Mediation provides an alternative to litigation in the courts to resolve family disputes and make arrangements about children, finances and other personal matters after separation or divorce. It is intended to reduce conflict and the time and costs involved, by helping families to reach long-lasting agreements in the best interests of all involved. Family mediators face many challenges in managing a wide range of conflicts on family matters. This book explores these challenges and evolving areas such as child consultation in mediation and the use of mediation in cross-border cases.
Family Mediation is an authoritative and practical guide which not only explains the principles and process of family mediation but also places it in the context of a changing family justice system and its interaction with other professionals and processes. The text is supplemented by appendices containing key sample documentation. An essential publication not only for trainee and experienced family mediators but also for all family justice practitioners seeking to understand how family mediation works in practice.
The first edition of this book was published in 1997. By then family mediation in Britain had for nearly twenty years been developing a limited public identity; and throughout that period Lisa Parkinson had been a central figure (arguably even the central figure) in its development.
The depth of the author’s experience of family mediation even by then; the level of her intellectual energy; her way with words; her breadth of vision; but above all her skill in communicating with different sorts of people (and in communicating how to communicate): all these qualities were likely to make the book an immediate success. But few could have forecast the level of its success. Reviewers wrote that it fizzed with good ideas; was packed with nuggets, all gold; brimmed with sheer quality; and was the most fitting text for any aspiring mediator. In the light of its necessary relationship with the family law and procedure of England and Wales it is in a way astonishing that the book was nevertheless chosen for translation into Russian, Portuguese, Italian, Spanish and Slovenian.
But it was in part its nexus with our family law and procedure at that time which has rendered the first edition – still in print – seriously out of date. It had been published a year after the enactment of the Family Law Act 1996 and in the expectation that all of it would soon be brought into force. Both expressly and by necessary implication a greatly increased role for mediation was written across much of the Act. In the book Lisa Parkinson addressed it all at length but, with typical prescience, questioned whether the new path to divorce there laid would prove too long and tortuous. In the event, of course, neither Part I nor Part II was brought into force at all.
There was, however, one Part of the Act – Part III – which did come into force; which has survived in a replaced form; and which was to have important consequences for the role of family mediation. Section 29 required most applicants for public funding for proposed applications to the court in private family law matters first to have attended an assessment for suitability for mediation; and public funding was made available for a mediator to conduct the assessment. If, as quite often occurred, mediation then followed, further public funding was made available for it. But, even when it did not follow, the process of assessment brought the possibility of mediation to the attention of one if not both of the parties and, in that it was a mainstream procedure, it came over time to raise the profile of mediation with the general public.
Now, however, we have two dramatic developments; and the result is that the timing of this second edition could not be more apt.
The first is the threatened removal of public funding for almost all applications to the court in private family law. Most mediators, certainly including Lisa Parkinson, are as concerned as are we family lawyers about the effect of its threatened removal on the ability of the family courts to work efficiently and to deliver justice. The proposal however is that in principle public funding of mediation should remain. Although the terms under which the funding for it is to continue will require the closest scrutiny lest they erode its provision through the back door, a situation in which family mediation were to be funded but family litigation were not to be funded would of course transform the landscape in favour of mediation.
The second is the Practice Direction about to be issued by the President which will substantially extend the ambit of the procedure introduced by section 29 of the Act of 1996. Instead of being a prerequisite to the grant of public funding for the making of an application, evidence of attendance at an assessment for mediation will be expected to be filed upon issue of most private law applications, whether the applicant is acting in person or is represented by solicitors privately funded or (in the rare remaining situations) publicly funded. Absent such evidence, the court will at the first appointment consider whether to use its power under Rule 3.3(1) of the new Family Procedure Rules 2010, which will come into force on 6 April 2011, to adjourn the proceedings in order to enable the parties to obtain advice about alternative dispute resolution.
For long mediators have been forecasting a breakthrough for family mediation. Today, at least, the forecast is solidly based. The subtitle introduced into this second edition is “Appropriate Dispute Resolution in a new family justice system”. Yes, the system will be new in various respects. And, yes, mediation will no longer be outside it nor even running in parallel with the system. It will indeed be in the system. So, irrespective of whether we are already family mediators or whether (as I do one day) we aspire to be family mediators, all of us who work in the system need a comprehensive understanding of family mediation, the practice of which is far more complex and multi-faceted than the uninformed observer might assume. We will need a vademecum. It will be Lisa Parkinson’s book.
Nicholas Wilson, Lord Justice of Appeal, President of the Family Mediators Association
31 January 2011.
"all of us who work in the system need a comprehensive understanding of family mediation, the practice of which is far more complex and multi-faceted...we will need a vademecum. It will be Lisa Parkinson's book"
Nicholas Wilson, Lord Justice of Appeal, President of the Family Mediators Association
"I have consistently recommended Lisa Parkinson's book as the definitive work on family mediation. I'm delighted that she has produced a 2nd edition"
Henry Brown, Mediator Co-Founder and Vice-President of the Family Mediators Association
"translated into five European languages....a significant indicator of the book's value and success if ever we saw one! if you are professionally involved in family mediation, or you aspire to be, you seriously need the latest edition of this definitive work...an excellent guide" ... read more
Phillip Taylor MBE
"a must... comprehensive and compelling...This book is not just for mediators: it is essential reading for all practitioners and judiciary in the family justice system."
Elizabeth Walsh, Solicitor and Mediator
“invaluable and indispensable … the second edition is even more comprehensive and compelling … a testament to the enduring and evolving interdisciplinary model of mediation … I recommend this book to: Experienced mediators to remind them of and reinforce their skill base; aspiring mediators for the basic building blocks; lawyers and anyone else who wants to know what family mediation is really all about; anyone interested in family mediation in the current changing climate” ... read more
Jane Staff, Family Lawyer and Mediator, North Staffordshire
"Why go to the bother of reading an English book on the subject? The answer becomes clear when you read it ... describes how referral to mediation works in practice and how the essential principles of mediation are maintained ...I recommend this book to all mediation trainers and experienced family mediators. I should be very glad if German lawyers, who have tended to steer clear of mediation, would refer their clients to mediation more readily, encouraged by the convincing evidence in this book of mediation's value and effectiveness” … read more
Christoph C. Paul, Lawyer; Mediator, Berlin
Translated from the German review published in “Zeitschrift für Konflikt-Management”, vol. 5/2011, September/October 2011, p. 160
"a must read ... the text has already been translated into 5 languages, making it a global reference for professionals at every stage of their professional development and practice ... In conclusion, Lisa Parkinson’s book has amply covered the theory and practice of mediation ... its content is informative and relevant ... an essential reference guide ... highly recommend" ...read more
Roisin O'Neill, Mediator
