Mediation Center
|
Address: |
620137, Ekaterinburg, 23 Komsomolskaya St., office 505 |
|
Telephone: |
+7 (343) 375-15-36 |
|
E-mail: |
|
|
Website: |
The Mediation Center was established by the decision of the Academic Council of Ural State Law University in 2009. It is the first center in Russia dealing with issues of conciliation procedures from the standpoint of legal science and in the system of Russian legal practices. The Center's specialists are USLU teachers, who, in addition to implementing programs of additional education and scientific activities, are actively engaged in practical mediation. The Center is headed by Svetlana Konstantinovna Zagainova, Doctor of Law, Professor of the Civil Procedure Department of Ural State Law University. The Center also includes: Nikolai Nikolaevich Tarasov - co-chairman of the Expert Council of the Center, Doctor of Law, Professor at the Department of State Theory and Law of Ural State University; Elizaveta Aleksandrovna Solomeina - leading expert of the Center, Associate professor at the Department of Civil Process of USLU; Galina Sergeevna Sheremetova - Leading Expert of the Center, Candidate of Juridical Sciences, Associate Professor at the Department of Civil Procedure of USLU; Ekaterina Alekseevna Ivanova - Analyst of the Center, Candidate of Juridical Sciences, Lecturer at the Department of Civil Procedure, Ural State Law University; Tatyana Sergeevna Khrushcheleva - Analyst of the Center, Candidate of Juridical Sciences, Lecturer at the Department of Civil Law, Ural State Law University; Igor Nikolaevich Spitsin - Candidate of Juridical Sciences, Associate Professor at the Department of Civil Procedure, Ural State Law University; Yulia Nikolaevna Vaseva - Senior Lecturer, Department of Civil Law, Ural State Law University.
The Centre's activities are conducted in several directions:
1. Mediation training. The Center has developed and tested educational programs that meet the needs of the legal community:
· training is carried out under the training program for mediators who carry out activities on a professional basis. Such training became in demand after the adoption of the Federal Law "On an Alternative Dispute Settlement Procedure with the Participation of an Intermediary (Mediation Procedure)" (Federal Law on Mediation). Currently, more than 2000 people from 50 regions of Russia have been trained under these programs. According to the results of surveys, all graduates use mediation or individual mediator techniques in their professional activities;
· training is provided in specialized professional advancement programs for certain areas of legal activity. Thus, the program "Techniques of Mediation in Judicial Activity" has been repeatedly implemented in various regions of Russia when working with courts of general jurisdiction, as well as in the execution of state contracts with the Supreme Arbitration Court of the Russian Federation and arbitration courts of constituent entities of the Russian Federation. The program "Mediation in Notary Activities" was approved and recommended by the Federal Notary Chamber of the Russian Federation for advanced training of notaries, assistant notaries, and notary chamber employees. According to specialized programs, the commissioners for the protection of entrepreneurs’ rights and employees of their offices, bailiffs, state and municipal employees are trained annually to implement mediation techniques in the activities of jurisdictional bodies;
· short-term seminars and trainings are organized aimed at getting a general understanding of the mediation procedure, developing skills in organizing and conducting negotiations in various fields of activity, building effective communication, etc.
2. Conduct mediation procedure. The adoption of the Federal Law on Mediation and the introduction of accompanying amendments to the legislation laid the foundations for the application of the mediation procedure. During the period of the Center's work, about a thousand conflict situations arising from civil law relations, including those related to entrepreneurial and other economic activities, as well as family, labor legal relations, were resolved. The subjects of these disputes were individuals, Russian and foreign organizations. As advantages of mediation in comparison with the trial, participants, as a rule, noted: predictability of the result (the parties themselves made a decision to resolve the conflict); lack of connection with claims (the parties could discuss all their questions); enforceability (mediation agreements were executed voluntarily, because they were in the interests of both parties and were accepted by the parties themselves); confidentiality, flexibility and informality of the procedure.
