Mediation of Construction Disputes in the United States

Abstract

Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR), including partnering, dispute review boards, mediation and arbitration, have become the primary ways of settling construction disputes in the United States. This article describes why mediation is used to resolve disputes and describes what the mediation process looks like. Mediation procedures and techniques may be quite different depending upon the style of the mediator (facilitative or evaluative) and the type of dispute (community or construction) being mediated. An evaluative style of mediation is used for construction disputes in the United States. The article discusses what mediation users want from mediators, the phases of development of ADR in the United States, as well as the costs of mediation. An appendix describes a model of mediation used for community disputes which can become the basis for understanding the evaluative approach to mediation used in construction disputes.