Originally from The Dark Side of Arbitration, Second Edition

Preview

This book revisits, updates, integrates, and harmonizes three books by one of the authors, Ugo Draetta, published by Juris Publishing on international arbitration. However, it is not a mere juxtaposition of these books, which would hardly have been necessary. What will be attempted here is to capture and emphasize the central theme, or as the French say, the fil rouge that ties all the above books together, and reduce the books to unity.

This fil rouge is the “dark side of arbitration.” A few words of explanation may be necessary to clarify this concept.

In most cases, the arbitration process unfolds smoothly and without problems. When this occurs, the process is rewarding for all the players involved.

Yet, pathological cases exist where problems arise from the misconduct of one or more of the players who act inappropriately and in violation of the applicable binding rules. These forms of inappropriateness are often not “in the dark” at all. They become known to the players involved and trigger the relevant remedial actions contemplated by such applicable rules. Examples of these actions would be a party’s challenge of the independence or impartiality of the arbitrator(s) or the request to set aside the award on the same grounds. This book will not deal with these situations, as they are abundantly discussed in legal literature.