• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.135-172
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• 2004

While doing business in China foreign companies occasionally find themselves embroiled in disputes with Chinese individuals, companies or the Chinese Government. There are three primary ways to resolve a commercial dispute in China are negotiation, arbitration and litigation. The best way of dispute resolution is negotiation as it is the least expensive method and the working relationship of both parties concerned in dispute. But negotiations do not always give rise to resolution. Arbitration is the next choice. Unless the parties concerned can agree to resort to arbitration after the dispute has arisen, the underlying contract namely, sales contract or separate agreement must show that disputes will be resolved by arbitration. Agreements to arbitration specify arbitration body and governing law. There are two Chinese government -sponsored arbitration bodies for handling cases involving at least one foreign party: China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission(CIETAC) and China Maritime Arbitration Commission(CMAC) for maritime disputes. Contracts regarding foreign companies doing business in China often designate CIETAC arbitration. CIETAC distinguishes between two kinds of dispute resolutions, foreign-related arbitration and domestic arbitration. For a dispute to be classified as foreign-related arbitration, one of the companies must be a foreign entity without a major production facility or investment in China. CIETAC has published rules which govern the selection of a panel if the contract does not specify how the choice of arbitration will be handled. CIETAC's list of arbitrators for foreign-related disputes, from which CIETAC's arbitrators must en chosen, includes may non-Chines arbitrators. But many foreign experts believe that some aspects of CIETAC needs to be improved. The purpose of this paper is to improve the understanding of arbitration in China, CIETAC by way of studying the current situation and improvement of international commercial arbitration in China.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.55
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• pp.63-93
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• 2012

The purpose of this paper is to examine the consideration factors, from both parties' perspective, to select the most appropriate arbitral institution when they inset an arbitration clause in their contract. Accordingly, the author analyzed the advantages of institutional arbitration compared to non-institutional arbitration. The typical advantages of institutional arbitration would include: $\bullet$ Benefits of using an established set of rules $\bullet$ Services provided by the institution $\bullet$ Low risks of obstruction $\bullet$ Enhancement of the possibilities of enforcement $\bullet$ Forecast of the estimated cost $\bullet$ Specially useful for existing disputes Next, this author examined the consideration factors when selecting the institution in respect of the following factors: $\bullet$ Institution's arbitration rules $\bullet$ Institution's rule regarding the appointment of arbitrators $\bullet$ Ability of administrators of each institution $\bullet$ Reputation of the arbitral institution and the likability of enforceability of its award $\bullet$ Cost $\bullet$ Choice of the arbitral institution in relation to the choice of place of arbitration Finally, this author reviewed Model Arbitration Clause of major international or local Institutions, including ICC, AAA, LCIA, KCAB, CIETAC, ICSID and WIPO. Further examination was given to the selection of the numbers of the arbitral tribunal, the seat of arbitration and the language of arbitration, according to the designated articles in each institution's arbitration rules.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.30 no.1
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• pp.87-111
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• 2020

Smart contracts are implemented by blockchain technology, which stores the terms of the contracts of both parties on the blockchain. In the event of an international dispute over smart contracts and blockchains, no special solution has been proposed, such as the enactment of the International Unification Act. The blockchain platform which operates smart contracts is decentralized and operates through distributed nodes around the world without central servers, making it difficult to establish jurisdiction and governing laws. As an alternative to traditional dispute-solving methods, a new mediation model-smart arbitration-is being attempted. The arbitration process is likely to be a preferred means of resolving disputes over smart contracts in practice. There are many problems, such as the fairness of the arbitration center on the selection and judgment of arbitrators, the question of securing reliability, the question of the validity of the arbitration agreement, and how much the court can be involved in the case. Preparations at the national level, such as fostering blockchains and smart contract experts, and overhauling the legal system, are needed.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.117-138
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• 2008

