CEJC recently received a very generous bequest from June and Jack McKay, for which we are deeply honored and profoundly appreciative. 

​I first met Jack in the early 1980s when I was an intern at the San Francisco Consortium for Elder Abuse Prevention, then housed at Mount Zion Hospital, and he was a leading figure on the group's Steering Committee.The program, now part of the Institute on Aging, was launched by the Coalition for Agencies Serving the Elderly (CASE), which Jack also chaired and was active on for many years. ​Among his many other accomplishments, he was the founding director of Support Services for Elders (SSE), one of the country’s first comprehensive financial case management programs.SSE provided services that ranged from simply helping clients pay their bills to conservatorship. 

At CEJC, we honor Jack's legacy by advancing his vision, most recently through our collaboration with the Judicial Council of California on its state-funded study of conservatorship. The study aims to protect the rights of those under conservatorship while exploring the least restrictive protective options, a mission that aligns perfectly with Jack’s pioneering efforts. I’ve heard that Jack was an incredible folk-dance caller. Although I regret never having the chance to see that side of him, I saw him as a mentor and often followed his calls in our work with elders.   ​

Beyond education, June was deeply committed to restorative justice and criminal justice reform, topics we discussed often. When visiting, she often pulled out items she’d clipped from the San Quentin News, a publication written and produced by incarcerated individuals with a mission to promote public safety and social justice. I later learned that she extended her targeted clipping service to others as well. When my last book came out, June bought a stack and told me to send them to individuals I most wanted to reach. It was a powerful exercise in human values, leading to books being placed in the hands of passionate students and high-ranking government officials alike. I look forward to working with my CEJC colleagues to follow June’s lead by using this gift to promote new leadership and set our sights high.  ​

By Carol Sewell, CEJC Policy Director
 
CEJC’s elder justice lens is trained on the systems and policies that protect older adults’ rights and access to the supports and services they need and want. Our mission is to promote and advance policy changes to ensure the rights of older adults are preserved, to advocate when those rights are at risk, and to support systems that empower older adults’ autonomy, equity, and diversity.
 
While policies lay the foundation for elder justice, the structure of systems ensuring justice depends on an educated and committed workforce to implement the vision. Policies such as the Affordable Care Act and, more recently, California’s Master Plan for Aging, show movement toward increased equity and accessibility of services, yet the fact remains that when services are understaffed, there may be limits to who has access.
 
Workforce shortages cause major concern across the health and service spectrum, and they are especially worrisome for anyone concerned with the future of aging. Already there are too few direct care workers, too few health care professionals with geriatric expertise, and too few educational institutions focused on filling these gaps. As the population of older adults continues to expand, understanding the depth of these shortages will be the first step in resolving the equity and access issues.
 
Geriatric Social Work
A primary right of older and disabled adults is the right to live in the least restrictive setting that accommodates their needs.[1] Community living affords individuals greater control over their living arrangements and their schedules, enabling them to participate in community activities, to interact with neighbors, and to receive the tailored services they need in their own home. Social workers play a pivotal role in community living for older and disabled adults, providing social supports, case management, emotional counseling, and help arranging services. Social workers assess and monitor services provided for in-home supportive service recipients; they manage day-to-day activities in assisted living and provide support for residents in congregate housing.
 
The need for more social workers with gerontology/geriatric training was identified nearly 20 years ago by a 2006 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Report to Congress[2] and again by the John A. Hartford Foundation in 2009. Both reports cited the growing older adult population and the increasing need for social workers across a broad range of aging services. According to the Hartford Foundation, “Geriatric social work ranks as one of the top 20 careers in terms of growth potential. Employment in the field of geriatric social work is expected to increase faster than the average of all other occupations through 2015, due in part to shorter hospital stays and the need for care coordination at hospital discharge.” [3]
 
The findings were reinforced in research by Chapin, et al, that identified the opportunity for social work education with a stronger gerontology emphasis to “begin to address gaps in understanding the particular needs of diverse groups of older adults.” The authors acknowledge that aging issues are relevant in all social work practice areas, noting that 62 percent of social workers surveyed by National Association of Social Workers (NASW) believed their work required a greater understanding of aging issues.[4]
 
In its 2019 stakeholder recommendations for California’s Master Plan for Aging the California Chapter of NASW noted the increasing and vital role of social workers in the continuum of care for older adults. The recommendations include “access to professional social work services in all settings, regardless of medical diagnosis, payer, or involvement of other disciplines.”[5]
 
Beyond the Judicial System
The American Bar Association defines elder law as "…the legal practice of counseling and representing older persons and persons with special needs, and their representatives about the legal aspects of health and long-term care planning, public benefits, surrogate decision making, legal capacity, the conservation, disposition and administration of estates and the implementation of their decisions concerning such matters, giving due consideration to the applicable tax consequences of the action, or the need for more sophisticated tax expertise.”[6] Legal assistance is needed to draft wills, for estate planning to protect even low-income elders’ resources, and to address rental and housing issues, access to government benefits, and rising rates of elder abuse and financial exploitation.
 
