Today House and Senate negotiators reached agreement on legislation that redefines federal oversight of the financial services industry. The agreement may have a major effect on arbitration in the financial services industry. Overlawyered reports, “Tucked away in the Obama administration’s proposals for revamping regulation of financial services is a provision that would apparently allow federal … Continue reading End of Arbitration in Financial Services Contracts? →

As I posted earlier this week, I am in Kosovo for a few weeks at the invitation of the American Bar Association to do an assessment of legal education in the country.  As part of that process I had meetings outside of Pristina so we set out for a full day road trip.  It is … Continue reading Road Trip, Kosovo style →

Pepperdine’s Peter Robinson has published an article titled Settlement Conference Judge – Legal Lion or Problem Solving Lamb: An Empirical Documentation of Judicial Settlement Conference Practices and Techniques in which he reports on an empirical study he conducted of judges in California to assess their methodologies in settlement conferencing. As he acknowledges, the results cannot … Continue reading Robinson on Judicial Settlement Conferences →

Yesterday Sarah gave us her views on the Supreme Court’s opinion in the Rent-a-Center West case – a big win for business.  For other takes on the case in the legal blogoshpere see: Prawfsblawg – Today’s arbitration decision in Rent-A-Center v. Jackson SCOTUS blog – New rule for deciding validity of agreements to arbitrate arbitration … Continue reading More on Rent-a-Center West v. Jackson →

Today in Jackson v. Rent-A-Center West, the Court again confirmed its view that challenges to a contract which contains an arbitration agreement will go to the arbitrator, a view that it has held and repeatedly affirmed since its decision in Prima Paint in the mid 1960s. Under Prima Paint, a party may enforce a potentially … Continue reading Victory for Business in Rent-A-Center West v. Jackson →

The Federal Judicial Center has released a whitepaper entitled In Their Words: Attorney Views About Costs and Procedures in Federal Civil Litigation, that reports on interviews with 35 attorneys exploring the costs of federal civil litigation. The report contains many predictable conclusions (costs increase with higher stakes; IP litigation is really expensive) as well as … Continue reading FJC Report on Litigation Costs and Impact of Arbitration →

I am in Kosovo for a few weeks at the invitation of the American Bar Association to conduct an assessment of legal education in the country.  Kosovo is a country whose history has been determined by conflict.  There are therefore no shortage of dispute resolution issues and topics here and I will try to write … Continue reading Greetings from Kosovo →

This morning our Marquette Foreclosure Mediation Program was singled out as a primary reason that the Mayor of Milwaukee won a public policy award for “Innovative Response to Economic Downturn” from the Public Policy Forum and last week the MFMP won “Lawyer of the Year” from the Milwaukee Bar Association.  Not a bad week!  I … Continue reading Theory to Practice (and the lovely results) →

I reported last week on BP’s suggestion that it would appoint an independent mediator to help resolve claims relating to the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Now, BPs hand has been forced by the Obama Administration. BP announced today that it would establish a $20 billion fund to compensate victims, and that the fund would be overseen … Continue reading Feinberg to Oversee BP Fund →

Recently posted to SSRN: an article describing a study of lawyers’ prediction about litigation.  It turns out that lawyers are overconfident in their assessments about the likelihood of success.  This result should surprise every person who has never met a lawyer. The study also found that lawyers don’t improve with experience on this measure, and … Continue reading “Lawyers Are Overconfident” and other shocking discoveries →