You may have heard the inauguration poet, Amanda Gorman (she’s 22!), speaking on NPR today. She said that there are certain combinations of letters she has trouble pronouncing, and because she often reads her poetry out loud, she has to change her first choices of words to other words so that she can be understood … Continue reading Making Ourselves Understood →

Just following up on a previous post: My new article, “Talking About Abortion (Listening Optional),” published in the Texas A&M Law Review, is now available on SSRN. Abstract: Whether we can expect others to listen—and whether we choose to listen to others—have become central challenges in handling conflicts around polarized and high-profile political matters. For … Continue reading Reynolds on the Listening Dilemma →

My Oregon Law colleague shared this alarming graph today (you have to click the title of this post to see the chart): Our political positions and partisan affinities resonate as a matter of emotions and values, and the powerlessness that so many feel must be fueling the responses people had to this survey. H/T Ofer … Continue reading Feelings of Political Violence →

This year’s AALS will be a virtual meeting, which for many of us means that we will actually be able to attend the meeting. I just signed up and selected my “agenda” of programs. Among those is the panel brought to us by our ADR Section — “Effective Twitter Advocacy: Is It Possible?” — it … Continue reading AALS 2021: ADR Panel →

FOI Amy Cohen (Ohio State) has published a post on the Law and Political Economy blog describing her new article, “A Labor Theory of Negotiation: From Integration to Value Creation.” I was fortunate to read an early version of this article — it’s incredible! Here’s an excerpt from that post that gives you a sense … Continue reading Cohen on Negotiation and Political Economy →

Listening is a bedrock ADR practice. Does this mean we must always listen? Or can listening sometimes make things worse? Recent debates around “cancel culture” and “deplatforming” are of special interest to our field, which values the sharing of diverse perspectives but also appreciates complex social dynamics and strategic communication. In my new article (forthcoming … Continue reading The Listening Dilemma →

Since posting our call for papers, we have received several inquiries about what a proposal for Star Wars and Conflict Resolution should look like. The short answer is that we are not expecting any particular format or presentation. We are delighted to receive proposals that make sense (in terms of organization, structure, specificity, whether to … Continue reading Sample Proposal Formats for Star Wars Book →

Any Star Wars fans out there? At the recent AALS ADR WIP conference, Noam Ebner (Creighton) and I unveiled our new project — an edited collection of essays tentatively titled Star Wars and Conflict Resolution. We are in the call for proposals stage, seeking 300-word proposals for short chapters (4000-5000 words). We plan to build … Continue reading Call for Proposals →

Scott Hechinger, attorney and policy director for the Brooklyn Defender Services, has a fascinating op-ed in today’s New York Times, calling for the end of mandatory minimums. He argues that one of the problems with mandatory minimums is that they make police misconduct more difficult to manage. From the perspective of negotiation, mandatory minimums represent … Continue reading Mandatory Minimums and Plea Bargaining →

Peter Boghossian (Portland State) has posted three short videos in the New York Times on disagreeing better. He is co-author of How to Have Impossible Conversations, which I am going to check out now. I liked these videos because they provide examples the kinds of micro-moves that are so important for navigating difficult conversations today. … Continue reading Boghossian on Disagreeing Better →

Last week, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) finalized a revised rule (the 2019 Final Rule) removing the prohibition in the 2016 Rule on pre-dispute arbitration agreements for long-term healthcare facilities but keeping provisions from the 2016 rule “banning facilities from requiring that residents sign arbitration agreements as a condition of admission to … Continue reading Long-Term Healthcare Arbitration Update →

From FOI Noam Ebner (Creighton), a wonderful and thought-provoking essay on preparing our students for practice in the technological era, describing work he has been doing with Alyson Carrel, Erin Archerd, and others: No, mediation jobs are not going to be taken over by robots. I though I’d foreshadow this important point, as any discussion … Continue reading Ebner on the New Mediation Syllabus →