ABSTRACT
Family mediation, in particular, has emerged from its innovative, empirical grassroots as an autonomous professional practice independent of other professional interventions in the field of separation and divorce, such as therapy, counselling, social work and legal practice. Family mediation practice in Britain is governed furthermore by European legal instruments and government-sanctioned quality assurance standards covering both individual practice competence and quality assurance standards relating to the provision and delivery of legally-aided family mediation services. The spirit informing the pioneering origins of mediation in Britain was a transatlantic reflection of the ‘new consciousness’ that had arisen in the social movement of the 1960s in the United States, in the community justice movement in particular. It is universally accepted that the process of mediation has four fundamental and universal characteristics: the impartiality of the mediator; the voluntariness of the process; the confidentiality of the relationship between the mediator and the parties; and the procedural flexibility available to the mediator.
