ABSTRACT
In all the cases included in this study the narratives from questionnaires and interviews enriched, expanded, and humanized the quantitative analysis. After all, the ultimate reason for both the civil court system and a mediation alternative is to resolve disputes between people. In a basic but abstract way, we are all “equal before the law.” Clearly, however, this study and others like it reveal inequalities of such a complex nature that articulating them stretches the tools we have available. I have separated the disputants into overlapping groups, and analyzed mediation dyads as if the individuals fully represented those groups and categories. This methodology has a logic and legitimacy that reveals real group patterns. Yet this study would not be complete without including more of the actual cases, with the voices and idiosyncratic stories of individual humans at the forefront.