According to the National Elder Law Foundation, in 2024 there are 500 certified elder law attorneys in the U.S.[7] With 17 percent of the nation’s population age 65 and older,[8] already the need for experts in elder law is great. Elder law attorneys understand the ever-changing legal landscape affecting older adults’ legal rights and needs, along with the complex issues that confound an older adult’s approach to these challenges. Decisional capacity, limited mobility and complicated trusts and family dynamics all enter into the mix of determining the best outcome for an older client. New court requirements around surrogate decisionmakers, conservatorships, innovative self-help clinics and elder advocates in the courts will only increase the need for this expertise in coming years.
                                                                                                               
Protective Services and Law Enforcement
One of the most critical areas needing geriatric expertise is Adult Protective Services (APS). Elder maltreatment and exploitation affect at least one out of every 10 U.S. older adults living at home, according to the National Center on Elder Abuse.[9]  Master’s level social workers (MSW) make up the majority of California APS professionals charged with investigating crimes that include physical, emotional, sexual, financial (exploitation, frauds and scams) against older and disabled adults. Along with investigations, APS social workers evaluate clients and help them connect with needed supports like in-home supportive services, public assistance, safer and  more appropriate housing, case management and, when needed, probate conservatorships. Many agencies rely on workers with specialized skills to handle certain case types, such as those with non-English speaking victims or victims of financial crimes, among others.[10]
 
According to a 2018 report from the National Adult Protective Services Association (NAPSA), a majority of APS agencies lack sufficient staff and funding,[11] problems that will only increase as the older population continues to expand. At the same time, there is little incentive for social work students to focus their graduate studies on older adults. While California MSW students receive stipends of up to $20,000 to study child welfare services, a stipend program for graduate level social work students focused on older adult services has only recently been launched and has yet to be fully implemented across the state’s higher education system.[12] Knowledge of older adult vulnerabilities, the effects isolation and lost mobility, medication mismanagement, malnutrition, and cognitive decline are basic components of a gerontology education that can strengthen the skillset of MSW students entering the protective service field. [13]
 
Police and sheriff’s deputies are often the first to respond to reports of elder abuse, unsafe driving, wellness checks, substance abuse or behavioral issues. Basic knowledge of the issues facing older adults, including complex health issues, family dynamics, recognizing cognitive impairments and older adult autonomy are critical to this work. According to research published by the American Geriatrics Society, out of the 84% of law enforcement officials reporting basic training in working with elders, “only 32% rated themselves knowledgeable about aging-related health,” which many report would help address the frequent challenges they face.[14]
 
Summing up
This is only a snapshot of the workforce shortages that stand in the way of elder justice. Promoting the many opportunities in gerontology/geriatric careers is essential to provide just and equitable services and supports to the growing population of older adults. Until we can say that older adults have the supports they need to safely choose community living; until they have access to the estate planning and legal supports needed to protect themselves from exploitation; and until the professionals charged with protecting and investigating harms against vulnerable adults have the necessary skills to do their work and manageable caseloads, elder justice remains elusive. 
 
