This Volume is a special issue, almost entirely dedicated to the TMD symposium that took place on 1 December 2016 at the premises of Intersentia Publishing company near Antwerp. The symposium addressed the current Belgian and Dutch plans for new legislation aiming to further the use of mediation by intending litigants. The TMD Editorial Board is honoured that an insight into the respective plans was provided by the highest level authorities, that is: Mr. Koen Geens, the Belgian Minister of Justice, and Mr. Dennis Hesemans, senior counsel to the Dutch Minister of Justice. The Board is equally honoured that on behalf of the European Commission, Mrs. Karen Vandekerckhove, Acting Head of Unit at DG Justice and Consumers, was willing to discuss the outcomes of the recent official Evaluation of the EU Mediation Directive 52/2008. These findings made it possible to assess the Belgian and Dutch plans in a broader European perspective. The presentations delivered by these three keynote speakers have been reworked and are included as main contributions in this Volume.

Mediation plays a critical role in the development of any civil justice system. The positive effects of mediation could only manifest if the process is protected in ways that allow parties to truly be able to choose what is best in their interests and explore options free from interference from anyone else. The Chinese legal culture, coupled with a systemic distortion of the function of mediation during the period between March 2008 and March 2013, made it very difficult to develop an authentic mediation system that places party autonomy and other core principles at the heart of the process. As much as the leaders of the Supreme People’s Court today are aware of the need to strengthen the courts role in declaring legal norms and enforcing rights, it is argued that courts (especially lower courts) are likely to continue to use judicial mediation for institutional or strategic purposes.

This article is about the process of Collaborative Practice, also known as Collaborative law, and more specific collaborative divorce. The aim of this article is to explain what the process entails, when it can be used, what the benefits for clients are and what a professional can gain by making this method his own.
The history of the Collaborative Practice process and the manner the process was introduced from the United States to Europe are reported. Furthermore, the development of the Collaborative Practice community in Europe, with a focus on the expansion in the Netherlands and Belgium, is described.
On the basis of a practical case the process will be explained and the findings, experiences and reviews from the multidisciplinary team and the clients will be exemplified.

Over the last years the expectations of Belgian clients have changed and the Flemish lawyer needs to adapt his positioning. Clients are looking for a personalized solution that not only provides a solution for the substantive (pure legal) aspect of the dispute, but also meets, at least takes into account, the more emotional and relational aspects of the conflict.
In collaborative negotiation (also called principled or interest-based negotiation), the approach is to treat the relationship as an important and valuable element while seeking an equitable and fair agreement for all parties.
As part of the collaborative law method, each party engages its own specially trained Collaborative attorney whose job consists in helping to settle the dispute outside the court. If one of the parties however decides to go to court, the collaborative law process terminates and both attorneys are disqualified from any further involvement in the case.
The Association of French- and German-speaking Bars of Belgium has integrated collaborative law in its code of ethics. The Association of Dutch speaking Bars of Belgium looks in which way collaborative law can also become a part of the practice of the Flemish lawyer.

Taking the recent European Commission’s Report on the application of Mediation Directive 2008/52/EC as a starting point, the authors set out to reconstruct the pattern of ADR/mediation activities undertaken by the EU and the Council of Europe over the past 40 years. The authors conclude that the European initiatives have been conducive to a broadening and deepening of the ADR debate. Remarkable shifts can be observed in the emphasis placed by the European agencies during this period, notably a shift from emancipatory to efficiency-based arguments. The inherent coupling of private mediation and public adjudication entails risks however for each of these distinct conflict resolution strategies. The authors call for advanced research designs to generate the data needed for a genuine evidence-based policy in this domain.

It is often assumed business mediation in The Netherlands is not used to its full potential. This article reports on 17 interviews with lawyers from leading Dutch business law firms about their considerations regarding mediation. Most reasons mentioned to turn to mediation are in line with the advantages of mediation described in the literature. Unique positive considerations are: (i) mediation may serve as a substitute for confidential discussions between lawyers and (ii) a mediator may help to sidetrack the sub-standard lawyer on the other side. Reasons mentioned to refrain from mediation are: (i) attempts to resolve the conflict have already been made at various hierarchical levels of the companies involved; (ii) for lawyers with adequate negotiation skills a mediator has little added value; (iii) parties require a formal judgement; (iv) mediation implies some sort of compromise; (v) lack of trust between parties; (vi) not knowing any sufficiently skilled business mediators.

The author notices that more and more Belgian judges seem to have understood what mediation is and what benefits it can bring to litigating parties over adjudicated solutions. Currently, judges have no means to force the parties to try to settle their dispute through mediation. Judicial initiatives aimed at convincing the parties and their lawyers to try mediation, are too often simply ignored. The article contains quotes from various tribunals advocating or ordering mediation before the continuation of the trial. The author’s argument is that the law should enable judges to force the parties to mediation, i.e. at least to participate in a joint session with the designated mediator. He describes what ought to be included. A new bill is currently being prepared by the Ministry of Justice – inspired by the Netherlands model – that will change the rules of civil procedure with a view to enhancing recourse to mediation.