coined as "second tier," allow Shell to influence prime or majority ADR firms, with whom they do business, to also contract with minority and women owned ADR firms within the business community.

In the upcoming months Shell will be targeting  . . . ADR services to participate in second tier efforts. Shell astutely recognizes that by embracing the concept of inclusion, the company will rise to a higher level, reflecting its belief that it "will benefit from diversity through better relationships with customers, suppliers, partners, employees, government and other stakeholders, with positive impact on the bottom line."

I'm assuming that my questioner does not agree with the "affirmative action" aspect of this program.  Having debated the affirmative action issue since I began law school at U.C. Davis where the Supreme Court Bakke decision originated, I know well how divisive this issue can be.  But it is an important issue -- an issue critical to a nation not only "conceived in liberty" but "dedicated to the proposition that all men (sic) are created equal."

So Let's Take a Look at ADR and Diversity

I'll ask the academics over at the ADR Prof Blog to correct me if I'm wrong.  

I understand the academic criticism of mediation to be this:  in the immediate post-civil rights era while greater legal protections have been afforded to women and under-represented minorities, the "people" have been channeled into a system -- mediation -- that lacks the prejudice-flattening constraints of the rule of law.  More disturbing, say critics, is the fact that this "lawless" system is largely presided over by -- excuse me if this offends anyone -- OLD WHITE MEN.

I've learned more about racial bias talking to my liberal (white) "unprejudiced" friends this election season than I have since I participated in the "second wave" women's movement in the early nineteen seventies (remember consciousness raising?)  I do not judge them, nor myself, for our necessarily limited view which just happens to be that of the dominant culture.

I know we still have a serious racial divide because when I talk to my educated and liberal African American friends they say things that shock me. Things like -- the U.S. may have started the AIDS epidemic to rid the world of Africans. OK. I get it.  There's something about their experience of America that is so radically different from mine that I think their point of view is, frankly, just a little nuts.  This is what I do know -- I will never truly be able to see the world from their point of view.

That said, I do think we can criticize people for taking advantage of "diversity" issues to forward an agenda -- or their own personal advancement -- other than forwarding diversity itself. We can criticize those who would deepen the divide to profit from it.

I think Obama is modeling the correct response to racial divide, which is one of the reasons his candidacy impresses me so.  There haven't been many public figures willing to talk about the elephant in America's living room -- racism.  Nor has anyone on the national stage in my memory ever said "your dreams do not have to come at the expense of mine."

If I could write a sentence in a circle at this point, instead of linearly as the language requires me to do, I would do so.  Here is what I understood Obama's response to the question of the racial divide in America to be.

Acknowledge it Heal it Move on Heal it Move on Acknowledge it Move On Heal it Acknowledge it

There are no periods in this sentence because this activity needs to be constant and on-going.  Because we will always be stuck in our own point of view.  Because in-group and out-group prejudice will always be with us. And because the more visible markers there are for "otherness" in others, the more prey we are to the error of dividing the world into "us" and 'them."  

The answer?  Diversity.  Vigilance.  Education. 

Toward that end, here are some ADR Diversity resources: 

Commonality to Balance Diversity

Mediation:  the Great Equalizer?  A Critical Theory Analysis

Toward a More Perfect Union in an Age of Diversity: A Guide to Building Stronger Communities
through Public Dialogue

Center for Dispute Resolution, whose mission is to "to promote and provide education and comprehensive approaches to dispute resolution that constructively serve the needs of our culturally diverse society."   

ACCESS ADR:  A 2004 Diversity Initiative Launched With The Support Of The JAMS Foundation And The ABA

Striving for DIVERSITY in ADR & Why it Matters: An Interview with the Hon. Timothy K. Lewis, the Chairman of the AAA's Diversity Committee [who] speaks candidly about his interest in diversity in the decision making professions, and why allowing minorities and women an opportunity to participate is so vitally important.

The Diversity Task force of the International Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution ("CPR") whose mission it is to "adopt businessdriven initiatives to increase the ethnic, gender, and social diversity of mediators, arbitrators, and those involved in alternative dispute resolution, both within CPR institute and on a national scale."

Compilation of mediate dot com articles on diversity in mediation 

THE GREGORY SOBEL DIVERSITY IN MEDIATION SCHOLARSHIP APPLICATION

Slouching Towards Inclusion by Carol Miller Lieber & Jamala Rogers

Diversity Resistance

The Media Diversity Institute

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Here's another character who everyone will recognize.  The Drama Queen.  Male or female, those who "stir up" conflict to add a little dramatic flair to an otherwise boring day, do so for a predictable set of reasons.

Before dissecting the guy who's the first to spread the word that George is being fired for "cooking the books," and tells Crystal that the office manager has it in for her at the same time he tells the office manager that Crystal covets her job, let's briefly return to the conflict "basics" outlined in chapter one.  

A conflict exists whenever two or more people believe that their needs (or desires) cannot be satisfied at the same time.  They see all relationships as zero sum games.  The social scientists would say that such people are in a constant state of  "perceived relative deprivation."  They are deprived in relationship to their fellows.  

We all live in a state of relative deprivation.  We drive a Honda while our neighbor drives a BMW.  We rent while our best friend owns.  Our salary is less than six figures.  The guy in the office next to us is making 200 grand.  Other people have been given more talent, better luck, more resources, superior business and professional networks, and, of course, more loving and supportive families.  And yet these "relative" deprivations do not always result in disputes.  Not unless we name, blame and claim.   

Naming, Blaming and Claiming

As we said in chapter one, "conflicts" over scarce resources do not ripen into disputes until we suffer a perceived injurious event such as failing to get in to the school of our choice; being rejected by an employer we hoped to work for; having our lavish dinner party go unreciprocated, or watching someone else take our parking space!  When we begin to suspect that we have been injured, we start looking around for the source of that injury -- someone to name as the cause, to blame for the loss and from whom to claim redress.  

Name, blame, claim.  