[1] US Department of Justice Office of Civil Rights. Information and Technical Assistance on the Americans With Disabilities Act: Olmstead: Community Integration for Everyone. https://archive.ada.gov/olmstead/olmstead_about.htm   
[2] U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (2006). The supply and demand of professional social workers providing long-term care services. Report to Congress. http://aspe.hhs.gov/daltcp/reports/2006/SWsupply.htm.
[3] The John A. Hartford Foundation. Escalating Need for Geriatric Social Workers. 2009.
https://www.johnahartford.org/ar2009/Escalating_Need_for_Geriatric_Social_Workers.html#:~:text=The%20continued%20growth%20of%20the,in%20terms%20of%20growth%20potential
[4] Chapin, R., Nelson-Becker, H., Gordon, T., Landry, S. T., & Chapin, W. B. (2007). Responding to the Hartford Geriatric Social Work Initiative: A Multilevel Community Approach to Building Aging Competency. Journal of Gerontological Social Work, 50(1–2), 59–74. https://doi-org.proxy.lib.csus.edu/10.1300/J083v50n01_05
[5] National Association of Social Workers California Chapter. Input for the California Master Plan for Aging: Letter to CHHS Secretary Mark Ghaly, MD. November 19, 2019. https://www.chhs.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/National-Association-of-Social-Workers.pdf
[6] Kirtland, M. What Is Elder Law: And Why Do You Care? American Bar Association. Voice of Experience. August 27, 2019. https://www.americanbar.org/groups/senior_lawyers/resources/voice-of-experience/2010-2022/what-elder-law-why-do-you-care
[7] Colliton, J. Planning Ahead: What certification means in Elder Law. National Elder Law Foundation. October 25, 2018. https://nelf.org/page/Whatcertification102518
[8] America’s Health Rankings. 2024 Senior Report. United Health Foundation.
[9] National Center on Elder Abuse. Prevalence of Elder Abuse. February 28, 2024.   https://ncea.acl.gov/prevalenceofeldermistreatment#gsc.tab=0
[10] Office of the Controller – City Performance, City and County of San Francisco. HUMAN SERVICES AGENCY - Adult Protective Services Staffing Analysis. May 18, 2017. https://sfcontroller.org/sites/default/files/Documents/Auditing/APS%20Staffing%20Analysis%20Final%20Report%205-18-17.pdf
[11] NAPSA. NAPSA Adult Protective Services Abuse Registry National report. 2018.  https://www.napsa-now.org/public-policy/
[12] MSW Stipend Programs. CalState East Bay. https://www.csueastbay.edu/sw/stipend-programs.html
[13] Kunkel, S. and Settersten, Jr., R. Aging, Society, and the Life Course. Sixth Edition. 2022. Springer Publishing.
[14] Brown RT, Ahalt C, Steinman MA, Kruger K, Williams BA. Police on the front line of community geriatric health care: challenges and opportunities. J Am Geriatr Soc. 2014 Nov;62(11):2191-8. doi: 10.1111/jgs.13093. Epub 2014 Nov 6. PMID: 25378267; PMCID: PMC4349487.

By Lisa Nerenberg, CEJC Director of Special Projects
​
It was unlike any elder justice event I’d ever been to. And I've been to a lot. Strategies to Advance Greater Elder Safety (STAGES), a two-day event hosted by Futures Without Violence last June, signaled that change was coming to our field.

Coming back together, we reflected on what we'd heard. There had been questions and explanations, lapses and misunderstandings: a forgotten acknowledgement, disagreement over whether restorative approaches could be applied to domestic violence, and an explanation of gender pronouns for doubters. There were gestures of humility and empathy and the exhilaration of new connections and understanding.

​Restorative Approaches
The line-up of presenters included trailblazers and influencers, seekers and explorers. Arlene Groh, who gave the first plenary presentation, was in the trailblazers’ camp as founder and co-ordinator of the Healing Approaches to Elder Abuse Project, supported by the Community Care Access Centre in Waterloo, Ontario, one of the oldest enduring programs to bring restorative approaches to elder abuse. The program uses circles and other restorative practices as alternatives to the traditional criminal justice system to address the harm caused by elder abuse.

​Qiana Mickie mixed it up next in her plenary talk, shifting the focus to food. The “New York City- based food systems leader” reflected on food as a medium of cultural expression and a connector of generations. The communal gardens she works with and promotes are places that foster exchange among the young and old and raise awareness about how access to nutritious food is a matter of social justice.

Sharing Stories of Healing
A workshop on guided storytelling by Meghna Bhat was a chance to share personal experiences of healing and reconciliation and to look for deeper meaning and connections in our pasts. She challenged us to incorporate the power of storytelling into our work with older adults.

​The panel Restorative Approaches in Elder Justice with American Indian and Alaska Native Communities, moderated by Sonya Begay of the Administration for Community Living, emphasized the indigenous roots of restorative justice and highlighted how it is reflected in tribal programs that serve elders today. Panelists included Dr. Jacque Gray, former Director of the National Indigenous Elder Justice Initiative, Peggy Jo Harper, Director of Elder Justice Projects at the Native American Elder Justice Initiative, and Margaret Carson, manager of the Muckleshoot Tribe's Adult Protective Services Program. In a lively presentation and Q & A, the panelists described how they drew from the wisdom of elders, current and ancestral, in designing tribal codes, conducting research, and meeting the everyday needs of tribal members.