3. Scientific activity. The USLU mediation center is a platform for scientific research and exchange of experience between Russian and foreign scientists in the field of alternative dispute resolution methods. In 2012, for this purpose, the Center established a scientific and practical conference "The Practice of Mediation in Russia: Problems, Difficulties, Solutions". The conference is held annually with broad support from the legal community. It was held three times in Ekaterinburg, as well as in Lipetsk, Simferopol, Perm. Such a relocation of the conference venue allows reaching a wider audience, which contributes to the introduction of the institution of mediation into the legal culture of Russia.
In addition, from 2011 to 2014, the USLU mediation Center implemented the first legal experiment in Russia "Development and testing of mechanisms for integrating mediation in civil proceedings". Objectives of the experiment: finding an optimal model for coordinating conciliation procedure (mediation) with civil proceedings, as well as developing documentary forms of interaction. The experiment was conducted jointly with the Sverdlovsk Regional Court and the Office of the Judicial Department of the Sverdlovsk Region. Initially, the Oktyabrsky District Court of Ekaterinburg was chosen as the site of the experiment. Subsequently, due to positive results, the experiment was extended to all courts in the Sverdlovsk region.
As a result of the three-year experiment, the technology of explaining the right to mediation by the judge was tested, forms and methods of interaction between mediators and courts were developed in order to develop conciliation procedures, and the use of separate mediation techniques by the judge in conducting the process was tested. Due to this experiment, the mediation procedure has become more widely used when considering cases in the courts of the region. In February 2013, the experiment was extrapolated to the territory of the Lipetsk region, where a similar project was organized on the basis of the Lipetsk Regional Court and other courts of general jurisdiction. The USLU mediation center coordinated this project and trained judges and mediators according to developed and tested programs. The results of the legal experiment conducted in the Sverdlovsk region were revised taking into account the accumulated experience and analysis of foreign practices and adapted to the socio-economic conditions of the Lipetsk region and the organizational forms of work used in the courts of the region.
From 2015 to the present, work has continued with the judicial system, and a number of projects have been implemented in cooperation with the Perm regional court and the Chelyabinsk regional court. In particular, in cooperation with the Perm Regional Court, more than a dozen groups of students were trained on the programs "Mediation Techniques in Judicial Activities" and "Mediation. Basic Course". As a result of the work carried out, the practice of mediation in the region began to expand. In addition, the Council for the Development of Mediation in the Perm Territory was created, which included representatives of the judicial community, mediators, state and municipal employees. The Council has become a platform for discussing the difficulties arising in the field of mediation.
Among other things, the USLU Mediation Center actively and successfully participates in the international activities of the University. Thus, in 2012, the University of Pavia (Italy) and USLU concluded a framework agreement on cooperation in the field of mediation, within the framework of which various educational and scientific events are held. In 2013, at the invitation of the Ministry of Justice of Finland, representatives of the USLU Mediation Center took part in a Russian-Finnish seminar dedicated to the exchange of experience in the field of mediation in courts. Colleagues from Germany, Italy, Finland, Croatia have repeatedly participated in the conference "The Practice of Mediation in Russia: Problems, Difficulties, Solutions", organized by the Center.
In 2017, the University of Pavia (Italy) organized a Summer school dedicated to alternative dispute resolution methods, where representatives of the Center introduced students to Russian developments in this field.
Since 2017, representatives of the USLU Mediation Center have been interacting with representatives of judicial and other state bodies of the Kyrgyz Republic on the legal regulation of conciliation procedures in this country. In 2018, the USLU Mediation Center signed a Memorandum of Cooperation with the Republican Community of Mediators of the Kyrgyz Republic.
The accumulated knowledge is reflected in scientific articles published annually by representatives of Ural State Law University Mediation Center. The Center also established a series of books "Library of the Mediator", which has six editions. The books reflect Russian and foreign experience of conciliation procedures and include translated materials. In 2014, the Center won the public award "Arbitration and Reconciliation". The founders of the award were the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, the Institute of State and Law of the Russian Academy of Sciences, St. Petersburg State University, the editorial board of the Arbitration Court journal, the Russian Center for Assistance to Arbitration, the National Arbitration Chamber, the Federal Chamber of Lawyers of the Russian Federation and others. The prize was awarded to the Center in the nomination "Development of alternative dispute resolution in Russia" for effective interaction with state courts for the development of mediation.