The Drama Queen in the Field of Conflict

Of the primary responses to conflict -- denying, avoiding, yielding, problem solving, and contending -- the Drama Queen almost always chooses contention.  Contentious responses to conflict include ingratiation or gamesmanship, shaming, threats, promises or arguments, and coercive commitments or violence. All of these tactics are employed to overpower the will of another to get what the contender wants. 

Meet Drama Queen John.  He's your colleague who has recently been assigned to work on the same project you have.  You are calm, well-organized, efficient and productive.  John is impulsive, chaotic, inefficient and un-productive.  You've never understood why John has lasted as long as he has at this job.  "Maybe he's the owner's brother-in-law" you've speculated -- but only to yourself.   

As a good team player, you've been keeping your own counsel.  You've mentioned neither your opinions about John nor your irritation with him to your co-workers.  You've been careful in all your interactions with John not to show your annoyance.  You've been "getting along and going along" while at the same time trying to keep your eye on the prize -- the successful completion of the project that's been entrusted to you.   

For all your caution, things start to go wrong on the first day.  That very afternoon your supervisor Jamie drops by your office to mention that your teammate Gina is complaining about your domineering style.  The following week, you hear that George is saying you didn't deserve the bonus you received last year.  Someone has suggested that you have a "special" relationship with the divisional vice-president.  By week three, the team meetings have become tense.  People with whom you've long worked well eye you suspiciously when you enter the room.  And John is uncharacteristically cheerful. 

What Happened Here?

Unless someone talks to John about his dissatisfaction, we'll never quite know why he's been spreading rumors about you and creating ill-feeling between you and your team mates.  Still, we can make a few fair assumptions based on our knowledge of the social psychology of conflict.

For whatever reason, John appears to have named you as the source of some dissatisfaction in his worklife.  He's blamed you for that dissatisfaction and is actively claiming something from you.  In this case, his claim -- though negative and likely self-destructive -- comes in the form of personal satisfaction. 

What does someone like John get out of demonizing you to your workmates? The perverse satisfaction of exercising control, of making a drab office day momentarily dramatic, and, of exacting revenge from someone he's cast in the role of adversary.  John's hallmark characteristic is a lack of control.  Remember that he's disorganized, chaotic, impulsive and unproductive.  When he's able to create an atmosphere of suspicion about you, he's momentarily achieved the thing he most lacks, the thing you appear to have, the thing he believes people like you have deprived him of -- control.  

Though you needn't pity the poor Drama Queen, now that you know what drives him, you have some chance of engaging him in a productive conversation about his workplace behavior; a conversation that will make your work life far more cheerful and friendly.

Below, the Conflict Map outlining some of the concepts discussed here -- scroll down to the second page. 

Conflict Map - Get more documents

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Dear Janis,

As you'll notice, I've posted on my blog the first three "chapters" of the ABC's -- due out from Janis Publications under the more genteel title "A" is for Donkey in July.    

Not meaning to compare myself to one of the greatest writers of all-time -- Charles Dickens -- other than in our mutual need for reader recognition, I'm hoping you will find that the "serialization" of the ABC's will encourage readers to buy it rather than discouraging them from doing so.  As you'll remember,

[a]ll of Dickens' novels made their first appearance in serial form. Nine came out in monthly installments: Pickwick Papers, Nicholas Nickleby, Martin Chuzzlewit, Dombey and Son, David Copperfield, Bleak House, Little Dorrit, Our Mutual Friend, and The Mystery of Edwin Rood. Five were composed for weekly serialization: The Old Curiosity Shop and Barnaby Rudge in Master Humphrey's Clock; Hard Times in Household Words; and A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations in All the Year Round. . . . Oliver Twist appeared in the monthly issues of Bentley's Miscellany, which Dickens was editing at the time. Although he took up the weekly form with the intention of getting into more frequent correspondence with his readers, Dickens never ceased to fret under the restrictions of tailoring his narrative into briefer segments; and indeed, with Hard Times he returned to the practice of blocking out his stories as if for monthly installments. Thus, the novelist's preferred and characteristic method was that of monthly serialization, calling, as he said, for "the large canvas and the big brushes."

Simply put, as a writer of installment novels who invited reader comments as he wrote, Charles Dickens may have been the first blogger for whom instant gratification was also "too slow." 

We don't, however, have to return to Victorian England for serialization precedent.  Tom Wolfe's phenomenal best-seller The Bonfire of the Vanities  was serialized in 27 installments in Rolling Stone magazine starting in 1984. The novel was a bestseller and a phenomenal success, even in comparison with Wolfe's other books.  Although it was thereafter made into one of the most dreadful movies of all time, we cannot blame that failure on the serial form the novel originally took.

Now that I've compared myself to two of my favorite authors, I will have to display a little humility.  Unless I can merge blogging with book writing, I don't think this book will be ready this July, this summer, this fall or next winter.  I think I'm only going to get it written if I do it this way.  

I hope that's alright with you!  The book itself will be better written (there are editors and publishers for a reason) ; far better illustrated; and, will make a fabulous gift for any friend, neighbor, co-worker, or mother-in-law the impulse-Borders'-buyer has in mind when they first see the ABC's irresistibly offering itself at the check-out stand.

I'm also hoping to convince you that the word "Asshole" will draw more customers than it will repel.  But that's why I'm in contact with readers.  I'm certain they'll tell me.

All best to you and your lovely husband Ray,

Vickie

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In the new issue of The Complete Lawyer, my fellow Human Factor columnists and I talk about what new tricks we had to learn and old skills we had to re-invent when we took the journey from legal to mediation practice.  I give you my section of the column below, encouraging you to link to the Human Factor here to read what my my good friends and colleagues Gini Nelson, Stephanie West Allen and Diane Levin have to say.

