m3 Archives

Understanding Mediators’ Orientations, Strategies, and Techniques: A Grid for the Perplexed, Harvard Negotiation Law Review, Vol. 1, No. 7, 1997; Len Riskin

This Article begins with a review of previous efforts to categorize mediation and their shortfalls, including the lack of any widely-shared comprehensive method for describing the various approaches to mediation practice. The Article then offers a new “grid” system for classifying mediator orientations, strategies, and techniques and describes the potential utility of the grid, particularly its effectiveness in selecting mediators. (See Riskin’s (last?) follow up: Replacing the Mediator Orientation Grids, Again: The New New Grid System)