Litigation, Essay Example

Many of the cases in America will never have their day in court. That is because most people cannot afford the trouble it would cost to finance a trial lawyer. In the current environment, the cost of litigation has become a huge problem. If one were to employ an attorney to defend them in a legal suit it would costs thousands of thousands of dollars even if the cases were eventually dismissed. Many companies at present are already using ADR techniques to their advantage, which they found saved substantial costs in legal fees.

ADR or Alternative Resolution of Disputes offers the means to control the sky rocketing costs of legal fees. ADR agreements are mostly non-binding and can be appealed in court procedures. The primary goal is the resolution of disputes without the need for any litigation. The goal of the procedure is to do a fifty-fifty split and most of them are entered voluntarily. This demonstrates that the parties in ADR proceedings usually come away satisfied with the results. (Cheesman, 2010) defines litigation as the procedure of bringing maintaining and defending the lawsuit.

The traditional form of litigation favors the concept of resolving the dispute through court procedure, probably involving trial and investigation (Lewis, 2010). Although it is not necessary for the lawyers to be present, the plaintiff and the defendant need to be represented by their attorneys. The attorney in both perspectives will provide legal advice to their client, and then will display the positions of the client in the appropriate hearing in court. They use the attorneys as their voices in the courtroom such that communication to anyone including the other party will be done through their legal representative unless the judge or magistrate says otherwise. There are obvious advantages that ADR enjoys over the traditional form of litigation.

As mentioned earlier, cost effectiveness is the most popular in that category (Bingham, et al, 2009). ADR almost costs a quarter of what litigation costs on a normal occasion. That is because ADR has a fixed cost that virtually does not supersede the budget while litigation on the other hand, is unpredictable. Even something quite small can turn into an incredibly large legal battle. Litigation usually takes more time than its alternative, to an extent that some legal proceedings end up in court for a decade. Speed is another primary advantage for ADR in that while a dispute in court could drag on for years, the same dispute could be handled in a space of months.

When litigation proceedings go to court, most of the time, especially if the case involved high profile individuals, or companies, then the contents of the case become quite public. One of the real benefits of the ADR system is the amount of confidentiality that it embodies. ADR agreements are confidential proceedings and the less the people that get involved, the less the likelihood it will reach the public knowledge. Some companies cannot afford the bad public image that a lawsuit would bring if they belong to the advertising sector.

The other advantage that ADR offers is that the parties are usually free to accommodate power imbalances. Some disputes that happen in companies are characterized by imbalances in the power system. Here there will be a side with superior financial resources that will have the better advantage over the other. This is because it will purchase highly talented legal advisors, who will almost guarantee a win even with a weak case on their hands. Therefore, it seems traditional litigation is outdated in that it is cumbersome, costly and unfair to a percentage of society.

References

Bingham, L. B., Nabatchi, T., Senger, J. M., & Jackman, M. S. (2009). Dispute resolution

and the vanishing trial: Comparing federal government litigation and ADR outcomes. Ohio State Journal on Dispute Resolution, 24 (2), 225-262. Retrieved from Academic Search Complete

Cheeseman, H.R. (2010). Business law: Legal environment, online commerce, business

Ethics, and international issues (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall

Lewis, M. (2010). Traditional Litigation. Law Office. Retrieved from

http://www.meredithlewislaw.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=50&Itemid=61