This study lies on building the International Standardization of China Arbitration System for improving a relationship of mutual trust and the safety trade between China and other worldwide countries, especially, South Korea as their one of the biggest trading partners through the comparative analysis of China and UNCITRAL Arbitration Law. In this analysis, the differences from China and UNCITRAL in arbitration law are like belows ; lack of arbitrator's international mind, the limitation of private property right, prohibition of Ad. hoc arbitration, arbitrator's biased nationalism, localism, and their short specialties. a deficiency of the objectiveness for arbitrator's election, a judgement rejection of claimants by using nonattendance and walkout, impossibility of prior and temporary property custody for execution of arbitration award. etc. For the improvement of the International Standardization of China Arbitration, this paper propose as follows: 1) Extension of private property right, reorganization of tax system, realization of open competition, exclusion of 'Sinocentrism', globalization of arbitration system 2) The abolition of old fashioned bureaucracy with approval for ad.hoc arbitration 3) An education for arbitrator's internationalization, specialty, and to promote legal knowledge 4) A settlement of the third country arbitrators' selection for reflecting interested party's decision by the court in a selection system of arbitration committee. 5) Institutionalization of arbitration judgment that prevent for claimant's avoidance by using a withdrawal and an intentional absent 6) A permission of the right of claimant's court custody directly before the begging of arbitration request for the prevention for destruction of evidence and property concealment 7) Grant of the arbitration tribunal's interim measures of protection for private property preservation to the third party, proof security, prevention from the loss that selling the corruptible goods 8) Improvement of arbitration's efficiency from the exclusion of the obstacles that are forgery, concealed evidence, and arbitrator's bribe taking Lastly, I hope that this study will serve to promote friendly economic relationship between China and South Korea and strive for international equilibrium through the achievement of China Arbitration's International Standardization. I will finish this paper with a firm belief that this will lead to more advanced studies.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.57-75
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• 2007

Ever since franchising emerged in the industry of distribution, it has been growing explosively in the U.S.A. and all other countries as well. It is a method of expanding a business by licensing independent businessman to sell the franchiser's products and/or services or to follow a format and trade style created by the franchiser using the franchiser's trade marks and trade names. Franchising is a form of business that touches upon many different areas of law including, but not limited to, general contract law, general principles of commercial law, law of intellectual property, competition law, fair trade practices law and other industry specific laws e.g., the Fair Practices in Franchising Act in Korea. Arbitration is a long established, legally recognized procedure for submitting disputes to an outside person(s), mutually selected by the parties, for a final and binding decision. Despite its merits as an alternative dispute resolution, it has been criticized, on the other hand, particularly by franchisees' attorneys on the ground that even though it is required to protect the franchisees against the enforcement of pre-dispute arbitration agreements because of the franchisees' paucity of bargaining power vis-a-vis the franchiser, arbitration cannot afford it. Until recently, however, little has been written about the legal issues pertaining to franchise agreement and arbitration clause contained therein in Korea. This treatise reviews the cases and arguments in relation to the subject especially of the U.S.A., which have been accumulated for decades. The issues addressed herein are the pre-emption by the FAA, the disputes to be arbitrated, the selection and qualification of arbitrators, the place of arbitration hearings and the evidentiary rules applicable, the expenses of arbitration, theory of fiduciary duty and the like, all of which are relevant to franchise agreement.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.29
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• pp.39-61
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• 2006

The governing law in international commercial arbitration may be divided into governing arbitration law and governing substantive law. The former governs the parties' arbitration agreement and the conduct of any subsequent arbitration. But the later governs the parties' substantive rights and obligations, which means the law that governs contract formation and performance, and the law to be applied by the arbitrator to the merits of the dispute. The purpose of this paper is to examine how to determine the substantive governing law when there is express choice or implied choice between parties. Moreover this author checked any restrictions on party autonomy and also any possibilities to deviate from the governing law. In case of express choice the sources of the law or rules of law might be the national law of one of the parties, the neutral law, the general principles of law or lex mercatoria according to the arbitration law selected by the arbitral tribunal. Some arbitration laws or rules empower the arbitrator to decide the case ex aequo et bono or to act as amiable compositions. If the governing law could be determined expressly or impliedly by the parties, the arbitral tribunal would make a selection. In this case the criteria for selecting a governing law are not exactly same from country to country. But failing any indication by the parties as to governing law, the arbitral tribunal should apply the rules of law, the law or the law under the rule of conflict that the arbitrators consider applicable, according to the governing arbitration law. Among the connecting factors offered by the conflict rules, (which means the factors that the arbitrators consider applicable), some legal systems give precedence to the formation of the contract, other system to the place of performance of the contract, and others to the closest connection or centre of gravity. But the Rome Convention, which unified the conflict rules of the contracting states, gives precedence to the law of the domicile of the party which has to effect the performance which is characteristic of the contract. Finally this author suggested the Choice of Law Clause which covers governing substantive law and governing arbitration law at the same time. Thus the UNIDROIT Principles as well as any national law may be included as a governing law in international arbitration. So when we make sales or service contract, we should take into consideration of the UNIDROIT Principles as a governing law or a supplement to the governing law.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.3-24
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• 2014

