Collaborative Divorce: Trend or Tool?

magus12 · 2009-08-26T12:52:51+00:00

Regardless of whether this is a father's or mother's rights blog, and as an attorney practicing in Massachusetts, I absolutely agree with the author's dissection of the inherent problem with "collaborative divorce" as practiced. The motive force behind the "trend" and the problem it was intended to initially address was to cut the incredibly high costs, emotionally and financially, of resorting to litigation right off the bat if the parties were able to work "collaboratively" together, particularly where the parties have children.

I can't entirely agree with your solution although I do see some merit to it. You are absolutely right that the fees collected by the attorneys, et. al., in a collaborative process are completely wasted if the parties have to start all over again with new attorneys who will be more than willing to further clean out the parties in litigation. I would suggest that we penalize the attorneys who initially sign up to work collaboratively by forcing them to fork over their fees if either they were themselves not intending to work collaboratively or failed to honestly ascertain whether their client was in good faith willing to work collaboratively. Alternatively, the party who fails to work collaboratively in good faith should pay the other's fees for both the failed collaborative process and the resort to litigation.

The sad fact behind all of this is that no matter where one works or in what area, "just collecting the bucks" seems to be the workplace zeitgeist. I've worked as a trust administrator for a prominent national bank and the attitude was pretty much laissez-faire with regard to the ethics and what was most valued was taking and generating fees. You can also see it in the health care setting when a doctor prescribes a medicine that the patient comes in demanding because the patient saw it advertised on TV. Getting the money is the only value left in America, it appears. Sadly, it looks to me like we're all becoming used car salesmen, no matter what our vocation.

Title	Collaborative Divorce: Trend or Tool?
Author	jalam1001
Upvotes	0
Comments	1
Date	August 26, 2009 2:16 AM UTC (16 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/9e5p6/collaborative_divorce_trend_or_tool/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/collaborative-divorce-trend-or-tool.1053191 https://theredarchive.com/post/1053191

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