RISE and Alternatives to Punitive Approaches
Another panel, led by M.T. Connolly, elder justice expert and author of the new book The Measure of our Age, Navigating Care, Safety, Money, and Meaning Later in Life, focused on the research-driven RISE program. RISE provides alternatives to strictly punitive approaches to accountability, diverting APS clients to the community based non-profit Elder Abuse Institute of Maine, which has the flexibility to work with survivors, offenders, whole families, and other stakeholders to prevent abuse and mitigate its harm. The panelists illustrated how the program's impact is being magnified through careful evaluation and parlayed into public policy, citing how they've received public funds to expand statewide.

Collaboration
Other workshops and presentations, too numerous to list, expanded on the themes of economic justice and creative partnerships. It was a diverse array that showcased collaborations and affiliations among lawyers, domestic violence advocacy groups, and faith communities. Members of UBUNTU Research & Evaluation, a learning community focused on racial justice, applied an Afrofuturist lens to mistreatment and discrimination against elders of color. Lizzy Letter described her elder justice work as Staff Director for the U.S. Senate Committee on Aging.

​The electric Dr. Eloise Sepeda closed out the event with a forceful appeal to reject practices that marginalize BIPOC survivors and a call for culturally specific projects designed for and led by the communities they serve. It was a challenge to come together to reduce systemic harm and increase holistic support and well-being for families.

Fresh Approaches
For those like me, weary from the current onslaught of elder abuse, predation, and exploitation we confront daily, and disheartened by our field's lack of progress in stopping it, the event's fresh approaches were deeply appreciated. STAGES was a time to reconnect with old friends and meet others who shared a thirst for both new and old--innovation and a return to age-old traditions. It was a call to exit the echo chamber and the kind of event that left me wanting more.

​Dee, like the 20 thousand other California prisoners over the age of 55, is not allowed to retire or even reduce her work hours. The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s (CDCR) policy of full-time work for all prisoners disregards the widely accepted consensus that prison life ages people, and people in prison are physiologically ten or more years older than their chronological age. Prisons generally classify those past the age of 55 as elderly. 

Regardless, even prisoners who are well into their 70s are still required to engage in “normal programming.” Refusal to work can result in a cascade of disciplinary actions, including the loss of “privileges,” which include access to phones and the prison canteen, visits, and packages. Some are placed in segregation. Without work, inmates have no way to purchase personal items the prison system doesn’t provide, like postage, toothpaste, toilet paper, or deodorant.
 
Prisoners are not eligible for Social Security or Medicare because the Social Security Administration suspends payments to anyone already earning benefits who is sentenced to more than 30 days’ incarceration.[1]  And even though they are required to file taxes while in prison, CDCR pays so little (between 08¢ and 52¢ per hour) for full-time work that incarcerated persons don’t earn enough to pay payroll taxes.[2]

Although those classified as permanently disabled by the prison medical department are exempt from the work requirement, prisoners report that such exemptions are difficult to obtain and not granted to people who have chronic diseases like arthritis, diabetes, osteoporosis, or age alone. The exact number of medical exemptions granted is not available. 

​Nationally, inmates aged 50 and older are the fastest growing segment of the inmate population, while the overall prison population is decreasing (Bureau of Prisons, 2018).  Between 2000 and 2017, the share of prisoners aged 50 or older more than quintupled, from 4% to 23%, the result of harsh, lengthy prison sentences and mass incarceration during the “tough on crime” policies of the 1980s and 1990s.[1]

CURE-CA, a grassroots, all-volunteer, non-profit organization and member of the CURE national nonprofit network, is working to change CDCR policy to allow some older inmates to retire and others to be given part time work or volunteer assignments. CURE promotes restorative justice and the welfare of those enmeshed in the criminal justice system and is currently in the process of contacting concerned groups to gain information, ideas, and support for addressing the needs of imprisoned senior citizens. To learn more and support CURE-CA’s work, contact https://curecalifornia.org/

​[1] https://www.aclu.org/files/assets/elderlyprisonreport_20120613_1.pdf
[2] Incarcerated people, like anyone else, have to file a tax return if they have enough income. Most incarcerated people have in-prison jobs that pay a very small amount of, and sometimes no, money. Most facilities “pay” you by putting credit in your commissary account.  How Do You Go About About Filing Taxes When Incarcerated? 

