Landmark Supreme Court Cases: The U.S. legal system, as seen in landmark cases like Marbury v. Madison and Dred Scott v. Sandford, is built on the principle that all parties must be heard in open court, with opportunities for direct defense and rebuttal.
Reconstructing Memories
“The uncritical acceptance of eyewitness accounts may stem from a popular misconception of how memory works. Many people believe that human memory works like a video recorder: the mind records events and then, on cue, plays back an exact replica of them.
On the contrary, psychologists have found that memories are reconstructed rather than played back each time we recall them. The act of remembering, says eminent memory researcher and psychologist Elizabeth F. Loftus of the University of California, Irvine, is “more akin to putting puzzle pieces together than retrieving a video recording.”
Even questioning by a lawyer can alter the witness’s testimony because fragments of the memory may unknowingly be combined with information provided by the questioner, leading to inaccurate recall.”
From: “Why Science Tells Us Not to Rely on Eyewitness Accounts”, Hal Arkowitz and Scott Lilienfeld. Scientific American magazine, January 8, 2009.
Didactics
Many German literary texts have a didactic element, aiming to educate readers about the dangers of unchecked conflict and the value of peace. They often present conflict as a process that can be understood, analyzed, and, ultimately, transformed. This aligns with the German peacebuilding approach, which emphasizes interest reconciliation, addressing structural causes, and creating conditions for sustainable, peaceful development.
Underdog
One reason why Americans don’t mind losing an argument is that once they lose, they can be seen as the underdog. Underdogs are people who are considered unlikely to win. There is a long history in America of the Underdog finding support and overcoming difficult odds to ultimately win in the end.
In the 1960s and 1970s a cartoon superhero series about an underdog (that was even called “Underdog”) was very popular.
In 1980 the US Olympic hockey team, which was comprised of young and inexperienced players, played against the seasoned Russian Olympic team. Even though the Russian team was highly favored to win, the American team ultimately defeated them. This event later inspired the 2004 film “Miracle.”
Cowboys, as lone travelers in a foreign land, were often the underdogs in the cowboy/Indian conflicts in early American history, yet many of them were able to overcome the difficulties and survive.
At age 13, Bobby Fischer won a chess match against one of the leading American chess masters. That match became known as the “Game of the Century.”
underdog: a loser or predicted loser in a struggle or contest; a victim of injustice or persecution: a less powerful person or thing that struggles against a more powerful person or thing.
Robert Frost, the celebrated American poet, wrote in 1928: „I’m a poor underdog. But tonight I will bark with the great Overdog. That romps through the dark.“
caucuses
Separate Interviews and Flexibility: Mediation sessions in Germany can involve joint meetings but also frequently include separate discussions (so-called “caucuses”) with each party. This allows the mediator to address sensitive issues privately, minimize escalation, and help parties express concerns without direct confrontation. The process is tailored to the needs of the parties, and mediators are trained to manage dynamics that could increase tension if parties were forced into direct, head-to-head exchanges.
Sore Losers
No culture raises its children to be sore losers: someone who cannot admit defeat, makes excuses, challenges the final results.
Americans certainly do not like a sore loser. Instead, they respect a losing political candidate, sports team, work colleague who admits defeat, neither blames others, nor complains about the election, game or job being „unfair.“
In fact, in America many a (temporary) loser has come back to become a winner, primarily because they blamed themselves, looked at their own errors, and then corrected them. And they remained persistent.
The converse is the gracious winner: the person, team or organization which does not boast, brag or celebrate in an exaggerated way. Most importantly, gracious winners go out of their way to compliment, even praise, their opponent. Gracious winners stay small, don‘t puff themselves up. Modesty.
Sore: causing pain or distress; painfully sensitive; tender, hurt or inflamed so as to be or seem painful; attended by difficulties, hardship, or exertion; angry, irked. From Middle English sor, from Old English sār; akin to Old High German sēr sore and probably to Old Irish saeth distress.
Gracious: marked by kindness and courtesy, tact and delicacy; characterized by charm, good taste, generosity of spirit, and the tasteful leisure of wealth and good breeding. Latin gratiosus, enjoying favor, agreeable, from gratia.
“Face the music.”
“Face the music.” Implies confronting criticism or accusations directly, rather than avoiding or deflecting them.
Repeal means Revise
The right to a speedy trial, the American expectation that conflicts within teams are resolved quickly, can indeed lead to judgements passed which are not ideal, optimal, right or even just.
Americans make decisions quickly, often hastily. But, if the decisions are narrow in scope – have been isolated – then they can be revised. There is time for reconsidering and revision. The parties involved in the decision can be brought back in.
This same logic applies to the American judicial system. It allows anyone sentenced in a court to appeal that sentence. An appeal is when the accused (and sentenced) can take their case from a lower to a higher court for review.
In the American business context, a team member who believes that the judgement is wrong, or the conflict resolution process was unfair, can ask to have that decision reviewed by next-level management or by a neutral third party within the company, typically the human resources department.
adversarial process
The Use of Witness Testimony in Criminal Trials. The American legal system is built on the adversarial process, where both objective evidence (documents, physical evidence) and subjective witness testimony are presented and cross-examined. The right to confront witnesses (as discussed in Crawford v. Washington) ensures that subjective accounts are scrutinized alongside factual evidence before a judge or jury decides the outcome.
“Let’s clear the air.”
“Let’s clear the air.” Suggests addressing conflict or misunderstanding openly, often in a group or face-to-face setting.