The Arbitration Act of Korea entered into force on December 31, 1999. It was modeled after the UNCITRAL Model Arbitration Law to meet the goal of the internationalization of the arbitration system of South Korea mainly in terms of the System (Alternative Dispute Resolution) Act. In general, a hearing of arbitration is made up of an arbitrator, claimant, and respondent. This is accomplished in a single core. The advantages of arbitration are low cost and confidentiality. In addition, there is the participation of experts and rapidity with a single core agent. However, under the current Arbitration Act, there is no provision expressly relating to the qualifications of arbitrators. This should be accomplished by the arbitration act enforcement ordinance. Following specific details of the 'party' in conjunction with all the provisions of the Arbitration Act, Article 1 should be revised in a timely manner so that "conflict of private law" covers cases in which a dispute between the parties is desirable. In addition, in Article 3 the phrasing of "also dispute 'judicial'" should be revised to over disputes between parties. Furthermore, the provisions of Article 40 are described in the Supplement and so it is preferable to address Supplementary Delete. In addition, this study will analyze ADR in Japan and present a plan to establish a law to resolve disputes outside of court in that country. Therefore, the objective of this study is to assist in the study of legislating fundamental law for alternative dispute resolution. In spite of this, there are many in business and academia who would like to modify the arbitration system in South Korea to improve its function. There is much interest in accomplishing this,so proposals for legislation should continue to be made.In order to accomplish this, the arbitration systems of developed countries such as the United States can be used as a model. It can be seen that despite the idea that the parties involved engage in arbitration autonomously, many elements of the process from the selection of the arbitrator of the arbitral tribunal are specified in legislation and thus it is necessary to develop legislation that will allow arbitration to perform its intended function. Any given arbitral tribunal can be specialized, typically in a case an arbitrator who is an expert in the field is selected. This helps to avoid complaints concerning the results of the arbitration. In the case of international arbitration, however, this provision is often not employed and instead it is necessary to provide a Schedule and Supplement concerning international arbitration. Finally, the promotion of the enactment of the Arbitration Law Enforcement Ordinance must be a top priority in order to ensure proper implementation of the arbitration law.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.91-125
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• 2006

The arbitration rule of CIETAC was vastly revised and was put in force on May 1, 2005. By its revision, China has improved its arbitration system. Chinese arbitration law had many problems when it was enacted in 1995, but the problems could not be avoided because of the poor surroundings for arbitration in China. As China has not had much experience in operating its legal system effectively, and also has little in the way of studies on legal theory that would allow it to deal with its laws in a flexible manner, authorities usually wait to revise a law until enough relevant experience has been accumulated. Therefore, during the 10 years since its enactment, China has resolved the problems within its arbitration law through revision of arbitration rule rather than by revision of the law itself. As this law is a basic one in ruling the arbitration system in China, there are some limitations as to how far the system can be developed through revision of arbitration rule alone. In spite of the limitations, the revision in 2005 contributed a great deal to resolving the existing problems within Chinese arbitration law. The biggest problem in the arbitration law is the Chinese arbitration law that restricts party autonomy. With the revision of the arbitration rule, many problems concerning party autonomy were circumvented. This occurred because the arbitration rule now provides parties the opportunity to choose arbitration rule other than the CIETAC arbitration rule, and even allows parties to agree to amend articles in the CIETAC arbitration rule -- a very important revision indeed. In addition to party autonomy, there are other improvements for example, there is an enhancement of the independent character of the CIETAC, clearing of jurisdiction, easing in the formation of arbitration agreement, improvement in the way arbitrators are chosen, and enhancement in the cultural neutrality of the arbiter. Problems still remain that can only be solved by revision of the arbitration law itself. These problems relate to the governing law of the arbitration agreement, the collection of evidence, custody of property, selection of chief arbiter, interlocutory awards, etc. In addition, some non-legal problems must also be resolved, like the actual judicial review of arbitration awards or difficulties of executing arbitration awards.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.45
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• pp.51-82
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• 2010

The "rules of private international law" or "conflict of law rules" work to determine the governing law, the law applicable to international contracts. These rules permit parties' autonomy to choose the law applicable to their contracts in cases of both litigations and arbitrations. In this regards, the present article examines parties' five options for the choice of the law governing their contracts, which the parties should consider when negotiating and drafting an international agreement. This means that parties in international contracting should check the contents of the law that they are to choose as the governing law before doing so. The first option is to submit the contract to its own law, which can be the safest and simplest solution generally. However this option is subject to the consent of the other party, and is not appropriate when the domestic law chosen contains mandatory rules strongly protecting the other party. Secondly, the option of choosing the other party's law is not preferable in general. Even though the other party is strong enough to succeed in insisting on applying its own law, the other party is advised to counter-offer a neutral solution by suggesting the application of a transnational set of rules and principles of international contract, such as Unidroit Principles. The third option to choose the law of a third country should be taken with the caution that it should be harmonized with either, in case of litigations, the international jurisdiction clause which makes the country chosen have the jurisdiction over the dispute arising under the contract, or, in case of arbitrations, the way of selection of the arbitrator who has good knowledge of the law chosen. The fourth option of submitting the contract to the lex mercatoria or the general principles of law including the Unidroit Principles can be a advisable solution when a dispute is designed to be submitted to experienced arbitrators. The final and fifth is to be silent on the choice of the governing law in contracting. This option can be usefully available by experienced negotiators who are well familiar with the conflict of laws rules and enables the parties to avoid the difficulties to agree on the governing law issue and leave it open until a dispute arises.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.3-43
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• 2018

