Peter Lovenheim, Lisa Guerin, "Mediate, Don't Litigate: Strategies for Successful Mediation"
NOLO | ISBN 1413300308 | 2004 Year | CHM | 0,54 Mb | 464 Pages
NOLO | ISBN 1413300308 | 2004 Year | CHM | 0,54 Mb | 464 Pages
| “ | You and your spouse are getting a divorce, and cannot reach an agreement on how to divide your property and share custody of your children. Your neighbors’ dog has destroyed your prize rose garden, and they refuse to compensate you. You receive a stiff letter from a business claiming you are infringing its trademark and demanding $50,000 in damages. Any of these situations—or a thousand others—are likely to send your blood pressure sky high. Why? Because the first word that is likely to come into your mind, of course, is court. And most likely, the second is lawyer. The litigation fever in this country—the often unthinking dash to lawyers and to court—is only one symptom of a society grown increasingly adversarial and violent, where ordinary people have lost the belief that they can sit down together and reason out a solution to their own problems. But every year, the countless Americans who enter the legal system discover that the delays, costs, and stresses of litigation often leave them poorer and more frustrated—and less empowered—than when they began. Many would agree with Judge Learned Hand, who said in an address to the New York Bar Association in 1926: “As a litigant, I should dread a lawsuit beyond almost anything else short of sickness and death.” Fortunately, there is a much better way to resolve most disputes, an alternative that is often quicker, less expensive, more private, easier to navigate, and more likely to result in a solution that everyone can abide with in the long run. It is called mediation. | ” |