There have long been claims that compensations for noneconomic damages are random because tort law does not provide clear guidance regarding these compensations. I investigate, in both settled and tried medical malpractice cases, whether noneconomic damage payments are arbitrary and what...

There have long been claims that compensations for noneconomic damages are random because tort law does not provide clear guidance regarding these compensations. I investigate, in both settled and tried medical malpractice cases, whether noneconomic damage payments are arbitrary and what...

This article assesses predictors of payouts and non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases decided by the Spanish Supreme Court from 2006 until 2010. Medical malpractice cases can be judged in administrative or civil courts, and this distinction heavily relies on the type of hospital...

Though few realize it, forced arbitration clauses are endemic in today's marketplace — hidden in credit card agreements, bank accounts, corporate social media pages, even Starbucks gift cards. More than half a billion arbitration provisions infiltrate our everyday lives. Despite their...

This paper analyzes deterrence, settlement, and litigation spending under two alternative procedural regimes, i.e., the adversarial versus inquisitorial systems. We present a general litigation model with three sequential stages---care, settlement, and litigation stages---and we test the...

There is an interesting exception to businesses’, employers’, and service providers’ seemingly universal embrace of arbitration processes, particularly mandatory pre-dispute arbitration. Although it may be difficult to believe given arbitration’s current popularity, not everyone requires...

Alternative dispute resolution (ADR) is a category comprising various techniques which enable the parties to resolve their conflicts out of the highly formalized judicial proceedings. In many legal systems, ADR is an increasingly popular set of legal instruments to resolve disputes because of...

The paper attempts to explain the failure of postcommunist traders exemplified by Balkan traders to make use of arbitration courts by means of the rational choice of forum approach offered by the law and economics movement. Conjectures about traders? behaviour derived by combining this approach...

Legal institutions play an important role in affecting delay in settlement. But little research has investigated the institutional causes of delay. The empirical literature is ambiguous regarding the impact of trial-court delay on settlement delay. I analyze the timing of bargaining and the...

This paper examines the strategic effects of case preparation in litigation. Specifically, it shows how the pretrial efforts incurred by one party may alter its adversary's incentives to settle. We build a sequential game with one-sided asymmetric information where the informed party first...