I’m taking some much-needed time off with my family and won’t resume my regular posting schedule until August 15. In the meantime, here are some mediation-related links that you may enjoy while I’m away:

Bill Warters, who always has the coolest links at Campus ADR Tech Blog, has posted an article about Standpoint and Standpedia, two web sites which provide visual mapping tools to better understand conflict and controversy.

For some of the funniest and most honest writing on the ADR web, visit Geoff Sharp’s Mediator Blah…Blah… I particularly liked Geoff’s recent meditation (that’s meditation, not mediation) on trust.

If you haven’t visited Negotiating Tip of the Week lately, tune in to Josh Weiss’s podcast describing tactics for dealing with a negotiator who wants to compete, not collaborate.

Those of you who support efforts to keep the courthouse doors open to all who seek justice will want to read this article from Law.com’s Inside Opinions on “Blacklisting Medical Malpractice Plaintiffs“, which discusses the implications of a web site that publicizes the names of plaintiffs involved in med-mal litigation.

One of my favorite new blogs is the Law & Society Blog, offering “notes from the intersection of law, society, technology, economics, and culture”. You’ll find intelligently written articles like “He Who Cast the First Stone Probably Didn’t” about human behavior and the escalation of conflict, and “Virtual Property and Voluntarism“, which explores the blurring of lines between real and virtual worlds. If you are interested in other blogs that cover similar ground–the crossroads of law, society, and technology–visit Slaw, a cooperative Canadian law blog, and Human Law, a law blog published by English solicitor Justin Patten, who is also a committed supporter of alternative dispute resolution.

For mediators interested in the serious games movement–games created to promote social change and awareness, including the advancement of conflict resolution and peace–Collision Detection has an article on “Saving the World, One Video Game at a Time“.

You should also take time to check out the new look of one of Tammy Lenski’s blogs, I Can’t Say That! – How to talk things out in the relationships that matter. Formerly known as “Strategic Conversations”, this blog has an inviting, warm, and user-friendly feel. (For smart marketing advice for mediators, visit Tammy’s other blog, Mediator Tech.)

Finally, one destination that I always recommend is the ADR-friendly Blawg Review, the weekly review of the best in law blogging, hosted each week at a different law blog. There are plenty of reasons why busy mediators and mediating attorneys should make it a regular stop on their Internet travels–you can discover why in “Too busy to read law blogs? Why attorneys and mediators should read Blawg Review“.

In the meantime, until I get back, feel free to explore Online Guide to Mediation’s archives (over in the sidebar on the right). Or, visit my ongoing project, the World Directory of Alternative Dispute Resolution Blogs, for your passport to a whole world of ADR blogging.

Thanks as always for stopping by. I look forward to continuing our conversation when I return on August 15.

Regardless of one’s political views or on which side one stands in the terrible conflicts that have riven the Middle East, many of us are horrified and saddened by the death and destruction that have engulfed that part of the world.

Some have turned to the Internet to chart the geographic scale of the Israeli-Lebanese conflict, or to convey the reality of death toll figures along the Israeli-Lebanese border and in Iraq.

These are tragic events that unfold before us. Just when it seems that achieving peace is impossible, particularly between groups with a lengthy history of mutual hostility, hope arrives in the form of one remarkable community that has succeeded in transcending conflict.

A unique village in Israel bears two names, in Hebrew Neve Shalom and in Arabic Wahat al-Salam. In English the name means “Oasis of Peace“. Oasis of Peace is inhabited by Jewish and Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel, who together “work for peace, equality and understanding between the two peoples”, according to its web site, exchanging culture, raising and educating their children, and co-governing.

More information about this remarkable community can be found on Neve Shalom ~ Wahat al-Salam’s page of frequently asked questions.