My first day of mediation training progressed in somewhat the same fashion as my first few weeks in Civil Procedure. I remember struggling with the theoretical bases of jurisdiction in Pennoyer v. Neff one day only to be told the following week that Pennoyer was no longer the law. “Why,” I remember thinking, “did we even bother with Pennoyer when this Buckeye case about an exploding boiler now seems to be the law? Or would it be replaced next week as well?”

Law school, which taught me to “think like a lawyer,” was the precise opposite of my new mediation studies. Now, it seemed, I was being trained to stop “thinking like a lawyer.” Still, mediation, like the law, was full of conflicting ideologies from which it appeared I was required to choose.

It was easy for me to be evaluative: I had 25 years of legal practice in my backpack. I learned Dr. Cialdini’s “Principles of Ethical Influence”—Reciprocation, Scarcity (the rule of the rare), Authority, Commitment, Empathy, and, Consensus. These power principles helped the mediator to “make the other side see reason” when called upon to do so.

But the evaluative style was not the only prescribed route to mediation mastery. There were many who favored facilitation. The facilitative mediator first creates an atmosphere of hope and safety before helping the parties locate areas of agreement and mutual benefit. Here, the mediator is a follower or helper on the path to resolution, like the protective figures who appear early in a hero’s journey to enlightenment.

You can’t immerse yourself in mediation for long before you hear the clamor of the transformative crowd. Facilitative mediators, say the transformative folks, too often present themselves as wizards who intrude upon the parties’ conflict with their own agenda—usually “resolution be damned, let’s settle this darn thing!” The transformative mediator lets the session wheel out of control if that is where it is eager to go. Conflict is not seen as a state to be avoided or suppressed. Like a loving mother following the course of her child’s flu, the transformative mediator provides the parties with encouragement, opportunities to rest, lots of fluids and a metaphoric place to lay their heads as the conflict runs its natural course.

When I first brought this tangle of methodologies to the few master mediators I know, they all made short work of it with the scalpel of experience. “You are the technique,” they instructed. “Just stay in the process. Don’t guess. Ask questions. Listen. Don’t give up before the miracle of mediation happens.”

Now, four years into a full-time ADR practice, I am still struggling to embrace the entire dispute—the business or people problem that found its way to an attorney because of the justice issues with which it was burdened. I often feel that I’m walking a razor’s edge. I will never stop “thinking like a lawyer.” Nor will I stop pursuing this new way of thinking—one that looks for the opportunity to finesse the legal impasse by using the problem itself as an opportunity to broker a deal.

Why mediation? For me, it’s simply a broader canvass on which to paint a new picture. How mediation? In baby steps, one after the other, in just the same way I learned to be a litigator and trial attorney. How can the Human Factor help with your own life and legal practice? Stick around. Miracles are common here. We think you’ll enjoy the ride.

 

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. . . because the jury is about to transform your $1.7 million commercial dispute into $352.7 million verdict . . .  read all about it in this 2001 story, After $1.7 million landed in the wrong account, CoreStates insisted it could seize the money. It was A VERY COSTLY MOVE.

I give you only the article's conclusion, daring you to click on it without reading it to the end.

The overarching question of why the bank didn’t settle remains a puzzle.[The Bank's counsel] thought he gave the bank solid advice. All the lawyers who joined in the bank’s defense hold to that position: Legally, they contend, the bank was within its rights in seizing the $1.7 million.

But the case ran away from them. It got bigger and bigger and worse and worse. And there was no stopping it. One defense lawyer observed, “It went to hell in a handbasket.”

Maurice Mitts says his client is willing to call it quits for the $56 million. But First Union still isn’t willing to pay a big number. Mitts isn’t surprised.

“ ‘We know the law, we are the law, and too bad for you,’ ” Mitts said. “That’s been their attitude all along.”

Thanks to the Philadelphia law firm of Mitts Milavec, LLC for fighting the good fight and posting this dynamite legal tale.

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I talk a lot in this blog about community; about the need for all of us to understand that when you drill a hole in the other guy's side of the boat, you sink too.  There's something about disaster on a grand scale that brings the best out in us -- creates heroes.  And maybe, if you're inclined to ask why "bad things happen to good people" the answer is that we need to be reminded of our common humanity; common fragility; and, our common obligation to serve as stewards of the planet and all life on it.

So it is with more than a small amount of pleasure that I announce the book launch for my good friend Cathy Scott's memoir of the heroic pet rescues that took place in the wake of Katrina.

Cathy was one of the "kids" in my neighborhood fom the time I was five years old until we all left the old neighborhood for our adult lives.  She was also a member of the first writers' group I was ever part of -- Sisters of the Pen -- a neighborhood "club" we started when I was in the sixth grade and Cathy just entering high school.

Only Cathy has truly fulfilled the dreams of that small group of children and teenagers.  This is her sixth or seventh book and the one that I just know is going to sell a million or more copies for her.

Nostalgia aside, here is the information on the book launch!  (for the r.kv.r.y. literary journal's special issue on natural disasters, click here).  

A book launch event will be held on Saturday, July 26, marking the national release of author Cathy Scott's  book, PAWPRINTS OF KATRINA: Pets Saved and Lessons Learned (to be released this summer by John Wiley & Sons).

The event will be held from 1:45 p.m. - 5 p.m. at Best Friends Animal Sanctuary's Welcome Center (5001 Angel Canyon Road, Kanab, Utah 84741, a 3-1/2-hour drive from Las Vegas). Refreshments will be served.

Attending and signing books will be actress and animal activist Ali MacGraw, who wrote the book's foreword, and photographer Clay Myers, who has more than 70 compelling photos in the book. Also signing will be police K-9 handler Cliff Deutsch, who is featured on the cover rescuing a dog.

On display at the Welcome Center patio deck during the event will be Ark, a full-sized replica of a flat-bottomed boat used to save animals from floodwaters. It was created by Cyrus Mejia, in-house artist and a co-founder of Best Friends . The 4-by-10-foot boat is covered in a unique collage of animal admissions forms (with rescued pets' pictures), photos from volunteers, satellite images of Katrina, maps of New Orleans and strips from pet product bags used during the rescue effort.

