Revista da EMERJ - V. 22 - N.1 - Janeiro/Março - 2020

17  R. EMERJ, Rio de Janeiro, v. 22, n. 1, p. 11 - 26, Janeiro-Março. 2020  total, has also increased remarkably and now has even surpassed voluntary mediations, reaching 13,4% on the total of mediation of 2017, i.e. dealing with 20.835 cases. The Court of Milan (ord. 27/4/16) has recently issued a de- cision which interprets Article 5, second paragraph of the Legis- lative Decree 28/2010 on civil and commercial mediation with a substantialist approach. This latter provision refers to mediations conducted by order of the judge of the trial. The judge can com- pel the parties, after a prima facie evaluation of the case, to go to a mediator. If the parties do not obey, the judge will bar any sub- sequent phase of the proceedings. With this decision, the Court adheres to the principle that the condition of admissibility cannot be satisfied with a simple preliminary mediation meeting between the attorneys. The Court of Milan expressly states that the parties must personally attend the meeting, unless they have a legitimate impediment. The decision confirms the importance of participa- tion of the parties to mediation and the centrality of reaching an agreement that comes the closest to the economic and non-eco- nomic interests of the contenders. The Court concurs with what has been decided by other Courts (including in Florence, Rome, and Palermo) when the judges, after evaluating the conduct of the parties, the state of the trial, and the nature of proceedings, had re- quested to attempt a mediation. This provision testifies a growing awareness that meeting in front of the mediator cannot be a mere formality, but a process necessarily founded on the negotiation of the substantive interests of the parties. Italian judges might have finally become aware of the mediation rationale, while the quality and the number of mediation projects they were involved to 7 , pro- ved an effective sensitization about conciliatory measures. However, one should take into account that within the num- ber of mediations by court’s order, which proves an increased awareness of the procedure among the judges, only a small por- tion concerns non-mandatory matters. In other terms, only a little percentage of this kind of mediation results from a truly proacti- 7 Matteucci, G. (2017). “Civil Mediation, How to Kick-Start It; The Italian Experience. Training, Compul- sory, Tax Relieves, Control”. Revista da EMERJ , 19(4), 78-100.