Nations have generally resisted third-party settlement of their disputes and adjudicative techniques, in particular, have usually played only a limited role in their relations. This article notes some of the reasons adjudication is not more widely used as an international dispute settlement technique and urges that more attention be paid instead to the use of other non-judicial dispute management tools such as negotiation, mediation and conciliation. More broadly, the author proposes that international lawyers should focus their attention, not simply on adjudication, but on dispute avoidance and management processes as a whole, and goes on to suggest some of the questions which might be explored to help us better understand and utilize this range of processes.