Volunteers from Katrina will be at the event, and many Best Friends staffers who worked in the region will be attending too, so it will very much be a reunion. While book signings are scheduled for other parts of the country (including New Orleans on the third anniversary of Katrina), this is the kick-off event and a great opportunity to visit the sanctuary.

To find out where to stay in Kanab, go to: http://www.bestfriends.org/atthesanctuary/angelcanyon/visitorfaq.cfm.

A new Holiday Inn Express has opened in Kanab (435-644-3100), so if the sanctuary cabins and cottages or other hotels are full, the new one will probably have openings. Summer is a busy time in the area, because of nearby Zion, Bryce and the Grand Canyon, and booking early is highly recommended.

If you'd like to take a free tour of the sanctuary, which sits on 33,000 acres in Angel Canyon with about 1,800 animals on any given day, you'll need to book a reservation by calling 435-644-2001, ext. 4537. Or, for more info, go to: http://www.bestfriends.org/atthesanctuary/angelcanyon/visitorfaq.cfm

To learn more about Pawprints of Katrina, go to: http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470228512.html

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It is a truism that litigation tends to get worse rather than better over time.  This is as true in the law as it is in physics -- things fall apart.  Your client's clean and righteous narrative tarnishes over time; grows more complex and filled with contradictions.  It's a little like a political campaign.  Barack's ground-breaking race relations speech and Hillary's single tear aside, Clinton and Obama tend to look worse, not better, over time. We all do.

Whether the value of your legal "case" is up today or down tomorrow turns not only upon the most recent documents produced, pre-trial motion won or witness deposed, it also turns on those things that fall apart over time -- including currency exchange rates.   

The micro-economics of settlement timing include corporate events such as quarterly and year-end financial reporting requirements; potential mergers and acquisitions; and, how much financial bleeding your client's divisional president can take this year before worrying about demotion.  

In international disputes, currency exchange rates loom large in the macro-economics of settlement timing.  My own last really "big" case before I left practice was potentially worth a quarter billion dollars in "hard" damages -- the total projected clean-up costs for 500 toxic waste sites in every Canadian province. 

The Canadian dollar was not only weak at the time, it was weakening.  Though the question of whose currency would control was contested, my client was confident that Canadian dollars would eventually govern since clean-up costs by the American plaintiff would be paid in Canadian dollars.  I remember a time when the Canadian dollar was tumbling in value so rapidly that every time I saw opposing counsel in court I'd remind him of the day's exchange rate with a warning that "your case isn't getting any better over time." 

Settlement timing in that case was motion-driven, however, and the matter did not settle until after the entry of a pre-trial judgment in my client's favor pending appeal.

Though I was (and would continue to be) driven by pre-trial losses and victories, savvy settlement counsel would be keeping an eye on macro-economics -- which would, in any international litigation, require someone to be tracking currency exchange rates.

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Thanks to Anne Reed over at Deliberations for forwarding this April 22 Psychology NewsWire, It Pays to Know Your Opponent: Success in Negotiations Improved by Perspective-Taking, But Limited by Empathy.

It Pays refers to recent work done by Kellogg School of Management Professor Adam Galinsky, who has demonstrated (with colleagues William Maddux -- (INSEAD -- Debra Gilin -- St. Mary's U. --  and Judith White -- Dartmouth) that success in negotiations depends on focusing on the head and not the heart. In other words, it is better to take the perspective of negotiation opponents rather than to empathize with them. (You may remember Galinsky as the academic responsible for demonstrating that the person who makes the first offer will (nearly) always get the larger share of the delta between the two parties' "bottom lines."  See Making the First Offer here). 

Now Galinksy and friends inform us that we are far more likely to reach a negotiated resolution to a conflict if we use our heads rather than our hearts.  As It Pays reports:  

Perspective-taking, according to the study published in the April 2008 issue of Psychological Science, a publication of the Association for Psychological Science, involves understanding and anticipating an opponent's interests, thoughts, and likely behaviors, whereas empathy focuses mostly on sympathy and compassion for another.

"Perspective takers are able to step outside the constraints of their own immediate, biased frames of reference," wrote the authors. "Empathy, however, leads individuals to violate norms of equity and equality and to provide preferential treatments."

The researchers performed a total of three studies designed to assess the relationship between successful negotiations and perspective-taking and empathy tendencies. In two of the studies, the participants negotiated the sale of a gas station where a deal based solely on price was impossible: the seller's asking price was higher than the buyer's limit. However, both parties' underlying interests were compatible, and so creative deals were possible. In the first study, those participants who scored highly on the perspective-taking portion of a personality inventory were more likely to successfully reach a deal. In contrast, higher scores on empathy led dyads to be less successful at reaching a creative deal. 

Why Enlightened Self-Interest Trumps Sympathy

Just when you were about to stereotype "negotiated resolutions" as commie-pinko limp-wristed new age aquarian left-of-liberal kum-by-ya marshmellow toaster solutions to the problems of (excuse me fellas) real men -- along comes new research once again demonstrating that negotiation requires hard heads rather than soft hearts. 

Why?

Because our competitive natures ("I need my stuff to survive") will almost always trump our collaborative inclinations ("we need each other to survive").  If this weren't so, the world wouldn't be divided into its current "pie pieces" -- the first, second and third worlds for instance.  

More particularly, because distributive non-interest based bargaining is all about getting "our share" of a fixed pie while interest-based or integrative negotiations require the parties to:  (1) learn about and attempt to satisfy their bargaining partners' often non-apparent needs and desires; and, (2) to collaborate in an effort to find ways to satisfy those needs and desires in novel and creative ways, reaching an integrative agreement becomes much more likely than reaching a purely distributive one. 

Why?

Because the integrative deal will -- by its very nature -- serve more of both parties' interests than would its distributive counter-part.  

