Mobile mediation: How technology is driving the globalization of ADR

• Main Author: ALEXANDER, Nadja
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2006
• Subjects: Mediation; motion pictures; divorce mediation; globalization; technology; Dispute Resolution and Arbitration
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/sol_research/1879; https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/sol_research/article/3831/viewcontent/MobileMediation_2006_HamlineJPubLPoly.pdf
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Mediation has made it to Hollywood. The opening scene of the romantic comedy, The Wedding Crashers (2005), features a hilarious attempt at divorce mediation. The mediation scene does not demonstrate any mediation skills to be emulated, and the film itself, apart from the opening scene, has nothing to do with mediation. Nevertheless one cannot ignore the power of the borderless dream machine called Hollywood. The Hollywood film industry does more than export films and fantasies around the world; it is a driving force in the globalization of the themes with which it deals. When mediation becomes one of those themes - albeit fleetingly - it is on its way to becoming a globalized concept.How appropriate then of the 2005 Symposium on Advanced Issues in Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) at Hamline University to recognise the early stages of the globalization phenomenon in ADR. Entitled, Intentional Conversations about the Globalization of ADR, the two-day Symposium invited participants to grapple with issues such as the ethics of exporting ADR, how globalization affects the principles of ADR, the challenges for dispute resolution practitioners moving between cultures, and how the design of ADR systems can accommodate different social, legal and cultural imperatives. One topic that was not canvassed - and upon reflection, I am amazed that it was not raised throughout the two day meeting - was the impact of technology on the globalization of ADR.