The A*Team – a US DOJ-funded project to address systemic obstacles faced by elder abuse multidisciplinary teams – held a meeting with California banking officials to discuss issues around information sharing and reporting during elder fraud investigations. The difficulty of balancing customer privacy, fiduciary responsibilities and mandated reporter duties with customer autonomy were highlighted throughout the meeting. Both A*Team members and bankers expressed frustration with the current system and agreed to work together toward solutions that could serve all parties’ needs.
 
Following the conversation, one of the bank officials (we’ll call her Banker A) emailed a case-in-point: an older customer had just closed her account and withdrawn all her funds because the bank refused to transfer over $400,000 in what they suspected was a case of fraud. The growing number of fraud cases has banks on high alert, and Banker A’s institution had taken appropriate action to protect their customer’s funds and file the necessary reports.
 
The customer in this case was undeterred. Withdrawing her funds in the form of a cashier’s check, her goal was to continue the transaction from a different bank. Where the first bank had a history with the customer and could easily recognize a new and dangerous change in her banking habits, the new bank had none. The question arose of how to prevent the new bank from facilitating the fraud? Do banks have the right to share this kind of information without violating customer privacy laws? Time was of the essence, but Banker A felt helpless to prevent the fraud once the account was closed and shared her frustration with the A*Team. 
 
The usual procedure in this type of situation is for banks to file a Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) with the Federal Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), along with the mandated reports to law enforcement and adult protective services (APS). Because the suspected crime is non-life-threatening, neither law enforcement nor APS is mandated to prioritize a fraud case for same-day response, increasing the odds that the customer’s funds will be long gone by the time an investigation begins.
 
Given the A*Team’s membership and expertise, a very different approach was pursued. Responding to Banker A’s note, our team’s expert in financial abuse prosecution reached out to the appropriate county District Attorney, who assigned an investigator to follow-up on the case. A second banking official (Banker B) contacted her liaison at the new bank, alerting the institution to the situation, and urged Banker A to file an online report with the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center. At the A*Team member’s notification, a DA’s investigator immediately contacted Banker A to follow-up, then, together with Adult Protective Services, went to the individual’s residence to inform the customer about the fraud. The District Attorney reported later that day the customer was the victim of a romance scam and had already lost several hundred thousand dollars to the fraudster, but the remainder of her funds were saved. 
 
The case points to inherent flaws in the system as it’s currently designed. Following state guidelines, APS responds immediately to reports involving “an immediate life threat, imminent danger, or a crisis in an existing case” (CCR Title 22, 33-510). If the threat level is found to be less, the guidelines require a response “as soon as possible” but no later than 10 days from receiving the report. Counties are able to establish their own, more rigorous, response criteria. Depending on the urgency of the case, San Francisco’s APS, for example, either responds immediately, within 24 hours, within 2 to 5 days, or no later than 10 days after a report is filed.
 
Financial Abuse Specialist Teams (FASTs) create relationships between relevant partners to review non-urgent abuse cases and strengthen important local networks. Few have the ability to respond immediately to case reports, although if more banks were part of the FAST team, the connection between APS and bank participants could open the door to more timely response. 
 
Normally, law enforcement, and not the District Attorney, would receive the cross-report of suspected abuse. Typically, the District Attorney’s office will not get involved until local law enforcement has generated a police report number. In many jurisdictions, law enforcement views financial abuse as a civil matter and will not investigate cases that involve family members or loved ones. Investigating internet fraud or scams is beyond the scope of many agencies, so these crimes often go uninvestigated.
 
Banks have legal authority to delay a transaction for 15 days when fraud is suspected, and a court can order a longer hold if it’s warranted, but a customer can still close an account and take their funds elsewhere at any time.
 
None of the established procedures provide a way to prevent an individual from losing their funds, raising important systemic issues for the A*Team to study. Cumbersome procedures that may slow response times, inability of banks to share information, and the need for clear guidance on procedures for both banks and abuse responders are the types of issues the A*Team was created to address. By demonstrating its knowledge of how to intervene, the A*Team proved it has a head start on developing solutions that can work for everyone.

​Carol Sewell is CEJC's Director of Policy and A*Team Project Coordinator

​I'm proud to be part of a community of advocates that is deeply committed to autonomy, human rights and dignity. It gives me hope.
 
Let's regroup and move forward.

​Forty-five years ago, I left the Moonies—a far-right authoritarian cult—and ever since, my career has been dedicated to stopping destructive cults and spreading awareness about undue influence. In my decades of activism, I have come to understand how social psychology and the law are connected.