Perspective-Taking, Sympathy and Foreclosure

I don't know my neighbors well.  They have a small family with very young children and keep pretty much to themselves.  I understand from the local grapevine, however, that they're selling their house because one of them lost their job and they can't make the mortgage payments.   

If we lived in another country or if the neighborhood belonged to certain religious sects that make it their business to take care of their own, we might all come together to help the neighbors save their house.  But we don't.

We have and express a lot of sympathy when we discuss our neighbors' plight.  "Must be hard for the kids," we say, "and the parents have worked so hard to improve the property.  It would be a shame if they lost their equity."

Our sympathy, however, does not lead us to trump our self-interest (which includes simply "keeping to ourselves") in favor of the interests of the neighbors.

If, however, we learned that the neighbors were about to sell the house to a local fraternity, you can put easy money on the neighborhood mobilizing into action to find a solution.  And once the neighborhood starts looking for an affordable solution to a neighborhood problem, the chances that the interests of the distressed family and their (temporarily) better-off neighbors will intersect and that new resources will be brought to the table ("hey, George, I know a lawyer who specializes in these things" or a banker or a politician or a journalist for the L.A. Times) increase exponentially. 

Heck, instead of hiring lawyers to stop the sale to the fraternity, we might put together an emergency neighborhood loan-fund.   Or simply help find the unemployed neighbor a new job.  There are a lot of resources in my neighborhood.  And many good-hearted people.  But I'm afraid modern American folk-ways just don't allow for a neighborhood solution to one of its member's problems.  Until, that is, our own self-interests are threatened.

So it might seem counter-intuitive to say that mentally putting ourselves into another's shoes to ascertain their interests needs and desires (perspective-taking) is more likely to create a "deal" between people than simple sympathy. 

But we didn't survive as a species because we're particularly loving.  We survived as a species because its in our best interest -- our only interest -- to cooperate with one another. 

Or, quite simply, we die.

Which reminds me that it's Earth Day.  Make a contribution to the planet and our collective and individual survival as a species today by clicking on the image below!

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. . . you tend to escape gravity in a fury of creative activity.

Like this!  The Spring issue of the r.kv.r.y. quarterly literary journal, which has just been published and is quickly approaching it's fourth anniversary.  (see also r.kv.r.y.'s blog here!)

If you, like me, chose law as the default profession of the liberal arts major (Literature here, natch) check out our latest issue, which is full of great stuff -- more than a little of which has been written by lawyers.

Don't get me wrong -- I LOVED legal practice and am even more passionate about mediating the resolution of the type of case I litigated for 25 years -- complex commercial litigation.  

NEGOTIATING the resolution of these cases is really just the final part of my legal career -- a turn in the road that I'm more than pleased to have followed, particularly as our national recession deepens. 

Why?  Because negotiated resolutions don't depend upon court calendars, cranky and often unpredicatable Judges (my friends on the Bench excluded) or someone else's idea (12 people good and true; three arbitrators; one Judge, etc.) of what the most beneficial and fair solution to a business problem might be.

It's all of a piece, you see, because story -- as in those written by r.kv.r.y.'s contributors -- is more important to the mediated settlement of a dispute than a litigated resolution.  In mediation, we dress the "legal case" back up in all of its compelling though often messy particulars; we put the flesh and blood people back into the business problems that led them to lawyers in the first instance, permitting them do with their mutual conflict what they do best -- create a commercial solution to a business problem.  

Story. Self-determination.  Justice.

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(top: we assimilate and organize data in our own favor:  click here for full size chart)

Despite our own beliefs that we've adequately analyzed the weaknesses in our own cases, we have all been told at one time or another that we are "buying our own bull%#@^."

Is there a remedy?

First the Social Science Research

According to Bargaining Impediments and Settlement Behavior, studies of self-serving bias on estimates of probable damage awards provide strong evidence that:

• we assimilate information based on our existing biases (remember the OJ verdict);
• even when told we're doing so, we continue to organize information in such a way that it supports our existing opinions;
• the receipt of additional information, without more, will simply "confirm" existing biases; and,
• to make a difference in the parties' views of the merits of their case, mediation practices must include techniques for de-biasing the parties.

The Research

Research subjects were given the identical "case" materials and randomly assigned roles as "Plaintiff" or "Defendant." The subjects were put into bargaining pairs and asked to: (1) estimate a "fair" award by a Court to the Plaintiff; and, (2) to attempt to settle the dispute.

The experimental results and their implications were reported as follows:

• Plaintiffs' predictions of the [probable award] were, on average, $14,527 higher than defendants'.
• Mean plaintiffs' fair settlement values were $17,709 higher than defendants'.
• Not surprisingly, the settling parties' assessments of what a fair settlement would be and what a judge would likely award were closer together than were those who did not settle.
• Among the 59 pairs who settled, the mean difference between the plaintiffs' and defendants' predictions of the judge's award was $9,050.
• For the 21 pairs who did not settle, the average difference was $29,917.
• The strong correlation between the magnitude of the bias in a bargaining pair and non- settlement supports the conclusion that the self-serving bias often prevents parties from settling disputes at the most advantageous time and for optimal mutual benefit.
• Even when asked to tell the "other side's" story in an essay before predicting possible awards or when told about the existence of the bias, the subjects continued to evaluate the case according to their own material interests.
• Only in one experimental setting where subjects were both informed of the bias and made to write an essay substantiating the other side's case was the effect of the bias mitigated.
• That subjects were unable to rid themselves of the bias when informed of its existence demonstrates that it is not a deliberate strategy.

Other findings of the experiments point to biased assimilation of information as the likely psychological mechanism underlying the self-serving bias.

When subjects were presented with eight arguments favoring the side they had been assigned (plaintiff or defendant) and eight arguments favoring the other side and were asked to rate the importance of the arguments as perceived by a neutral third party, there was a strong tendency to view the arguments supporting one's own position as more convincing than those supporting the other side, suggesting that the bias operates by distorting one's interpretation of evidence.

