Experienced Leadership

Mark Appel is a Senior Research Fellow of the Center and serves on the Global Research Council.  He co-leads with Chloe Baldwin the Center’s research and education program focused on dispute mitigation and avoidance within the energy and natural resources sectors. 

Mr.  Appel is an Independent International Mediator and Arbitrator with ArbDB Chambers in the City of London. He focuses his practice on investor-state relations. He was the Founding Director and is now the Honorary Director of the International Mediation Institute (IMI) and served as the immediate past chair of the IMI Investor-State Mediation Taskforce. He is also a Member of the UNCITRAL Mediation Rules Advisory Committee.  

He has nearly 40 years of global mediation and arbitration experience. Currently based in London, he previously worked in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Africa. He is thoroughly familiar with Civil and Common Law mediation and arbitration practice and procedure. He has 30 years’ experience in training mediators and arbitrators on multiple continents on behalf of various dispute resolution institutions, government ministries, courts and NGOs  

Before becoming an independent international mediator and arbitrator, Mr. Appel served in executive and senior executive positions in leading ADR institutions. He was instrumental in building out the American Arbitration Association’s ADR platform. He also served in a senior role at the International Centre for Dispute Resolution (ICDR), leaving ICDR/ AAA as Senior Vice President-EMEA in December 2015.   

Mr. Appel has significant experience as a consultant in designing and administering dispute avoidance, conflict management and dispute resolution systems. His areas of experience include Construction/Infrastructure, General Commercial, Labor (including significant experience with Labor Unions) and Employment, Sports, Environmental, Social/Community and Governance.  In each case, he developed early stakeholder mapping and used critical listening skills to identify stakeholder interests and incorporate them into the dispute avoidance process.  

He is a member of the AAA/ICDR Mediation Panel, the AIAC Arbitration and Mediation Panels, the SCCA Mediation Panel, and the ADGM-CEDR Investor-State Mediation Panel. 

Mr. Appel holds a Bachelor of Arts – BA, History Political Science/Peace Studies, and a Juris Doctorate Degree, from the University of Denver – Sturm College of Law.