ABOUT TDM Sample article This is a free sample article available at transnational-dispute-management.com If you are interested in these articles why not take a subscription? Or read our other free articles & newsletters. Subscription fees start at 75 euro per year, see our subscription page for more details... Contribute? Read our Submission guidelines for more information. About TDM Focussing on recent developments in the area of Investment arbitration and Dispute Management, regulation, treaties, judicial and arbitral cases, voluntary guidelines, tax and contracting. TDM is supported by CEPMLP / Dundee, the International Bar Association and other law firms, international organizations and companies. Editor-in-Chief Editor-in-Chief is Thomas Wälde, Professor of International Energy Law (and former Executive Director) of the Centre for Energy, Petroleum and Mineral Law and Policy (CEPMLP) at the University of Dundee, the internationally leading graduate school in oil, gas and energy law and policy. Professor Wälde is the former principal UN adviser on oil, gas, energy and investment law.

The Mediation Process - Practical Strategies for Resolving Conflict, 2nd Edition

Christopher Moore, The Mediation Process - Practical Strategies for Resolving Conflict, 2^nd Edition, Wiley/ Jossey-Bass publishers 1996, ISBN 0-7879-0248-9, San Francisco, 430 pages, index, bibliography, 35 $

Thomas W Wälde, CEPMLP

This book is an in-depth and insightful practitioner handbook for mediation. It provides a general review of relevant literature, describes how mediation works, identifies the main phases and steps of the mediation process and then goes through the several phases of mediation in considerable detail, concluding with an extensive chapter on "reaching a settlement". Here, the manual suggests how the final direct inter-party mediation process is prepared, the stage set, the parties made to interact, the mediator's role. The book concludes with useful annexes: professional practice guidelines, a model mediation agreement, waiver and consent form, a sample memorandum of understanding and a list of professional associations.

The book is written very clearly; it is easy, and enjoyable to read. It is also helpful to the practitioner in recalling proper mediation practice. This is often nothing more than common sense, but it is helpful to use this "annotated checklist" to re-think the steps, the method, the approaches and a number of mediation props. The book is very much focused on mediating disputes in US culture - family, divorce, employment, trade union disputes. It is not directly applicable to, for example, the mediation of complex transnational and cross-cultural commercial or political disputes. Nevertheless, the author has made sure to pay attention to various cultural attitudes (with, in the US, most national cultures of the world represented in some form or other). I have heard that what is written in and for the US is not applicable elsewhere. I don't agree. This book expresses a lot of experience, a lot of common sense and a lot of relevant academic literature, and all with considerable cultural sensitivity. As such, it is useful in dispute scenarios everywhere. On the other hand, in the hands of a beginner, it could lead to misconceptions. While the standard forms are useful to look at, they would be out of place in a non-US, large-scale commercial mediation. It would also be useful to review the effectiveness of the many institutional mediation rules now around. I personally have found that they express very little in real substance - apart from appeals to impartiality, professionalism, integrity and a - in my view very impractical and unrealistic - prohibition to use mediation information in subsequent litigation.

For an experienced practitioner, this book helps to make explicit already applied good practices and through its checklist approach it helps to think about how to design a mediation plan, procedure and method which is suitable for the always very particular dispute - particular in terms of the issues, industries, cultures and professionals involved. I have found this book the best among a much larger group of books on mediation I have looked at - but, evidently, every mediation case and type requires its own approach. The challenge of designing a tailor-made mediation approach to a particular situation tests the mediator.