mediate
verb /ˈmiːdɪeɪt 
/
/1 [no object] Intervene in a dispute in order to bring about an agreement or reconciliation: Wilson attempted to mediate between the powers to end the war...
- He says that the army and the police who mediate between the settlers and the villagers are no good.
- It was Spring who proposed the establishment of an international body to mediate between the parties.
- Again, it was the patron's role to mediate between the artist and the press, ensuring a harmonious relationship on both sides.
1.1 [with object] Intervene in (a dispute) to bring about an agreement: set up a tribunal to arbitrate and mediate disputes...
- With tensions running high, regional and national leaders were brought in to mediate the dispute.
- This body consisted of an international list of arbitrators who would mediate disputes between states.
- Its refusal to spell out a timetable for statehood or to offer the Palestinians any hope at all does not make the United States appear even-handed in mediating this conflict.
Synonyms
resolve, settle, arbitrate in, umpire, reconcile, mend, clear up, patch up
1.2 [with object] Bring about (an agreement or solution) by intervening in a dispute: efforts to mediate a peaceful resolution of the conflict...
- He tried to mediate a peaceful solution to the Lebanese civil war in the 1980s, and was instrumental in securing the Taif Accord of 1989.
- The World Bank mediated a solution to the Indus River dispute, resulting in negotiation of the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty.
- China's refusal to leave the reef has prompted the Philippines to ‘internationalize’ the issue, urging the United Nations to mediate a solution.
Synonyms
negotiate, bring about, effect, make happen
rare effectuate
2 [with object] technical Bring about (a result such as a physiological effect): the right hemisphere plays an important role in mediating tactile perception of direction...
- Thus this study shows the critical importance of the serotonin system as well as the dopamine system in mediating cocaine's pleasurable effects.
- These signals are sent via the chemical messenger serotonin, which is involved in mood regulation and in mediating the effects of the most widely prescribed antidepressants.
- However, it is not immediately apparent why nontoxic particles might mediate their effects via their surface.
2.1Be a means of conveying: this important ministry of mediating the power of the word...
- She, too, can give praise to the ‘God of Israel’ whose healing power has been mediated through an Israelite healer.
- Here we find a greater reliance upon the power of the church and this power is mediated by a very strange and special figure.
- Of course, organizations form part of wider power fields and, thus, mediate those power relations to engaged anthropologists and our collaborators.
Synonyms
convey, transmit, communicate, put across/over, impart, pass on, hand on, relate, reveal
2.2Form a link between: structures which mediate gender divisions...
- However, the original focal site does not mediate the link between other sites and the language name.
- A competing, though less compelling, interpretation is that similarity mediates the link between liking and perceived intelligence.
- Future work may identify explicit factors mediating the links between somatic and psychological symptoms.
adjective /ˈmiːdɪət /
/Connected indirectly through another person or thing; involving an intermediate agency: public law institutions are a type of mediate state administration
Derivatives
mediately
- In Alcock, Lord Oliver distinguished the case of the witness from that where ‘the injured plaintiff was involved, either mediately or immediately, as a participant’ in the traumatic event.
- Aristotle says words express thoughts and thoughts represent things; so clearly words refer mediately to things by way of our mental conceptions: we talk about things in the way we know them.
- The sceptical possibilities, and the threats they pose to our knowledge, depend upon our knowing things (if we do) mediately, through or by way of something else.
Origin
Late Middle English (as an adjective in the sense 'interposed'): from late Latin mediatus 'placed in the middle', past participle of the verb mediare, from Latin medius 'middle'.