Barack Obama, Syria, and the Exertion of American Military Power

This article reviews American policy toward Syria since the onset of its civil war there. It concentrates on debates and decisions about the use of American military power to influence events there. Before 2014, President Barack Obama consistently refused to use military power and, while he did initiate military action against the Islamic State in the summer of 2014, many in and out of the administration thought he should do more. This article identifies reasons for Obama’s hesitance and argues that some of his pre-2014 fears about using military power have been realized in later years

Employment Arbitration Agreements: The Case for Ethical Standards for Dispute Resolution System Designers

Dispute resolution design is an emerging field, both academically and professionally. Attorneys, mediators, and arbitrators, the other roles in the alternative dispute resolution process, have codes of ethics which guide their conduct. Dispute resolution designers, however, have no such guidelines. This article uses the example of mandatory arbitration agreements in the employment context to illustrate why this lack of ethical guidelines for dispute resolutions designers is problematic. In recent years, mandatory arbitration agreements significantly impacted employment law and litigation. The two most problematic provisions that often appear in mandatory arbitration agreements in the workplace context are cost sharing provisions and class action (or multi-party) waivers. Courts have been hostile to efforts to minimalize the impact of class action waivers in arbitration agreements, and arbitration services have been powerless to ease their impact in light of the developing jurisprudence. This paper will examine this issue and explore how the enforceability of mandatory arbitration in employment cases has evolved through the courts. The paper will also discuss a possible path to overcoming the negative impact of these agreements and propose a modification in the approach of dispute resolution designers that would provide a possible remedy