This study suggests that litigants may not be seeking to maximize their own payoff, but are rather trying to obtain what they deem to be fair.  

Conclusions from the Experimental Data 

The application of the self-serving bias to bargaining behavior led the authors of the study to tentatively conclude that 

• exchanges of information are not in themselves necessarily conducive to settlement, i.e., obtaining more discovery before the dispute is "ripe" for settlement may be neither cost-efficient nor an effective settlement strategy;
• the importance of information exchanges to the settlement of a dispute can only be analyzed in terms of how that information may effect preexisting biases, which suggests that attorneys pay greater attention to their opposition's case theories when analyzing information obtained during discovery; and,
• to act as an effective counter to the self-serving bias of both "sides," mediation practices should be, at least in part, directed at de-biasing parties rather than simply facilitating information exchange.
  

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Yes you CAN pre order this book now!!  Right here.

  Not ready for the revolution?   Read this review by clicking on the upper right hand corner and hitting "view full screen" at the bottom of the menu.

Book Review of Conflict Revolution; Mediating Evil, War, Injustice and Terrorism: How Mediators Can Help Save the Planet by Kenneth Cloke reviewed by Victoria Pynchon - Get more free documents

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The google algorithm throws these random musings on negotiation up to me on a weekly basis because "negotiate" is one of my "google alerts."  (have I said god bless google recently?)

Almost all legal writing is collaborative, so I feel this English professor's pain.  I just didn't know we shared this experience. 

From Blog en Abyme, excuses excuses by Kim Middleton, Assistant Professor of English and Director of the American Studies Program at The College of Saint Rose.

What I’ve discovered is that when you’re writing with someone, you’re negotiating and discussing all the time. Which secondary sources to use and why; how much space a particular piece of the argument should occupy; the particular ways that data should be interpreted; style; etc. And that’s all the stuff that we actually articulate. I’d venture that there is also always a secondary level of negotiation going on non-verbally: should I just take the lead on this part?; am I slowing us down?; is my expertise relevant here?. Essentially, there are all of the interpersonal elements to negotiate as well. Is it any wonder that it takes longer than writing an article alone?

Meanwhile, note to self: next time I assign a group project to students (I’m looking at you, film class!), I need to give them ample time to work through not just content, but interpersonal stuff as well. It would probably also help if I could get them to move across the street from one another, and assign one person per group to be the baker who provides snacks for each meeting. And then someone to do the group’s laundry and grocery shopping while they get their article written—I mean project done.

And yes, Professor, it does take food, drink and clean laundry to accomplish anything worthwhile as a team!  Thanks for the thoughts.  Now get back to that article right now!

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Red and yellow black and white they are precious in his sight Jesus loves the little children of the world.  Lyrics C. Her­bert Wool­ston (1856-1927); Music: George F. Root (1820-1895) (MI­DI, score). Root orig­in­al­ly wrote this tune for the Amer­i­can civ­il war song Tramp, Tramp, Tramp.

Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein.  Luke 8:17 

Easter is one of those holidays that resists secularization unless you have children, grandchildren, hard boiled eggs and a rainbow of pastel dyes. 

People don't casually say "Happy Easter" to one another, particularly in an urban American city and especially if half your family is Jewish.

Still, Easter reminds me that I used to be a practicing Protestant and that my values derive substantially from the liberal Christian teachings I was dipped into as a child -- first in Sunday School and then in church.

What did I learn?  Tolerance.  Compassion.  Empathy. Forgiveness.  Reconciliation. And perhaps most important of all, the genuine potential for every ordinary human spirit to experience a radical transformation -- so radical that one might say the individual had been reborn as a spiritual being. 

Listen, this is not light weight stuff. 

I like to write, but I'm no philosopher.  Nor am I writer with a huge brain, steadily empathic heart, encyclopedic knowledge, original thought or the courage to dream paradigm shifting dreams.  I do know that writer, however.  His name is Ken Cloke and I am steadily making my way through all 500 and something pages of his new book.  

These are the times to put our own individual highly personal spiritual or religious faith and a great deal of our material resources behind the transformation of human understanding necessary to save the species.  (as James Lovelock , author of Gaia instructed us, we have no need to worry about the persistence of the planet itself.  We are not necessary to its survival; we are merely its "spokesmodels.")  

As my personal Easter offering, I give you yet another excerpt from Ken's soon-to-be-released book Conflict Revolution - Mediating Evil, War, Injustice and Terrorism or How Mediators Can Help Save the Planet.

How Prejudice Works, and How to Oppose It

Prejudice is complex and operates on many levels. It can be found not only in insults and judgments, caricatures and stereotypes, but refusals to listen and communicate, stories of demonization and victimization, inability to experience empathy with others, and infinitesimal denials of humanity. It is reflected in personal selfishness and hostile relationships, bullying and aggressive behaviors, and ego compensations based on poor self-esteem. It is expressed through contempt, disregard, and domination, as well as through low status, inequitable pay, and autocratic power.

Prejudice commonly operates by stereotyping. People form stereotypes, in my experience, in eight easy steps:

1. Pick a characteristic
2. Blow it out of proportion
3. Collapse the person into the characteristic
4. Ignore individual differences and variations
5. Disregard subtleties and complexities
6. Overlook commonalities
7. Match it to your own worst fears
8. Make it cruel

If these steps routinely produce prejudice, it is possible to undo them, for example, by making people more complex than their stereotype permits, or distinguishing unique individuals within a group, or recognizing commonalities between people. It helps, in doing so, to acknowledge that everyone is equal, unique, and interesting; that everyone forms prejudices; that everyone can learn to overcome them through awareness, empathy, and communication; and that everyone can become more skillful in communicating across stereotypes and lines of separation created by fear.

It is common for people, when accused of prejudice, to respond defensively, but to confront other people’s prejudices aggressively, leveling accusations and instilling shame. These responses may initially succeed in suppressing the expression of prejudicial attitudes and undermining social permission and the cultures of discrimination that allow it to continue. But to root out the deep-seated biases that keep prejudice alive, it is necessary to dismantle it at a deeper level, in people’s hearts and minds.

