A practical reference on the EU rules and international initiatives that impact directly on EU cross-border disputes, this handbook is a must-have for any practitioner of cross-border mediation. The EU Mediation Directive 2008/52/EC laid down obligations on EU Member States to encourage quality of mediators and providers across specific compliance considerations, including codes of conduct and training, court referral, enforceability of mediated settlements, confidentiality of mediation, the effect of mediation on limitation periods, and encouraging public information. The book is organized into clear and consistent themes, structured and numbered in a common format to provide easily accessible provisions and commentary across the essential considerations of the Directive. All EU countries which have complied, along with Denmark (which opted out of implementing the Directive), or attempted to comply, with the Directive are included, allowing straightforward comparison of key issues across the different countries in this important and evolving area. Supplementary points of practical use, such as statistics on the success rates of mediation and advice on the requirements for parties to participate in mediation, and for parties and lawyers to consider mediation, add further value to the jurisdiction-specific commentary. A comparative table of the mediation laws forms an invaluable quick-reference appendix for an overview and comparison of the information of each jurisdiction, together with English translations of each country's mediation law or legislative provisions. Address this dynamic area of law with the benefit of guidance across all elements of the Directive impacting practice, provided by respected and experienced editors from the knowledgeable European authority in mediation, ADR Center, along with a host of expert contributors.

In October 2009, more than 50 of the world's leading negotiation scholars gathered in Istanbul, Turkey for the second in a series of three international conferences designed to critically examine what is taught in contemporary negotiation courses and how we teach them, with special emphasis on how best to "translate" teaching methodology to succeed with diverse, global audiences. In organizing the Istanbul conference, we took particular note of a consistent strain of criticism of the artificiality of a classroom environment, which became a running theme of many of our authors in the project's first year, captured in the previously published RETHINKING NEGOTIATION TEACHING: INNOVATIONS FOR CONTEXT AND CULTURE (DRI Press 2009). It would be hard to imagine a better environment for trying something new and different outside the classroom environment than Istanbul, and we tried to do honor to one of the world's greatest trading cities in our design for the conference. In brief, we dispatched small teams of scholars into the city's famous bazaars, for one exercise in studying how negotiation might be taught more actively, and dispatched teams into the city's less touristy neighborhoods on another occasion, with instructions that required each team to negotiate internally. The resulting rich collection of scholarship is gathered in our current title - VENTURING BEYOND THE CLASSROOM.

As the strategic economic partner of the Southern Mediterranean (MEDA) region, the European Union (EU) seeks to promote effective mechanisms of development through increased industrial cooperation in order to create a Euro-Mediterranean area of shared prosperity. The first Euro-Mediterranean Conference of Ministries of Industry, held in June of 1996 in Brussels, listed among its priority objects 1) the formation of a fair judicial and administrative framework for investment; and 2) the establishment and support of Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) through the development of regional networks. However, recent reports on the world trade and investment describe the MEDA region as an area with low attractiveness for international investment. One of the obstacles preventing enhanced trade and investment in the MEDA countries, particularly for SMEs, originates from the lack of an efficient, effective, and reliable infrastructure to manage trade and investment disputes. Inadequately drafted contracts, insufficient or incompetent legal advice, and defective functioning of judicial systems evidence the unsatisfactory protection provided to EU-MEDA transactions. SMEs are likely to suffer the most since their access to domestic tribunals is severely limited. In addition, they are largely unfamiliar with alternative systems to prevent and management commercial disputes.

The Guide for Regulating Dispute Resolution (GRDR) recommends transnational structures and principles for the regulation of dispute resolution in civil and commercial matters. It covers dispute resolution mechanisms in all their varieties, including negotiation, mediation, conciliation, expert opinion, mini-trial, ombudsman procedure, arbitration and court adjudication. The regulatory principles contained in this Guide are based on a functional taxonomy of dispute resolution mechanisms, an open normative framework and a modular structure of regulatory topics. In its development theory, empirical research and regulatory models from 12 jurisdictions in Europe and the wider world have been taken into account. The Guide for Regulating Dispute Resolution is formulated and commented upon in a concise manner to assist legislators, policy-makers, professional associations, practitioners and academics in thinking about which solutions best suit local and regional circumstances. The recommendations are a first attempt to provide guidelines for a value-based and coherent regulation of dispute resolution. Since this is a Herculean task, the principles suggested are only a first starting point to inspire further development. Acknowledgement: This is chapter 2 from the book Regulating Dispute Resolution (Oxford, Hart Publishing, 2013), ISBN: 9781849462587). This contribution is published in this Research Paper Series with the generous and exceptional permission of the rights owner, Hart Publishing.