About Us

OUR MANDATE

The McGill Journal of Dispute Resolution (MJDR) is a bilingual, peer-reviewed, student-run academic journal dedicated to the presentation and promotion of high quality scholarship in the fields of arbitration, mediation, facilitation, negotiation and other forms of alternative dispute resolution.

The Journal’s mandate is to promote discourse and the exchange of ideas between prominent scholars, practitioners, law students and the public at large. The MJDR seeks to achieve its mandate through the provision of free, high quality peer reviewed scholarship from leading scholars in these fields.

MJDR AND MCGILL

The MJDR is a product of the unique internationalism and pluralism of the Faculty of Law at McGill University. Through its unique “transsystemic” curriculum, which simultaneously exposes students to the Civil and Common legal traditions, students engage in comparative law analyses that promote a more critical understanding of the judicial system and, also, to examine international legal systems in a global context.

They are also provided with a large number of opportunities to examine alternative dispute resolution methods such as arbitration, mediation and negotiation. This provides all students at the Faculty of Law with a strong foundation in comparative law allowing them to become cosmopolitan jurists equipped to face the complexities of transnational legal practice. Combined with a strong faculty of experts in international law and private justice, the Faculty of Law at McGill University offers the perfect venue for the creation of a leading publication in the field of alternative dispute resolution.

OUR LOGO

The MJDR logo depicts the Greek goddess Rhea carrying a staff adorned with a fleur de lys and holding a tome inscribed with the Greek word αρμονία (meaning harmony) astride a lion on a field of royal blue.

Rhea was selected based on her role in the Ancient Greek myth of Persephone, in which she mediated a resolution of the conflict between Hades and Demeter that allowed Persephone to spend half of the year with her mother and half with Hades. More information on the myth can be found here.

The logo also incorporates symbolism that reflects the journal’s home in Montréal, Québec, Canada. The style of the lion reflects Canada’s ties to the Crown and the Common Law, while the fleur-de-lys represents both the province of Québec and the Civil Law. This symbolism also reveals the bilingual, transnational, transsystemic nature of the MJDR.