Running head: OPTION 1

Compare and Contrast traditional litigation with non-traditional
Option 1
Law/531
MJ Meade
May 24, 2011
Judge Gregory P.Holder

Society is familiar with litigation and its ramifications. One hires an attorney and files a lawsuit requiring the other to hire an attorney and defend the lawsuit. Litigation is expensive, time consuming, emotionally draining and unpredictable. With litigation, you never know the outcome until a judge or jury decides. Alternative dispute resolution, including arbitration and mediation, has been gaining popularity as a method to resolve some of the shortcomings of litigation.
Arbitration and mediation are alternatives to litigation and sometimes used in conjunction with litigation to attempt to avoid litigating a dispute to its conclusion. Arbitration and mediation use a neutral third party. Both can be binding; however, it is customary to employ mediation as a non-binding procedure and arbitration as a binding procedure. Arbitrators act similar to a judge d making decisions about evidence and giving written opinions, which can be binding or non-binding. Arbitration is conducted with one arbitrator. The most common procedure is for each side to select an arbitrator and for those two arbitrators to select a third arbitrator. The dispute is presented to the three arbitrators chosen, with a majority of the arbitrators rendering a written decision.
Mediation, on the other hand, is conducted before a single mediator who does not judge the case but helps assist a discussion and eventually resolve the dispute. Mediation has been found to be effective in resolving of cases and greatly reduces the trial docket of courts. Mediation has such a great success rate because the parties are brought together in a neutral environment where they can freely and confidentially present their position in front of a neutral third