Since 2003, with the financial and strategic support of certain of its multinational corporate members, CPR has engaged in a multifaceted effort to learn from the Chinese tradition of conciliation and to contribute to the rapidly growing discourse between American and Chinese businesses and, in particular, ADR proponents.

In addition to its close relationship with the Conciliation Centers of the China Council for Promotion of International Trade, CPR has established cordial exchanges with the Beijing Arbitration Commission, the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centerand several academic institutions and business associations.

CPR leaders have frequently visited Hong Kong and spoken to groups of business and legal leaders on opportunities to create industry-led dispute management initiatives and best practices.  In 2004, CPR trained its first class of mediators for the U.S.- China Business Mediation Center in Beijing.  The next year, CPR co-hosted a major conference in Beijing on commercial mediation that was attended by over 250 business representatives.  That same year it conducted a three-day training in Western mediation skills for a group of Chinese and Western attorneys, judges and arbitrators.  In 2006, CPR hosted a two-day conference at Mohonk Mountain House in the Catskill mountains of New York, at which 50 Chinese and American lawyers, judges and mediators exchanged perspectives and articulated the substantial challenges to cross-cultural commercial and legal dealings. 

More recently, CPR President Kathy Bryan conducted negotiations with CCPIT to renew the special ties between the two organizations, and also joined CCPIT’s Mu Zili to speak at a conference of dispute management that was convened in Beijing. 

CPR hosts a China Advisory Committee of attorneys and business people located in the United States and China has met periodically to explore the growing activities of CPR in connection with its relationship with the China Counsel on Promotion of International Trade and its joint project, the U.S.-China Business Mediation Center. In addition, the Committee assists CPR in developing other programs and initiatives of interest to CPR members doing business in China. >> Learn More

The U.S.-China Business Mediation Center was established in 2004 as a joint project of the Conciliation Center of the China Council for Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT) / China Chamber of International Commerce (CCOIC) and the CPR Institute for Dispute Resolution (CPR). The purpose of the Center is to provide an alternative to arbitration or litigation for the management and resolution of complex and significant commercial disputes arising between American and Chinese businesses. If you are interested in filing a mediation case with the Center, you may do so here on-line, through the  Mediation Submission Form.

The Center has several features that are designed to attract the trust, and therefore the use, of American and Chinese business disputants:

• It provides services to assist the facilitated negotiation of complex disputes. The Center has no judges or arbitrators, and parties are not required to resolve disputes on terms they do not wish to agree to.
• The Rules under which the Center’s mediations are conducted reflect accepted standards of American and Chinese business mediation, and are familiar to both Chinese and American users as fair and commercially rational.
• The Chinese and American Mediators who are made available through the Center have been specially trained by CPR and CCPIT to be aware of the business practices and legal alternatives of both Chinese and American companies. These mediators are drawn from the very highest echelons of Chinese and American lawyers and business people.
• Mediators are selected by the parties, not by the Center. The parties also retain control over the process and can “customize” the mediation proceeding to meet their particular needs.
• The Center is ethically rigorous. The mediation procedures endorsed by the Center include a Code of Ethics endorsed by mediation centers around the world, through the auspices of the Union International des Avocats. 

For more information about CPR's work in China, contact Lorraine Brennan at lbrennan@cpradr.org.