Union Member States

Making information sessions on the use of mediation easily available throughout the eu. a video guide to facilitate settlement.

LOCATION

Union Member States

SERVICE TYPE

ADR Technical Assistance

PROJECT TIMELINE

December 2008 – June 2010

MAKING INFORMATION SESSIONS ON THE USE OF MEDIATION EASILY AVAILABLE THROUGHOUT THE EU. A VIDEO GUIDE TO FACILITATE SETTLEMENT.

Despite the passage of the Mediation Directive in 2008, in many jurisdictions, lawyers, jurists and litigants were not yet familiar with mediation, making it difficult for advocates to counsel clients or for parties to make informed decisions on their dispute resolution options.

This project aimed at contributing to the overall objective of increasing the use of mediation in resolving cross-border commercial and civil disputes. It did so by assisting courts in implementing Article 5 of the Directive on mediation in civil and commercial matters, which deals with information sessions about mediations being “held and easily available” to parties and advocates. The specific objective of the project was to create a specialized, multi-language video about cross-border mediation, allowing the persons responsible for providing mediation information sessions to easily make these sessions available.

SELECT ACTIVITIES

  • Wrote, designed, and produced a 300 second specialized video about cross-border mediation in civil and commercial matters. The process included extensive contact with stakeholders and experts from the participating Member States in order to receive feedback and adapt the scripts.
  • The video was dubbed in the 23 EU languages (Bulgarian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, English, French, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Irish, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Portugal, Romanian, Slovak, Slovene, Spanish, Swedish, German) and distributed to Courts, Bar Associations, companies, law firms and individuals across the EU.

SELECT RESULTS

A key result of the project is that the video has made information about mediation easily available. Considering the innovative, high-quality video that has resulted, the impact of this project on the legal community is unquestionably positive. In addition, the feedback we have received regarding the video has been unequivocally complimentary. We consider this positive feedback a confirmation of the fulfilment of the results.

CLIENT

European Commission