The emergence of a multi-door courthouse is related with a couple of reasons as follows: First, a multi-door courthouse was originally initiated by the United States government that increasingly became impatient with the pace and cost of protracted litigation clogging the courts. Second, dockets of courts are overcrowded with legal suits, making it difficult for judges to handle those legal suits in time and causing delays in responding to citizens' complaints. Third, litigation is not suitable for the disputant that has an ongoing relationship with the other party. In this case, even if winning is achieved in the short run, it may not be all that was hoped for in the long run. Fourth, international organizations such as the World Bank, UNDP, and Asia Development Bank urge to provide an increased access to women, residents, and the poor in local communities. The generic model of a multi-door courthouse consists of three stages: The first stage includes a center offering intake services, along with an array of dispute resolution services under one roof. At the second stage, the screening unit at the center would diagnose citizen disputes, then refer the disputants to the appropriate door for handling the case. At the third stage, the multi-door courthouse provides diverse kinds of dispute resolution programs such as mediation, arbitration, mediation-arbitration (med-arb), litigation, and early neutral evaluation. This study suggests the extended model of multi-door courthouse comprised of five layers: intake process, diagnosis and door-selection process, neutral-selection process, implementation process of dispute resolution, and process of training and education. One of the major characteristics of extended multi-door courthouse model is the detailed specification of individual department corresponding to each process within a multi-door courthouse. The intake department takes care of the intake process. The screening department plays the role of screening disputes, diagnosing the nature of disputes, and determining a suitable door to handle disputes. The human resources department manages experts through the construction and management of the data base of mediators, arbitrators, and judges. The administration bureau manages the implementation of each process of dispute resolution. The education and training department builds long-term planning to procure neutrals and experts dealing with various kinds of disputes within a multi-door courthouse. For this purpose, it is necessary to establish networks among courts, law schools, and associations of scholars in order to facilitate the supply of manpower in ADR neutrals, as well as judges in the long run. This study also provides six case studies of multi-door courthouses across continents in order to grasp the worldwide picture and wide spread phenomena of multi-door courthouse. For this purpose, the United States and Latin American countries including Argentina and Brazil, Middle Eastern countries, and Southeast Asian countries (such as Malaysia and Myanmar), Australia, and Nigeria were chosen. It was found that three kinds of patterns are discernible during the evolution of a multi-door courthouse model. First, the federal courts of the United States, land and environment court in Australia, and Lagos multi-door courthouse in Nigeria may maintain the prototype of a multi-door courthouse model. Second, the judicial systems in Latin American countries tend to show heterogenous patterns in terms of the adaptation of a multi-door courthouse model to their own environments. Some court systems of Latin American countries including those of Argentina and Brazil resemble the generic model of a multi-door courthouse, while other countries show their distinctive pattern of judicial system and ADR systems. Third, it was found that legal pluralism is prevalent in Middle Eastern countries and Southeast Asian countries. For example, Middle Eastern countries such as Saudi Arabia have developed various kinds of dispute resolution methods, such as sulh (mediation), tahkim (arbitration), and med-arb for many centuries, since they have been situated at the state of tribe or clan instead of nation. Accordingly, they have no unified code within the territory. In case of Southeast Asian countries such as Myanmar and Malaysia, they have preserved a strong tradition of customary laws such as Dhammthat in Burma, and Shriah and the Islamic law in Malaysia for a long time. On the other hand, they incorporated a common law system into a secular judicial system in Myanmar and Malaysia during the colonial period. Finally, this article proposes a couple of factors to strengthen or weaken a multi-door courthouse model. The first factor to strengthen a multi-door courthouse model is the maintenance of flexibility and core value of alternative dispute resolution. We also find that fund raising is important to build and maintain the multi-door courthouse model, reflecting the fact that there has been a competition surrounding the allocation of funds within the judicial system.