On September 27, faculty members from the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law will participate in the “Mediating India” forum at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts (UMFA) on the U of U campus. The forum is free and open to the public.
At noon in UMFA’s Dumke Auditorium, Hiram Chodosh, dean and professor of law, will present the keynote address, titled “Mediating India.” Chodosh will focus on India as illustrative of the broader global challenge to create new processes and institutions to resolve conflict in an era of globalization. He will describe the limits of the formal Indian legal system to resolve conflict, and tell the story of mediation reform from its modest beginnings in 1995 to its emergence today as a partial remedy to the harmful condition of unresolved conflicts in Indian society.
Further, Dean Chodosh will detail the hazards of legal transplants and external advisers in India, drawing lessons applicable to rule of law reforms throughout the world, and he will demonstrate the early success in the Indian context of novel approaches for more effectively internalizing mediation within a legal culture. Finally, he will reflect on the potentially transnational and global significance of these advances within India.
Law professors Tony Anghie and James Holbrook will then comment on Chodosh’s lecture. Following the comments, a reception will be held from 2:00 to 2:45 p.m. in the Great Hall at UMFA.
Other forum programs include a faculty panel discussion titled “Mediation in Different Cultures.” The discussion will be held from 3:15-4:30 in the Tanner Library, 459 Carolyn Tanner Irish Humanities Building. Participants include Chair Chibli Mallat, a professor at the College of Law, as well as panelists Wayne McCormack (Law), Ashok Rajput (Languages), and Polli Wiessner (Anthropology).
Finally, from 4:45 to 6:15, a panel comprised of community members will discuss “The Global Significance of Mediating India,” also in the Tanner Library. To be chaired by Lew Cramer, CEO of the World Trade Center Utah, the panelists include Scott Leckman (surgeon and micro-finance activist); Jan Saeed (Director of Spiritual Life, Westminster College); and Randall Tolpinrud (president, Pax Natura Foundation).
“Mediating India” is part of the Democracy in South Asia Forum. It is co-sponsored by The S.J. Quinney College of Law, College of Humanities, Department of Philosophy, Barbara and Norman Tanner Center for Nonviolent Human Rights Advocacy, Institute of Public and International Affairs, Honors Program, The Westminster Tanner-McMurrin Lectures, and The Ethics Center and The Democracy Project of Utah at Utah Valley University.