My knowledge of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) was limited to the definition

based on the Rules and personal experience. Apart from the absence of a judge, mediation,

conciliation, early neutral evaluation, and mini-trial, I always believed that it was simply two

parties opting not to go to court, and instead hiring another person to act as a judge and be objective

in resolving their issues. This seemed like a tedious system for me considering my personal

experience with ADR. It felt like the whole process of ADR simply prolonged the agony of solving

an issue rather than expediting it.

My father once agreed to a proposed solution through an alternative dispute process

involving a large sum of money just to end the disagreement. However, the other party still refused

to comply afterwards despite reaching an agreement. In the end, we still had to go to court and my

father ended up spending more than he could have if we simply went to court in the first place.

The actual process on a larger scale, i.e. Public Dispute Resolution, became even more

complicated in my head considering more parties and more issues are involved. Yet, after attending

the the forum, I learned its basic objective is to listen to all the stakeholders and understand why

they believe what they believe and want what they want. From this, those tasked to solve the public

dispute will use a mutual benefits approach in finding a solution. David Fairman, the keynote

speaker, stated that this approach does not necessarily mean that all the stakeholders will get what

they want. However, it will leave them in a better standing than they would have ended up in if

they insisted on getting everything they wanted. Interestingly, I realized that Mr. Fairman seems

perfect for the job considering the impeccable manner he delivered his speech and the fact that he

is a “fair man.”
 Fairman spoke about how people differ in views and objectives because of the differences

in experience and sources of information. Knowing each stakeholders’ source of information turns

out to be more important than I thought it would be because it allows other parties to know whether

or not they are misinformed and why they prefer other solutions compared to others. This already

creates an initial understanding between conflicting stakeholders which is basically what Public

Dispute Resolution aims to achieve. Fairman admits that the process is quite tedious, as what I

believed from the beginning, and it requires all stakeholders to be very open-minded. This, I

believe, is where the difficulty lies, especially here in the Philippines. I understand that Fairman

was speaking from his own experience in the United States and other countries, and that his

knowledge about conflict resolution in the Philippines is very limited. However, knowing and

experiencing our current political climate, it seems like being open-minded is a luxury.

What caught my interest the most about the process of Public Dispute Resolution during

the forum was how they institutionalize the resolution. Apparently, it’s not simply about finding a

solution to a problem that somehow gives all the stakeholders a substantial portion of what they

want. The end of the process is to institutionalize the resolution so that future disputes of a similar

character will already have a framework to base a possible solution if not the exact same one. I

admire this final step because it shows how the process is thinking ahead. I don’t think many of

the processes we have here in the Philippines thinks forward and I can’t help but admire one that

is otherwise. Still, I remain hopeful that time will eventually lead our country to move forward in

direction instead of following ignorance and regression.