We are very excited to announce our Call for Papers for the 4th ADR Research Network Round Table to be held at the Faculty of Law, University of New South Wales, on Saturday 12th and Sunday 13th September 2015.

The round tables are designed to encourage a collaborative and supportive research environment in which papers are workshopped and discussed in detail.   Papers in draft form are distributed ahead of time to participants, to enable thoughtful and constructive quality feedback. On the day, speakers are given up to 30 minutes for presentation, with equal time for discussion.

We welcome proposals that consider dispute resolution from a scholarly, critical and/or empirical perspective. We particularly encourage submissions from postgraduate students and early career researchers. All proposals will be considered. Papers must not have been published or submitted for publication, as the focus is work in progress.

There will be a limit to the number of papers able to be part of the round table discussions. A panel will select round table papers from abstracts submitted. The aim is to be as inclusive as time and numbers allow. The following selection criteria will be applied:

– papers take a scholarly, critical and/or empirical perspective on an area of dispute resolution;

– the round table will include a spread of participants across stages of career; and

– a well-balanced range of work will be presented at the round table to provide diversity, to develop the field and to enable cohesive discussion.

Participation is on a self-funded basis.

Deadline for Abstracts:      30 March 2015

(300 words maximum, to adrresearchnetwork@gmail.com)

Date for notification:       15 April 2015

       Draft Papers due:            1 August 2015

Please see the full Call for Papers document for more detail: Call for Papers 4th ADR Research Network Round Table

In a recent UK High Court Queen’s Bench Division case of Emirates Trading Agency LLC v Prime Ministerial Exports Private Limited [2014] EWHC 2104 (Comm), Justice Teare concluded that a dispute resolution clause in which parties agreed to “first seek to resolve the dispute or claim by friendly discussion” before referring a dispute to arbitration was enforceable. His Honour’s reasons were summarised at para [64]:
• The agreement was not incomplete; no term was missing. The parties had agreed to the condition precedent to seek to resolve their dispute by “friendly discussion” and that if no solution had been reached within four weeks, then the arbitration clause could be invoked. Unlike an agreement to engage in mediation, “friendly discussion” did not require details of the process involved or appointment of a third party dispute resolution practitioner.
• The agreement was not uncertain – “an obligation to seek to resolve a dispute by friendly discussions in good faith has an identifiable standard, namely, fair, honest and genuine discussions aimed at resolving a dispute.”
• The agreement was not uncertain merely because it might be difficult to prove a breach of the clause in some circumstances. In some circumstances it could be concluded that a party had failed to engage in friendly discussion (for example, by not engaging in any attempt to negotiate).
• It is inappropriate to suggest that a clause that has been freely entered into by commercial parties, by which they have “voluntarily accepted a restriction upon their freedom not to negotiate” is inconsistent with the position of a negotiating party.
• Enforcement of the agreement was consistent with the public interest on two bases; first, freedom of contract and secondly, to avoid expensive and time consuming formal dispute resolution processes (in this case, arbitration).
His Honour considered a range of prior decisions in the UK, Australia and Singapore about the enforceability of dispute resolution clauses. Teare J was particularly influenced by the reasoning of Alsopp P in the New South Wales Court of Appeal case United Group Rail Services v Rail Corporation New South Wales (2009) 127 Con LR 202 regarding an agreement to “meet and undertake genuine and good faith negotiation with a view to resolving the dispute.” However, Teare J disagreed with Alsopp J’s limitation of negotiations under such a clause to discussion of the parties’ assessment of their rights and obligations under their contract. Rather, the topics that could form part of a “friendly discussion” that aims to resolve a dispute are unlimited and potentially much broader than the contractual rights and obligations of the parties.

This is an interesting case for those curious about developments in the judicial treatment of dispute resolution clauses and attitudes towards the concept of “good faith” in negotiations.