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Mediation |
International Mediation I have been interested in alternatives to the litigation of international business disputes for many years. In March of 1994, I presented a paper on Commercial Dispute Resolution in Beijing at the Third Pacific Rim Fisheries Conference. My thesis in that paper was that foreign businesses could avoid jury and judge trials in the U.S. by writing arbitration clauses and mediation clauses into their contracts. I am now focusing my attention primarily on mediation, as opposed to arbitration, as a vehicle for resolving international business disputes. Cross-border litigation is immensely expensive and often does not produce an acceptable result. Arbitration can also drag on and can be quite expensive. Some of these cross-border disputes are amenable to mediation by a neutral third party, and that is I come in. My experience in China, Japan, Korea and Russia gives me insight that helps the parties to communicate and reach a negotiated settlement. Having majored in Russian language, and having spent the summer of 1963 in the Soviet Union studying Russian with Indiana University, I got a job with USIS and worked in the Soviet Union, attached the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, from 1964 to 1965. From 1966 through 1969, I served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Korea. From 1981 to 1984 I worked as a foreign lawyer with the firm of Kim & Chang in Seoul. In 1994 and 1998 I worked in China through the Shanghai office of Davis Wright Tremaine. I have made many trips to Japan over the years, and spent a year studying Japanese language at the University of Washington on a Charles Dana scholarship in 1979-1980. I have represented U.S. companies doing business in Japan, Korea, Russian and China, and I have represented Japanese, Korean, Russian and Chinese companies in the U.S. I have seen ventures succeed and I have seen ventures fail, and I have negotiated and mediated many disputes over the years. This experience, coupled with my training in mediation, gives me a unique perspective on resolving international business disputes, particularly in the Asia-Pacific region. My goal in mediating international business issues is to get the dispute resolved efficiently and economically. Compared to litigation, mediation can save the parties large amounts of time and money. The prerequisite is, of course, that both sides be willing to try the mediation process. This is not always the case. But if the parties are willing to sit down with a neutral party experienced in mediation, the chances of success are high. |