Our principal goals in responding to prejudice are therefore not to castigate, blame, or point fingers at those who exhibit prejudicial attitudes, as shaming and blaming merely triggers defensiveness and counterattack. Instead, they are to defuse prejudice by assisting those in its grip (including ourselves) to:

1. develop a knowledgeable, confident self-identity, and appreciate who they are without needing to feel superior to others 
2. experience comfortable, empathetic interactions with diverse people and ideas 
3. be curious and unafraid of learning about differences and commonalities 
4. feel comfortable collaboratively solving problems and negotiating differences 
5. be aware of biases, stereotypes, and discrimination when they occur 
6. stand up for themselves and others in the face of prejudice, without becoming biased in turn 
7. experience diverse affectionate relationships that grow stronger as a result of differences
   

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I don't know if today's post by Paul Secunda over at Concurring Opinions was penned in recognition of Mediation Week, but it might as well have been.  See The First-Person Narrative in Legal Scholarship here -- excerpt below.  

Allen Rostron[ and] Nancy [Levit's] . . . . series in the UMKC Law Review last year called Law Stories: Tales from Legal Practice, Experience, and Education . . . [was begun] to expand on the art of legal storytelling:

Over the last few decades, storytelling became a subject of enormous interest and controversy within the world of legal scholarship. . . Some . . . . told accounts of actual events in ways that gave voice to the experiences of outsiders. . . . [A]  major textbook publisher developed a new series of books that recount the stories behind landmark cases . . . to help students appreciate not only the players in major cases, but also the social context in which cases arise. . . 

Legal theorists began to recognize what historians and practicing lawyers had long known and what cognitive psychologists were just discovering - the extraordinary power of stories. Stories are the way people, including judges and jurors, understand situations. People recall events in story form. Stories are educative; they illuminate different perspectives and evoke empathy. Stories create bonds; their evocative details engage people in ways that sterile legal arguments do not.

Because . . . I [too] believe that legal storytelling is not only educative, but also a way to illuminate different perspectives, I chose to contribute this year to the Second Law Stories Series [--] Mediating the Special Education Front Lines in Mississippi [which] comes directly from my first-hand experiences as a special education mediator in Mississippi.

Professor Secunda concludes by asking whether story-telling should have a place in legal scholarship.  And quite a propitious day he posed to ask the question.

Barack Obama and the Racial Divide

Obama's speech today -- triggered by but not solely given to address questions about inflammatory statements made by his pastor from the pulpit -- was grounded in story.  Why?  Because only the texture, detail, ambiguity, contradiction, and paradox of actual "lived experience" at a particular time and in a specific place, is capable of approaching the "truth" of the human  predicament.  Where does story start?  Classically, with one's his birth and lineage.   

I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton’s Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I’ve gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world’s poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners – an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible. 

Giving to Airy Nothings/A Local Habitation and a Name

By beginning with autobiography, by taking the time to tell his wholly personal yet universal story, Obama does what Shakespeare said all writers must do -- "give[] to airy nothings/a local habitation and a name."  No single snapshot, no view from 30,000 feet, no abstract and colorless (or "colored") everyman can do much more than to "simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality."

We should long have known that only a bi-racial man might be permitted to take the national stage to address "white" demoralization with as much forcefulness as "black" misery; to describe "black" and "white" anger with equal understanding; to say that "[m]ost working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race."

Their experience is the immigrant experience – as far as they’re concerned, no one’s handed them anything, they’ve built it from scratch. They’ve worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they’re told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.

To acknowledge that 

for the men and women of Reverend Wright’s generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicia ns, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician’s own failings.

And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. . . . . That anger is not always productive . . . But [it] is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.

So Where Do We Begin?

Story, for Obama, is not simply a way to approach the difficult truth.  It is the instrument to cauterize our wounds; the weapon with which to resist the easy answer and the politically "correct" response.  

Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have . . . white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze – . . . . And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns – this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.

This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years.

So where do we begin? 

With story.  

"There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina," Obama concludes.

She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.

And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that’s when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.
She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.

She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too. . . . 

. . . Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they’re supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who’s been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he’s there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, “I am here because of Ashley.”

“I’m here because of Ashley.”

The recognition that we are involved, engaged, hopeful, willing, motivated, cheered, encouraged, and made more courageous because we have connected with one specific textured, multi-dimensional, storied human being, is not, Obama admits "enough."  

"But it is where we start."

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Compare the hilarious Bob Newhart routine above (from Mad TV) with any episode whatsoever of HBO's new series about psychoanalysis The Treatment.  

In legal/mediation terms, Bob Newhart's "treatment" -- "just stop it!" -- is akin to the mediator's refrain -- "move past it," "get over it" or simply "move on." 

Gabriel Byrne's methodology in The Treatment, on the other hand, is more akin to the process of complex commercial litigation.  The litigator, like the analyst, doesn't focus so much on the "patient's" described experience as he does upon his own interpretation of that experience.  We litigators -- like the chair-bound analyst -- too often ignore our client's actual, multi-dimensional, ambiguous and self-contradictory experience in favor of the form of their "problem"  -- the size and shape it must take to fit the "remedy" we are capable of providing.             

In either case, the patient/client too often feels like he is being treated like a child -- a child whose possession of a problem seems to give the designated authority figure the right to tell him what to do -- "just stop it" -- or to re-interpret, shape, edit or "spin" his very personal story into a "form of action" the law will recognize.  

Take a look at how unhappy Gabriel Byrne's patients are.  They're not unhappy just because of the problems they had when they first stepped through the therapist's door.  They're agonizingly unhappy because "the doctor" infantalizes and objectifies them; tells them they don't know what they're really thinking; suggests that they don't know what's best for them; and, then "hides the ball" while he lets them drift around without mooring.   

