KU News Release

KU law professor testifies before U.S. senators on arbitration

Chris Drahozal

LAWRENCE — A University of Kansas law professor testified March 16 before the U.S. Senate Republican Conference regarding a study he helped conduct on consumer arbitrations.

Chris Drahozal, the John M. Rounds Distinguished Professor of Law, spoke during a hearing on tort reform at the Dirksen Senate Office Building in Washington, D.C. Drahozal served as chair of the Searle Civil Justice Institute Consumer Arbitration Task Force, which released a report last week detailing its study of consumer arbitrations administered by the American Arbitration Association.

Drahozal’s testimony is timely given pending federal legislation to ban pre-dispute arbitration agreements in consumer and other contracts. Arbitration, an alternative to litigation, involves submitting a dispute to one or more impartial persons for a final and binding decision. The Arbitration Fairness Act, reintroduced in the U.S. House of Representatives last month, would ban such agreements, which advocates argue favor business and are unfair to consumers.

The Searle study found that measures to protect consumers’ rights are routinely enforced in American Arbitration Association consumer arbitrations and that outcomes are not biased in favor of businesses that arbitrate repeatedly.

Drahozal’s scholarly writing focuses on the law and economics of dispute resolution, particularly arbitration. He is the author of multiple books and numerous articles on commercial arbitration and has taught and given presentations on the subject in Europe and the United States.

Drahozal’s full testimony, as prepared for delivery, can be found at www.searlearbitration.org/.

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