Online Dispute Resolution Services: Justice, Concepts, and Challenges

Online dispute resolution (ODR) services are e-justice service conduits that utilize, implicitly or explicitly, electronic negotiation systems. They are a key mechanism that may provide a viable solution to the flood of e-disputes, and even for face-to-face disputes that can be resolved without being colocated (for instance, the social distance restriction of the COVID-19 epidemic forced court sessions to be conducted online). Justice is important in negotiation processes and in society. It is therefore suggested that ODR services are a viable means to serve justice on the web. We describe the state of e-justice and introduce the need for online dispute resolution services. We then present the concept of ODR, its different forms, and its association with negotiation support systems. To this end, we portray a classification of ODR services, give examples of different types of services, and specifically discuss one of the promising types, namely principle-based dispute resolution services. We conclude with an overview of the challenges associated with the introduction of ODR services, and specifically with their adoption by users, an issue that is also echoed in several other negotiation support studies.