Suppose you are a business entity or an individual negotiating a contract that contemplates an ongoing business relationship with another person or entity. You need to consider many things, not the least of which is what kinds of provisions, if any, you might want to include in your contract that deal with the contingency of one or more disputes arising in the future. You might decide, for example, to agree to arbitrate disputes. You might decide that arbitration is too risky in the circumstances and that you would rather have a court resolve your dispute, but that you nevertheless want to include provisions in your contract dealing with choice of law, choice of forum, permissible remedies and the like. These are all important decisions that need to made carefully and often with the help of an attorney having skill and experience in such matters.
But they are not the only things that you might consider or be asked by your counterpart to consider. Whether or not you agree to arbitrate, or to litigate but only in a particular forum under the law of a particular state, there is something else you might want or be asked to consider: an agreement to mediate future disputes arising out of or relating to the contract and the business relationship it creates.
Should you give such an agreement some serious thought? There is no single correct answer to that question because, like most other things, the devil is in the details. But, depending on the circumstances, an agreement to mediate as a precondition to judicial or arbitral dispute resolution might be a very good idea. Continue Reading »
