ABSTRACT
The effort to introduce alternative methodologies for resolving legal disputes into the mainstream of American corporate and legal systems seems to be meeting resistance. This chapter aims to identify some of the underlying barriers to use of alternative dispute resolution processes, particularly those that rely upon some form of consensus building or voluntary agreement to reach a solution. Whether the client is a corporation or an individual, human instincts and motivations are critical considerations in the process of dispute resolution. Many of the individual inhibitions affecting clients are operative as well at the lawyer level. The lawyer faced with a proposal to utilize an alternative means of dispute resolution may object or even aggressively oppose it. Alternative methods of dispute resolution, other than those that provide a decision maker with authority to bind the parties, appear to demand levels of human behavior and personal autonomy.
