What is integrative law?
When most people think of lawyers, they imagine aggressive courtroom battles, heated arguments, and a legal system designed to determine winners and losers. However, we have come to believe that the legal profession doesn’t have to work this way. Integrative law is a different approach—one that prioritizes collaboration, healing, and resolution over conflict, adversarial tactics, and zero sum games.
A New Perspective on Advocacy
Traditional advocacy depends upon coercion, force, and extortion to produce outcomes. As a result lawyers must intensify disputes in order to create conditions ripe for settlement or successful outcomes at trial. This traditional method increases costs (financial, time, and other resources). It is also emotionally, energetically and spiritually draining for everyone involved. Most importantly, it takes a single traumatic scenario and forces all parties to live it repeatedly throughout the process. Integrative law offers an alternative. Instead of viewing legal disputes as battles to be won, integrative lawyers see them as problems to be solved.
This approach is rooted in principles of kindness, cooperation and collaboration, through empathy, and creative problem-solving. Rather than escalating tension, disputes, and trauma, integrative lawyers help clients explore resolutions that align with their values, needs, and long-term well-being.
A Metaphor for Lawyers as Healers
It might sound absurd the first time you hear it, but we truly believe that lawyers should serve as healers of human conflict, which is the opposite of what we are currently known for. To explain this idea and unpack some of what we said above, think about this:
Pretend you have received a very serious cut on your arm. It happened in a serious accident. You are loosing a lot of blood. You have done your best to cover, clean and protect the wound until you can get in to see a doctor to help it heal.
Imagine that when you arrive, the doctor opens up your bandages and examines your wound. First, the doctor pours salt in your wound to make sure it hurts. The doctor tells you to leave it exposed and not to put bandages on it. The doctor asks you to come back in about 6 months. You spend the next 6 months suffering with an exposed and infected wound which festers and gets worse. When you come back to the doctor they performs the same exercise, but this time they have invited the person who inflicted the wound on you to your appointment, and a few other strangers. The doctor leads you into a room where you will be put on public display and the process recorded. Once here the doctor lets the person who hurt you and others pour salt in your wound, poke it and prod it, which is extremely painful. This pattern repeats for 3 years.
At your final appointment the doctor finally treats the wound, gives you stitches, covers it and gives you instructions for how to help heal it. At that point, it is too late. After it finally heals you are left with a horrible scar and painful memories. Had this doctor simply treated and stitched the wound at your first appointment the scarring would have been much less severe and you would have only been left with the memories of actually sustaining the wound.
Obviously, a doctor would never do this. Unfortunately, this is exactly how the legal system “treats” wounded clients. While the wounds may not be physical, the mental and emotional wounds are serious. Rather than immediately working to heal those wounds the legal system keeps them open and lets them fester and petrify all while letting everyone poke and prod at them in public settings. The legal system encourages this behavior with hopes and promises of large financial settlements and victories. However, very few people discuss the cost at which those “victories'“ come.
Our goal is to avoid help clients avoid this process all together in order to address the wounds immediately and directly so that client’s can heal and move on and avoid making the wounds worse.
Core Principles of Integrative Law
Integrative law isn't just about resolving disputes—it’s about transforming the way we engage with conflict. Some key aspects include:
A Focus on Relationships – Whether in employment disputes, business conflicts, or personal matters, integrative law considers the impact of legal issues on relationships and seeks solutions that preserve dignity and respect.
Facilitative Mediation and Dialogue – Instead of immediately resorting to formal legal action, integrative lawyers encourage open conversations and voluntary agreements whenever possible.
Empowering Clients – Rather than taking control of a case, integrative lawyers guide clients through their options, helping them make informed decisions that support their long-term goals.
Creative, Tailored Solutions – Courts often impose rigid, one-size-fits-all outcomes. Integrative law allows for flexible solutions that consider the unique needs of each party.
Minimizing Harm – The adversarial legal system can leave lasting emotional and financial scars. Integrative law seeks to resolve disputes in a way that reduces damage and promotes healing.
Why It Matters
Many people want justice, but they don’t want to engage in a prolonged legal fight. They want resolution, understanding, and the ability to move forward with their lives. Integrative law provides that path. It’s a more humane, efficient, and sustainable approach to resolving disputes—one that values peace and community building over prolonged conflict.
If you’re facing a legal challenge and want to explore a more collaborative, solution-focused approach, integrative law may be the right fit for you.
