Litigation

If I am falsely accused of a crime, I want a really good defense lawyer to make sure that I have the best trial possible so I can be found not guilty. If a toxic waste dump is pouring poisons into my drinking water, I don't want to sit around and talk about win/win unless there is first an injunction to make it stop while we work things out. Litigation is a fine tool, used in the right places, at the right times, and with the right perspective.

In the Anatomy of Peace, Resolving the Heart of Conflict (by the Arbinger Institute, http://www.arbinger.com), this distinction is brilliantly demonstrated by the story of Sultan Saladin. Widely believed to be the most successful leader of his time, he was no pacifist. If war needed to be waged, he waged it. It was HOW he waged the war, not what he did that made the difference. In the book, the authors distinguish acting from a Heart at Peace from acting from a Heart at War. The Heart at Peace recognizes that others are people with hopes, needs, cares, and fears as real as one's own. The Heart at War sees others as Objects, obstacles, vehicles, irrelevancies.

In this section, we explore litigation in many ways. Some of the resources are wrangling with whether to litigate at all while some are looking at ways to litigate more consciously and holistically.