This article is aimed at clarifying the legal implications of blockchain when applied to contracts and the impact of smart contracts in conflict prevention and dispute resolution.

The Internet and communications technology are changing every aspect of our lives. Now ODR is set to revolutionize commercial dispute resolution across APEC with the adoption of a new ODR Collaborative Framework. In this article, we will look at the challenges APEC small businesses face today and how the APEC ODR Collaborative Framework provides a much-needed solution to improve justice and boost trade.

We are currently witnessing a revolution in access to justice and a parallel revolution in justice delivery, design and experience. As dispute resolution design scholars tell us, the implementation of any new dispute intervention plan in a system should involve all of its stakeholders from the beginning. In our justice system there are three primary stakeholders, who have been traditionally involved in processes of innovation and change: the courts, the parties and the lawyers. Courts and parties have been involved in the development of online dispute resolution (ODR). However, one significant justice stakeholder, the legal profession, has been relatively absent from the table thus far – whether by lack of awareness, by lack of will or innovative spirit or by lack of invitation: lawyers.

This is a written representation of the presentation given on 29 October 2019, at 3:20 pm Eastern at the NCSC ODR2019 Summit held at the Colonial Williamsburg Lodge in Williamsburg, VA.

The authors presented on this topic during the International ODR Forum 2019 in Williamsburg, Virginia. The goal of this presentation was to share practices and ideas that have worked well in the design phase of an Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) pilot project for the State Courts of Colorado.

Technology has revolutionized the world in the last century, although computation devices have existed for millennia and punched-card data processing for two centuries. After 70 years of progress in technology and telecommunications with all the knowledgeable computer specialists and the sophistication of online services, it is high time public and private justice offered fair access to a fundamental human right: justice online. The role of technology in dispute resolution is high on the agenda, and the topic is increasingly at the centre of discussions. In a world that is rapidly developing, it is surprising to observe that online dispute resolution (ODR) is lagging behind.

As a judicial officer and court administrators tasked with creating and implementing online dispute resolution (ODR), we have found it both challenging and rewarding to operate at the nascent stage of this brave new world for courts. There is no standard set of best practices clearly tailored for this unique task. Instead, we draw on the wisdom of similarly situated programmes and standards to guide us. Specifically, we have consulted the National Standards for Court-Connected Mediation Programs, Resolution Systems Institute’s Guide to Program Success and the National Center for State Courts’ many articles on ODR. From these resources, and our own experiences, we recommend that court administrators charged with designing ODR systems consider several questions.

Infractions are the most voluminous case type in most court locations. Through two initiatives funded by the National Highway Safety Administration, namely eCitation and On-line Disposition, the Connecticut Judicial Branch has been able to establish a comprehensive electronic citation and adjudication platform during a time of significant budgetary challenges.

The EU internal market has undergone several developments in the past decades. One of the main developments is the inclusion of a digital dimension. One of the fields in which these developments are very evident is the consumer market. A further development of e-commerce is however hindered because there are no suitable redress mechanisms for consumers involved in low-value, high volume claims typically arising from e-commerce transactions. In response to the ills of existing redress mechanisms, an emerging trend of consumer alternative dispute resolution (ADR) and consumer online dispute resolution (ODR) schemes has been identified throughout the Member States (MS) aimed to offer consumers a swift, cheap and simple procedure through which they can enforce their rightsThis paper outlines the EU approach to Consumer ADR/ODR, gives some observations of the functioning of the legislation in practice and concludes with some thoughts for the future.

Getting cases decided in court within a reasonable time is a problem in many countries and in some cases can present a veritable crisis of justice. An alternative that is commonly used in judicial proceedings (at least in many civil law countries) is to hold a preliminary hearing in order to encourage a settlement. This article aims to analyse online dispute resolution as an efficient alternative to resolve the crisis of justice in Brazil.

Canadian courts and tribunals are successfully incorporating online dispute resolution (ODR) mechanisms into their processes in order to offer user-centric dispute resolution systems aimed at increasing access to justice. Although they use different approaches, three such examples, British Columbia’s Civil Resolution Tribunal, Ontario’s Condominium Authority Tribunal, and Quebec’s PARLe-OPC platform, have all demonstrated how public ODR can increase litigants’ sense of justice while respecting basic legal tenets. This article serves as a short introduction to this user-centric Canadian approach.

This article was adapted from a presentation at the ODR Forum 2019 in Williamsburg.