Current Legal Understanding of Undue Influence
Phrases like “brainwashing” and “thought reform” are not widely accepted as legal theories, and courts rarely hear cases based on these concepts. However, the legal theory of undue influence is more widely accepted and has been recognized in law for hundreds of years. But cases involving undue influence almost always involve a person with mental or physical incapacitation—often an elderly person who was taken advantage of by a caregiver—and typically focus on the use of undue influence for financial gain. ​I believe that laws that prohibit the unethical use of undue influence should be expanded to include all instances in which people are placed under mind control. That includes cults’ exploitation of members’ labor, parental alienation (where one parent programs children against the other), coercive control by men over women, covert hypnosis, or when a president lies to foment an insurrection. 

Models of Undue Influence
Expanding and enforcing current laws relating to undue influence will require that judges and juries have the tools they need to identify undue influence and understand how people’s minds can be manipulated. I developed the BITE model of Authoritarian Control and the  Influence Continuum toward that end. “BITE” stands for Behavior, Information, Thought, and Emotional control. The BITE Model can be used in concert with “The Social Influence Model (SIM),” which was developed by Dr. Alan Scheflin, a Law Professor Emeritus at the Santa Clara University Law School, based on his decades of research on brainwashing and mind control as they relate to the law. SIM is used by expert witnesses to explain undue influence to judges and juries; it addresses six contributing factors: influencer, influencer’s motives, influencer’s methods, circumstances, influencee’s receptivity/vulnerability, and consequences. The BITE Model fits under “methods” in SIM. The Influence Continuum distinguishes ethical from unethical influence, the main distinction being informed consent. Nobody gives informed consent to join a destructive cult if they have been deceptively recruited.

​My aim, when I entered a doctorate program, was to develop an instrument that justice systems worldwide could  use to evaluate when undue influence has been used drawing from these models. For my doctoral dissertation, I conducted a factor analysis of the BITE model using a Likert scale to measure the presence of the four variables used in authoritarian control on 1400 subjects.

Undue Influence Law in the Future
Undue influence is a serious and pressing issue. Today, people are inundated with lies, propaganda, and disinformation in the media and on social media feeds. Constantly being exposed to lies and mind control can have serious consequences. Under the legal theory of undue influence, if any person has genuinely been coerced by manipulative recruitment into performing illegal actions, the victim should receive help to regain their freedom of mind, and the manipulators should be subjected to appropriate legal consequences. When a man in a bible cult was told by its leader to beat the devil out of his son who wanted to leave, it was the father who went to jail and not the cult leader who had control over him. That is not justice. Similarly, people coming out of ISIS are forever treated as criminals and terrorists. The law needs to recognize when cult tactics are at work, and that with proper counseling and follow up, people can and should be able to return to society.

​​The Federal government needs to address these issues by creating stricter and more expansive laws related to undue influence. The law also places too much emphasis on property and money losses and not enough on deceptive recruitment by cults and psychological and emotional abuse. I contend that if analytic tools are applied systematically on a mass scale, they can make it easier to identify and demonstrate undue influence and for victims to get the help they need.

​Based on my experiences, I believe that mediators can benefit from the following:

• Educate yourself about grief and be aware that it might play a role in your mediation.

 

• Don’t make assumptions about people’s response to loss. Remain curious. The emotional landscape of grief is highly individualized.

 

• Demonstrate openness to discussing loss. Be direct in your words. Avoid euphemisms, express sympathy, and inquire whether the party would like to discuss the loss. If there is willingness, invite discussion with open-ended inquiry: “I wonder how this conflict has affected your ability to grieve the loss of your parent.”

 

• Let the party lead the conversation. Some want to talk in detail; others, not at all.

 

• Consider customized procedures, such as private sessions with each party before the mediation to allow people to express their emotions privately in a less pressured conversation. And give them time to reflect afterward.

 

• Create an atmosphere where emotions conducive to reflection and good decision-making might emerge, remembering that lingering grief-associated emotions such as anger can have challenging effects.

 

• Invite sadness into the conversation and empathize with it. “I know you are furious with the other party, but I wonder if you are also sad about what happened. What do you think?”

 

• Simply understanding the profoundly debilitating effects of grief can help us extend our compassion and empathy beyond ordinary limits. When we make sense of offensive behavior or irrational negotiating positions, the urge to judge gives way to curiosity and understanding, or empathy – and a desire to help, or compassion.

 
Elder mediators need to be prepared to work with parties in the midst of loss. Developing skills to recognize and address the challenges of grief-associated emotions and cultivating personal qualities of empathy, compassion, and patience will help us better serve parties suffering from loss and grief – and better serve ourselves, too.