Mediation as a Profession

OVERVIEW This study deals with the situation of mediation in the Czech Republic. Mediation began to develop as a modern field during the 1990s. With the adopting of Act No. 202/2012 Coll. on Mediation, partial definitions were give for what mediation is and for the conditions under which it can be provided. Nonetheless, the situation in mediation is still very complicated. The study therefore presents a unified overview of what mediation is, of the principles upon which it is based, and of how it is used in practice. It introduces the role of a mediator and of the demands that must be satisfied for the performance of mediation, and it describes how the professional standards and code of ethics for mediators are established. By comparing the profession of an attorney to that of a mediator on the basis of the identifying characteristics of an expert profession, it determines whether mediation is a separate profession or a method that is useful in other fields