Mediation, Improvisations, and All That Jazz

In the present article, we will be exploring the subject of improvisation generally from the perspective of mediation and jazz as performance arts; the roles of the jazz musician, the mediator, and the mediation advocate as creative problem solvers; the elements of jazz in mediation; and the collective conversation in jazz as compared with the collective conversation in mediation

Defining the Ethical Limits of Acceptable Deception in Mediation

In a recent law review article I authored for the Loyola University of Chicago Law Review, Mediation Magic: Its Use and Abuse, I addressed the perplexing problem of the current lack of ethical guidance available to mediators and mediation advocates on the question of permissible uses of deception in mediation generally and in caucused mediation, in particular. This article is a sequel to that publication, offering the reader a condensation of some of the ideas contained in that article and some additional thoughts on criteria that might be appropriate to consider when designing a truthfulness standard for mediation

Music, Mediation, and Superstrings: The Quest for Universal Harmony

It is my thesis that to be an effective mediator, one needs to be a musician at heart (if not in fact)-both a composer and performer. Music is what a mediator does-what a mediator makes. To design or perform well, a mediator must at least understand music composition and performance in all its aspects. A mediator has no choice in the matter, because music, in a broad sense, permeates nature and is considered to be the quintessential ingredient of all matter and energy-of everything or unthing in the universe. To understand how music relates to what he or she does, the mediator must first comprehend its pervasiveness and its power in nature. The mediator must become acquainted with the superstring theory of elementary particles, a theory that describes the basic building block of all matter, of nature itself