“What’s the point?” asked the preacher, rhetorically. “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity” was his text, taken from Ecclesiastes, an Old Testament book apparently attributed to Solomon, whose wisdom…
Brings you down to buy a paper
If you read between the lines
No one seems to have the answer
To living in these troubled times
Still you try and you try
And you do what you must do
“Living in these…
A couple of weeks ago I came across a poem by the Native American writer Joy Harjo, entitled “Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings.” The title made me curious, as might be expected for a mediator. You…
Photo credit: Christof Häuser, via Nathalie Birli
We mediators are accustomed to recognising empathy as an important part of our mediation repertoire which is consistently reinforced in our…
Two weeks before the Singapore signing ceremony of the UN Convention on International Mediated Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation, the Romanian Parliament adopted modifications to the…
(I first wrote about mediation's values 12 years ago at the tail end of a Masters in Conflict Resolution and Mediation Studies.(1) Two years of study had convinced me that it is our values, rather…
It was an amazing week for Singapore! The highlight was the signing of the UN Convention on International Mediated Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation, now known as the Singapore…
“If two people are in a room, there are actually six to consider: “What each person is; what each person thinks he or she is; and what each person thinks the other is.” So began a recent Guardian…
Ever since I took a course developed by Ronald Heifetz on Exercising Leadership at Harvard Kennedy School of Government, I wanted to reflect on how much mediation and leadership have in common. As I…
“For nobody would understand,
And you kill what you fear,
And you fear what you don't understand.”
Powerful words. As a progressive rock music aficionado, these lyrics taken from the song "Duke’s…
