ADR advocates argue that the use of nonjudicial and nonadjudicatory procedures could yield more expedient and humane results. Legal and historical bases of the four principal systems of law dominant in the world today are outlined and examined, each showing a framework for dispute resolution. Arbitration provides procedural flexibility, expertise, and efficiency which respond to elements of the dilemmas posed by more traditional means of dispute resolution. The conclusions drawn are that American legal education should be redirected from the Anglo-American adversarial system to the humanistic, nonadversarial, alternative dispute resolution model.