The Mediation Story 

The "mediation story" excerpted below -- like last week's litigation story -- is not the client's story but the lawyer's or the mediator's preferred narrative.  Here, we tell our clients to "get over it.  Fix the future.  Don't obsess about the past.  Just stop it!"

But some clients are not going to want to "get past it." Some want to, need to, maybe even should "right the wrong."  Others want to, need to, maybe even should put the past behind them and problem-solve the future.

What do we do? 

We listen with as little judgment and as few pre-determined "solutions" as possible.  Then, we outline for our clients what we can do to help them solve their problem with our particular skill-set.  Then we tell them about the myriad other solutions available to them.  Preferably, we have a referral list in our desk drawer so we can provide them with the names of people whose skills and solutions best suit what they want.  

What we shouldn't be doing is selling our process. 

With that wind-up, here's more from CLIENT COUNSELING, MEDIATION, AND ALTERNATIVE NARRATIVES OF DISPUTE RESOLUTION -- on the "mediation story."  How all and any of this can be incorporated into your practice in the next post on this topic.    

[The mediation] narrative profoundly differs from that of litigation. The engine that drives litigation's morality tale is that conflict resolution is a contest between parties, one of whom necessarily represents good and the other necessarily represents bad. As a result, litigation seeks to designate who has committed moral transgressions by breaching legal norms (or, from the perspective of the defendant, who wrongfully accuses others of having done so).

The Story of Mediation subverts these norms by transforming this familiar morality tale into a story of collaboration. This subversion begins through how mediation conceives of conflict itself. Implicit in the Story of Litigation is that conflict represents a breach of the norms of conduct, thereby ripping the social fabric in some way large or small. In contrast, in mediation, conflict is a norm of conduct, a necessary byproduct of humans having distinct experiences and personalities and needs. Conflict is thus not necessarily a disruption of the moral order, and, indeed, can sometimes be productive. . . . . .

[T]he meta-narrative of mediation seeks to map the [parties'] "strivings" and "vanquishings" onto a collaborative struggle to resolve conflict. This narrative casts all participants as players in a process - collaboration - that is focused on reaching the common goal of successfully resolving or transforming a dispute. This story has moral entailments because collaboration is accepted as a social and moral good. Unlike litigation, however, this story does not generate a binary moral universe that divides the good from the bad, but, rather, a universe that values collaborative striving to achieve common ground and resolution.

This story places mediators in a role that is very different from the role played by decision-makers in litigation. Rather than being heroes of moral vindication to whom wronged parties appeal for justice, mediators promote and model collaborative striving to overcome conflict. This plays out in many accepted techniques in mediation. Mediators, for example, often seek "commitment" from participants to the process of mediation, although mediators are careful not to extend this commitment to a commitment to agree. 

This commitment to process is a proxy for a commitment to collaborate to seek to resolve conflict, thus incrementally moving participants away from contested litigation and towards collaborative problem solving. Similarly, mediators often "reframe" participants' statements in order to emphasize "common ground." This is also an effort to move parties away from a morally charged contest and into collaboration. Finally, mediators encourage and model collaboration through a positive message of optimism and progress towards resolution, even when (or, perhaps, especially when) impasse appears likely. 

Moreover, mediation approaches the narrative movement from Efforts to Restoration of Steady State in a very different way than litigation. . . . . The very language through which litigants seek redress of grievances - to "be made whole," "to pay your debt society" (with its implication that payment of the debt would return the ledger to balance), even the word "remedy" - implies Restoration.

In contrast, mediation tends to reject Restoration as a state to which the parties (and society as whole) should or even can return. Rather, mediation seeks Transformation on the part of all disputants so that conflict is resolved. It does so by embracing the notion that perceptions of the world (including perceptions of the actions of others) are unstable, thus enabling parties to appreciate alternative perspectives as a way to promote resolution of conflict. Mediation, therefore, does embody a plot that adheres to the narrative movement described by the Austere Definition, albeit in ways that are utterly alien to the morality tale of the story of litigation. The story of mediation can be characterized as follows:

• Steady State: Whatever Each Party Views as Pre-Conflict
• Trouble: Whatever Each Party Views as Constituting Conflict
• Efforts: Collaborative Striving To Overcome Conflict as Modeled and Promoted by Mediator
• Transformation of Steady State: A New Relationship Among Parties
• Coda: Moving On

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The ABA Section of Dispute Resolution Presents The 10th Annual Spring Conference Pacific Currents: Sound Perspectives on ADR

April 3-5, 2008

Pacific Currents: Sound Perspectives on ADR is the premiere conference in the world for dispute resolution professionals and lawyers engaged in dispute resolution processes. This conference offers some of the best ADR CLE in the country presented by diverse and experienced faculty. With over 90 CLE programs planned, you can fulfill all of your CLE requirements over the course of a few short days.

This year’s conference also offers many dynamic and engaging plenaries.

The opening plenary entitled Hot Topics in Arbitration: The Fair Arbitration Act, Hall Street, and More will discuss the most recent developments in arbitration law, including cases pending in the Supreme Court, as well as potential arbitration-related legislation.

Linda Babcock will present the Friday morning plenary: Women Don't Ask: Negotiation and the Gender Divide. Ms. Babcock will speak about the four-phase collaborative problem-solving approach to negotiation and how lawyers and mediators can use this approach to manage the reactions and emotions that may arise on both sides of a dispute.

ABA President William Neukom will deliver a keynote speech and Tom Stipanowich, Academic Director Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution and Professor of Law, Pepperdine University, will present at the Friday Luncheon.

Saturday offers The Language Conflict: How Aggression and Violence Inform the Way We Speak presented by Kenneth Cloke and Joan Goldsmith of the Center of Dispute Resolution. This skills-building plenary will examine strategies on how to turn hostile denunciations and debates into appreciative disagreements and dialogues. Don’t miss out! Register today to attend these exciting plenaries.

I'll be presenting