In 2015 the Conference of Chief Justices and the Conference of State Court Administrators (CCJ/COSCA), representing the leadership of the state court systems of the United States, adopted the following goal for access to justice for civil legal issues.

[…] the Conference of Chief Justices and the Conference of State Court Administrators support the aspirational goal of 100 percent access to effective assistance for essential civil legal needs.

The International Conflict Resolution Community has developed considerable theory and many case studies about ripeness and readiness for mediation. Readiness involves a readiness of the disputant to resolve the conflict, while ripeness indicates the time is appropriate to attempt a resolution. There is a sparse amount of theory about these issues in commercial and family dispute resolution (FDR). We discuss the practice of readiness for mediation, FDR and online dispute resolution and develop practices about when to mediate such disputes – especially when domestic violence has occurred.

The judicial landscape in Europe for commercial litigation is changing rapidly. Many EU countries are establishing international business courts or have done so recently. Unmistakably, the approaching Brexit has had an effect on this development. In the last decades England and Wales – more precise, the Commercial Court in London - has built up a leading position as the most popular jurisdiction for resolving commercial disputes. The central question for the coming years will be what effect the new commercial courts in practice will have on the current dominance of English law and the leading position of the London court. In this article I address this question by focusing on the development of a new commercial court in the Netherlands: the Netherlands Commercial Court (NCC).

In establishing the Brussels International Business Court (BIBC), Belgium is following an international trend to attract international business disputes to English-speaking state courts. The BIBC will be an autonomous business court with the competence to settle, in English, disputes between companies throughout Belgium. This article focuses on the BIBC’s constitutionality, composition, competence, proceedings and funding, providing a brief analysis and critical assessment of each of these points. At the time of writing, the Belgian Federal Parliament has not yet definitively passed the Bill establishing the BIBC, meaning that amendments are still possible.

In recent years, the Netherlands and Germany have added themselves to the ever-growing number of countries opting for the creation of an international commercial court. The Netherlands Commercial Court (NCC) and the German Chambers for International Commercial Disputes (Kammern für internationale Handelssachen, KfiH) will conduct proceedings entirely in English and follow their own, diverging rules of civil procedure. Aspiring to become the future venues of choice in international commercial disputes, the NCC law and the legislative proposal for the establishment of the KfiH allow parties to agree on their jurisdiction and entail detailed provisions regulating such agreements. In particular, the NCC requires the parties’ express and in writing agreement to litigate before it. In a similar vein, the KfiH legislative proposal requires in some instances an express and in writing agreement. Although such strict formal requirements are justified by the need to safeguard the procedural rights of weaker parties such as small enterprises and protect them from the peculiarities of the NCC and the KfiH, this article questions their compliance with the requirements upon choice of court agreements under Article 25 (1) Brussels Ibis Regulation. By qualifying agreements in favour of the NCC and the KfiH first as functional jurisdiction agreements and then as procedural or court language agreements this article concludes that the formal requirements set by the NCC law and the KfiH proposal undermine the effectiveness of the Brussels Ibis Regulation, complicate the establishment of these courts’ jurisdiction and may thus threaten their attractiveness as future litigation destinations.

The Court of the Astana International Financial Center is a new dispute resolution initiative meant to attract investors in much the same way as it has been done in the case of the courts and arbitration mechanisms of similar financial centers in the Persian Gulf. This paper examines such initiatives from a comparative perspective, focusing on their Private International Law aspects such as jurisdiction, applicable law and recognition and enforcement of judgments and arbitration awards. The paper concludes that their success, especially in the case of the younger courts, will depend on the ability to build harmonious relationships with the domestic courts of each host country.

The liberal globalised order has brought increased focus on the regulation of international commerce, and especially dispute resolution. Enforcement of contracts has been a concern largely owing to the insufficiencies of the legal systems, especially relating to the institutional structure, and it holds true for India as well. The commercial courts mechanism – international and domestic – with innovative features aimed at providing expedited justice is witnessing much traction. India, similar to many other jurisdictions, legislated in favour of specialized dispute resolution mechanisms for commercial disputes that could help improve the procedures for enforcement of contracts. This research attempts to critique the comparable strengths and the reform spaces within the Indian legislation on commercial courts. It parses the status of commercial dispute resolution in India especially in the context of cross-border contracts and critiques India’s attempt to have specialised courts to address commercial dispute resolution.