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This is an introduction to a collection of articles in the book Nordic mediation research. The background and history of mediation in the Nordic, or Scandinavian, countries is presented. The areas of mediation practice in the Nordic countries and Nordic mediation research are also introduced.

In this article, I analyse why and how the Norwegian child custody system fails to provide early resolution to many families. Resolution of these conflicts should be timely and adapted to the level and sources of conflict. Child custody mediation is mandatory in Norway for all separating couples with children, yet the number of child custody disputes in courts is similar to the other Nordic countries with voluntary mediation schemes only. Particularly, high conflict families seem to receive inadequate services and support to manage their conflict, although the aim of the system is to prevent conflicts from being prolonged and escalating. In addition to an analysis of the failure of the system, I explore the different tiers of mediation services (the Family Counselling Office mediation and court-connected mediation) and their relationships—or lack thereof. This interrelationship influences the mediation system and its outcomes. To understand the context, I offer a brief account of the development of child custody mediation and give a societal background for the Norwegian child custody mediation system.

In this article, I explore the historical origin and development of the use of the term “restorative justice” in published sources. The main argument is that the growing popularity of the term and its expanding use makes increasingly blurred what restorative justice is. I begin by investigating the term’s international usage, tracing it back to written sources from the nineteenth century. Then, I cite personal communication with Howard Zehr to describe how his use of the term was inspired by Albert Eglash. Zehr initially popularised the term and, in the 1990s, use of the term expanded. In the 2000s, the term began to appear in United Nations and European Union documents, illustrating that restorative justice had become an internationally recognised approach to justice. After describing this international development, I analyse the Danish context, where the term “restorative justice” began to appear in writings around the year 2000. Around the same time, the existing Danish victim offender mediation programme became connected to restorative justice. Later, Danish practices outside the area of criminal justice became associated with the term. In conclusion, I argue that a potential problem of the expanded use of the term “restorative justice”—both in Denmark and internationally—is that usage may become so broad that the concept loses its meaning.

In this article, I discuss the process and outcomes of a successful developmental project on family mediation in Finland. Family mediation is a municipal service available for divorcing parents who cannot agree on child custody matters. In the Marriage Act of 1987, prerequisites were made for family mediation as an early intervention to help families in conflict. In practice, only few parents used the service. Moreover, the concept of mediation was fluid and diffuse and practitioners working with divorce families understood and applied mediation in different ways. Moreover, often family mediation was not undertaken as a distinct process. In the article, I describe the developmental work done in a project called “Fasper” whose aim was to change the present situation by exploring the concept of family mediation and producing new mediation models, practices and tools for family mediators. Following the methodological starting points of Developmental Work Research, the project did not offer a ready-made, top-down model for family mediation. Instead, practitioners studied divorce services and developed, tested and implemented new models and practices for family mediation. It is important to continue this work and bring it to the national level in order promote major changes in the system.

In Sweden, the government has invested considerable resources to implement victim offender mediation (VOM) for young people (under the age of 21). Despite this, the number of mediations is decreasing. What appears to be a gap between the legislator’s intentions and practical applications raises questions about the reasons for this gap and the premises for mediation in penal matters in Sweden today. Our purpose in this article is to highlight and discuss some circumstances that can explain this decrease and the future of VOM in Sweden. We start by discussing the development of VOM in Sweden and continue by analysing possible reasons for why mediation is declining. The conclusion is that the decrease can be explained by problems related to legal and organisational structures as well as mediation practice. The conclusion is also that if the state and municipalities do not show more interest in VOM and restorative justice, then this activity will probably disappear.

Court-connected mediated agreements seem to both fulfil and fail the ideal of self-determination in mediation theory. In a study of 134 agreements from court-connected mediation, we found that the majority of agreements contain creative elements and display great variation in the provisions they contain. These results indicate that the parties play an important role in crafting the substance of their agreements. However, we also found that the wording of the agreements is characterised by legal and bureaucratic language to the extent that people without legal training find it difficult to read and understand them. The judicial language is well known for the drafters of the agreement but not the parties. Thus, court-connected mediation seems to fail aspects of self-determination when it comes to drafting agreements. We draw on new-institutional theory when we explore and explain this apparent contradiction within the court-connected mediation practice.

In this article, I critically examine the judicial settlement scheme in custody and contact cases in Norway. The scheme is called mediation by the legislator, but it takes place as an integrated part of preparatory hearings in district courts. In most cases, an expert, typically a psychologist, is appointed to assist the judge. The role of these third parties varies but often they co-mediate. However, the expert can also be appointed as a mentor to the parents if they enter into interim settlements. If the case is not settled in the preparatory phase, the expert may provide the court with an evaluation of the quality of care each parent has to offer and the best interests of the children. The judge, on the other hand, is meant to preside over the main hearing should the settlement efforts not succeed and must, therefore, not say or do anything that is liable to impair his or her impartiality. The judge and the expert often use fairly evaluative techniques when promoting settlement. This so-called mediation scheme and the procedural rules and practices connected with it have been criticised, in particular, for the use of a single expert in several roles and for the unpredictable process that ensues from preparatory hearings with multiple purposes. A main concern is that there is an undue settlement pressure. At the end of this article, I propose amendments of regulation and practice.

In this contribution, I unfold how adapting a modern identity concept can transform the understanding of mediation. Since the middle of the twentieth century, a new way of understanding identity has developed within sociology and similar scientific fields. Further, within the last 20 years, it has become increasingly recognised that identity is changing and flexible and thus highly context dependent. In the article, I explore how the new identity concept changes the perception of what is going on in mediation. I go on to exemplify the roles that the parties assume. I also provide some central analytical tools of how to approach research analysis when incorporating this understanding of identity. A qualitative study of victim offender mediation (VOM) illustrates my points, but as the points raised here also address the basic premises of the mediation session, the present contribution is indeed also relevant to other fields of mediation research and practice.

In this article, I examine and discuss the implications of restorative processes in juvenile offence cases in Northern Ireland, Norway, and Orlando, Florida. The investigation focuses on the Northern Irish model, the Norwegian and models, and the and diversion programs of Orlando, Florida. I use interviews with professionals and observations of restorative processes and meetings related to these as the empirical basis for the investigation. In my discussion of the three models, I focus on issues of neutrality/impartiality, voluntarism, punishment, roles of offended parties and communities, and equality before the law based on the theories of Christie, Zehr, Vindeløv and Braithwaite While the models generally offer possibilities of addressing the individual circumstances of the young offender in a way that the traditional systems they locally compete with do not, the variation in content is so large that I consider if perhaps a community of practices labelled exists only at the abstract and not at the practical level.

Mediation is mandatory for all separated divorcing/separating spouses and co-habiting partners in Norway with children under the age of 16. A mediation model called “Children in Mediation” (, known as BIM) systematically includes children in the mediation process. In the article, we address two key issues based on statements from children to their parents as well as questionnaires completed by mediators and children in 250 mediations. Our first focus is on how the children’s actorship is expressed in the mediation context. We show that when given the opportunity, children largely choose to speak up, and we present some examples of their statements. We thematise the contradictory considerations of participation and children’s right to protection and assert that children’s potential vulnerability cannot, in general, justify preventing them from participation. Our second focus is on children’s experiences of their own participation and their general views on the inclusion of children in mandatory mediation and relationship breakdowns. In this analysis, we include how the level of conflict and problem accumulation in the family impacts the children’s decision-making about whether to participate or not. In the absolute majority of cases, children have positive experiences of their participation and encourage other children to participate. These assessments were made regardless of the level of conflict and degree of problem accumulation in the family.