A just-released study of dispute resolution practices in Fortune 1,000 corporations shows that many large companies are using binding arbitration — adjudication with private judges — less often and relying more on mediated negotiation and other approaches aimed at getting disputes settled more informally, quickly and inexpensively. The study, based on a 2011 survey of corporate counsel developed by researchers at Cornell and Pepperdine universities with input from the International Institute for Conflict Prevention & Resolution (CPR), indicates that although the approaches of large corporations vary widely, their decisions about how to manage conflict usually boil down to issues of control.

...The new survey, reflecting the responses of more than 300 Fortune 1,000 corporate counsel, presents a decidedly mixed picture. The respondents, almost half of whom are general counsel, assert that their companies are less likely to employ hardball litigation as a primary strategy, and instead broadly embrace mediation as a tool for resolution of all kinds of disputes now and in the future.

Read the full article at Law.com: http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNLJ.jsp?id=1202593174039&B...