Collaborative Law is an alternative dispute resolution model which originates in the United States but was introduced in Ireland in 2004. Collaborative law helps to resolve all sorts of family law disputes arising from separation, divorce, parenting or other family issues in a dignified manner without involving litigation through the Courts.

With Collaborative Law both parties to the dispute retain separate specifically trained solicitors whose only task is to help the parties with the disagreements that they have. Negotiations take place in a number of four way settlement meetings that are attended by both clients and solicitors. The number of meetings required differs with each couple, depending on the complexity of the issues involved. The agenda for each meeting is agreed between the clients and solicitors beforehand. The purpose of the four way settlement meeting is to reach a settlement, which is negotiated by both clients directly, with the legal advice provided by the solicitors, if needed. Each solicitor is there to ensure that their clients are guided towards a reasonable resolution.

With negotiations taking place only in the four way meetings, both parties insulate their children from their dispute and, should custody be an issue, they avoid the professional custody evaluation process.

If a financial, medical or other expert is required, then one expert is retained to advise both parties, as opposed to the traditional litigation approach of retaining separate experts to advise each client.

Once the issues have been settled and both clients have reached agreement as to the terms of the divorce/separation or other agreement reached, then the solicitors prepare and process all the papers required to obtain a Court Order on consent.

Each collaborative solicitor's retainer is always on the basis that should the negotiations breakdown, and it is not possible for the two clients to agree on a settlement, the two solicitors' retainers are terminated and each client must instruct new solicitors to proceed through litigation to achieve an outcome.

Collaborative Law is different from the traditional adversarial Court process in that all parties participate directly in an open and honest exchange of information. The traditional litigation approach is to obtain discovery of every piece of information in relation to each party's means or the issues. While discovery and the open exchange of information is a important foundation of collaborative negotiations, discovery is generally narrowed down to specific aspects of each party's finances or the issues that the other party is unclear about. Neither party takes advantage of the miscalculations or mistakes of the other.

With collaborative law the parties remain in control of the process but with each party having their solicitor there throughout the negotiations for legal advice and guidance.

Collaborative law is not suited to all parties who are involved in a family dispute. Generally, a degree of trust is necessary and the parties must have a reasonably amicable relationship.