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After over 15 years of working as a Legal Expert for World Bank, European Commission and various government programmes, I have decided to take a step back from International Development projects, assess what I've achieved and move in a new direction.
After a few years of working with individuals and institutions (in the public and private sector) in different parts of the world, I realized that dealing with conflict and helping clients reconcile opposing views were key parts of my work… even though project Terms of Reference rarely spell this out. This is what got me interested in Mediation in the first place and made me sign up for training in 2011.
Being a Mediator helped me become a better consultant and it was encouraging to hear a client say: "Klaus has the ability to help parties to a conflict or complex decision-making process find the best solutions themselves. His ability to speak different languages and understand parties’ intentions and motivations “beyond language” has helped us bridge our differences."
Encouraged by these experiences of doing de facto Mediation, I feel ready to become a fuly-fledged Mediator.
I am a self-employed Legal Practitioner & Mediator. The majority of my assignments have been as Senior Legal Expert in Legal Reform Programmes financed by the World Bank, European Commission and German Government. This work typically includes:
- Assessment of the compatibility of local legislation in view of negotiation and implementation of Free Trade Agreements, Association Agreements etc. between the EU and the beneficiary country;
- Giving advice in view of further legal approximation with EU Law;
- Capacity building, design of training materials etc,
- Moderating decision making processes.
I think "Informal Mediation" best describes the way in which I have applied my knowledge of Mediation in the framework of International Development. "Perfect clarity on paper" is the starting point of most projects I have been involved in and it can take several weeks or months of negotiations until donor, beneficiaries and consultants agree on what they actually want from the project and how to achieve this.
In addition hereto, I moderated around 30 consultative sessions involving public and private sector bodies in the framework of the CARICOM Single Marktet and Economy reform process.
- University Certificate as Mediator, Hochschule Darmstadt, Germany, 2012
- Training on "Cross Border Mediation" in the framework of the EU-funded project "EuroNetMed".
Mr. David McIlroy, Barrister, London, UK. E-mail: DMcIlroy@ForumChambers.com .
Ms. Sonja Miekley, Project Manager, Deutsch- Tunesische Industrie und Handelskammer (AHK-T), Tunis, Tunisia. E-mail: s.miekley@ahktunis.org .
Name of Certificate: Mediator* (Hochschule Darmstadt)
Description: Integrated further education course. Duration of the course was 1 semester and corresponds with a workload of 195 hours or 6.5 ECTS credit points.
Duration of the integrated further education course: October 2011 – March 2012
A list of publications can be made available.