In the News
Arbitration holds steady for franchising disputes
Publication date: June 1, 2009
Source: The Wall Street Journal online edition
Author: Richard Gibson
The Wall Street Journal online edition cited research by Rounds Professor Christopher Drahozal in an article about the prevalence of using arbitration to settle franchise disputes.
The Journal wrote:
Spurred by anecdotal evidence that arbitration has been losing its luster, two researchers say that's apparently not the case. After examining dozens of franchise contracts for 1999 and 2007, their study found that in both years about 44% of the contracts contained provisions for arbitration. Some contracts had no conflict resolution clauses.
"The default rule governing the resolution of disputes is litigation. If the contract is silent on how disputes are to be resolved, the parties may go to court," noted the researchers, University of Kansas law professor Christopher Drahozal and Quentin Wittrock, a principal with the Minneapolis law firm of Gray Plant Mooty. Their work appears in the current quarterly edition of the Hofstra University Law Review.
