Abstract

The resolution of commercial disputes involves not only the confirmation of the parties' legal rights but also the coordination of multiple interests, including transaction costs, performance capabilities, business trust, and future cooperation. Traditional litigation can clarify rights and obligations through judicial rulings, but in some commercial disputes, litigation costs, time consumption, and enforcement risks may affect the parties' actual interests. Commercial mediation provides parties with a means to negotiate and seek coordination of interests within a legal framework. This paper takes the concepts of Yin-Yang coordination, dynamic change, and appropriate balance inherent in the “I Ching” as its theoretical starting point, and analyzes the specific application of the principle of balance in commercial mediation using a freight dispute case between a Dalian cargo owner and a Singaporean carrier. This paper proposes that traditional philosophical thought can be transformed into a practically meaningful mediation method through four stages: listening, supporting, analyzing, and suggesting. Listening aims to identify the true demands of both parties; supporting aims to build trust; analyzing aims to comprehensively assess the legal basis and dispute resolution costs; and suggesting aims to formulate a legal, reasonable, and enforceable solution. This paper argues that balance is not a mechanical averaging of the interests of both parties, nor is it an arbitrary concession of legal rights, but rather an effective resolution of disputes through a reasonable exchange of interests under legal constraints.

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