Frank Sander

Frank E. A. Sander "is the Bussey Professor of Law. He was born in Germany and lived there until age 11. He has done considerable work in comparative aspects of alternative dispute resolution (ADR), family law and, earlier, taxation. In 1975 he spent some sabbatical months at the University of Stockholm, studying comparative aspects of family law. But after that he sought to rationalize his various intellectual interests and activities, which led to involvement with the field of alternative dispute resolution, which is now his primary area of academic work. In 1981, Frank was a member of a small group of ADR scholars and judges invited to China by its Academy of Social Science to discuss issues of ADR and his Dispute Resolution Casebook has recently been translated into Chinese. He has also been a Visiting Scholar at Tokyo University, and a visiting lecturer at Tubingen University in Germany. Frank has taught Mediation to over 1,000 foreign lawyers (and some nonlawyers) either as part of the one-week Mediation Workshop he has been giving twice a year at HLS for about 20 years or as a similar workshop offered in Australia, New Zealand, Spain, Norway and Germany. He is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Center for Negotiation and Mediation at the Instituto de Empresa in Madrid, as well as of the Institute for KMU [an acronym for small and medium-sized companies] and Commercial Law at the University of Lucerne in Switzerland. Frank did his military service by playing flute and piccolo in the U.S. Military Academy Band at West Point."

"Among other innovations, one of his early papers put forth the idea of the "Multi-Door Courthouse," a court system that helps direct disputants to the most appropriate route to resolution."

"In 1976, Chief Justice Warren Burger asked Frank Sander to present a paper on alternative dispute resolution. Delivered at the Pound Conference, this paper is considered a watershed event in ADR history."


 * Co-founder of the Program on Negotiation
 * 2006 recipient of the International Academy of Mediators Lifetime Achievement Award