What's Happening [07.30.13]

The "What's Happening?" Blog is a weekly round up of the all the ADR news, jobs, events and more. Check it out each week and view past news [HERE]

Conflict and Movements for Social Change: The Politics of Mediation...

Kenneth Cloke- Movements for social change are products, producers and resolvers of conflict. By joining together to bring about change, their members affirm the positive, creative role that conflict can play in calling attention to injustices, applying pressure to support needed social changes, reinforcing progressive values, halting censorship and retaliation, and resolving the chronic, systemic sources of social conflict. Yet these same movements are often plagued with their own internal conflicts, which are routinely handled in negative and socially regressive ways.

PEACE OF MIND: Brad Heckman '89 mediates the local with the global

In the opening scene of the comedy Wedding Crashers, a couple navigating a nasty divorce spits insults and accusations at one another while the mediators, played by Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn, attempt to steer the conversation in a meaningful direction. As the rhetoric grows more heated, Wilson's character interjects amiably: "I know it doesn't seem like it, but we are making progress."

After describing that scene, Brad Heckman '89 laughs and admits that, although amusing, the Wedding Crashers interpretation is inaccurate. Instead, mediation is serious business: it's an opportunity for two parties to meet, discuss and reach their own agreement with the help of the mediator—a neutral third party trained in conflict resolution. For Heckman, running the largest mediation organization in New York City is the logical result of years of traveling and a diligent commitment to providing conflict-resolution opportunities to communities in the United States and abroad.

IMI Introduces Mediation Advocacy Competency Criteria

The competency of the parties' advocates in mediations is widely recognized as a crucial factor in securing the best possible settlements. In order to establish a professional and technical basis for enabling disputing parties to identify the right people to advise and represent them in mediations, IMI has developed a comprehensive set of Competency Criteria of Mediation Advocates/Advisors.