The English philosopher Thomas Hobbes famously described life as
'nasty, brutish and short'.
John Lande, Isidor Loeb Professor of Law at the University of
Missouri School of Law, once quipped that Hobbes's adage could
be adapted to describe the experience of most parties involved in
litigation: 'nasty, brutish and long'.
The stereotype is that lawyers love to spin out a good fight,
because that way they make money out of it. Yet, I know litigators
who have had only one case go to trial in the past 15 years. To be
honest, I think a lot of litigators are very pleased when their
client agrees to settle a matter. Often, it's the client who
insists on going to court. Sadly, litigation is black and white.
There's always a winner and a loser. However, every lawyer
knows that conflicts usually revolve around shades of grey, and
that the court system has no way of recognising this.
