Streamlining Arbitral Proceedings: Some Techniques of the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal

Abstract

ALMOST TEN years ago there was a programme in London on arbitration sponsored jointly by the Inns of Court, the Law Society and the visiting American Bar Association. In my remarks on that occasion, I expressed concern over the slow pace of some arbitral proceedings, particularly in complex international commercial disputes.1 This year when I was kindly invited to present the Freshfields Arbitration Lecture, it occurred to me that this might be an appropriate opportunity to review the situation, to see what, if any, progress the arbitration community has made during the past decade toward achieving more efficient conduct of cases. When discussing this subject in London ten years ago, I spoke of the sloth and the dinosaur, cautioning that we must not allow arbitration to be as slow as the sloth or as cumbersome – and therefore as obsolete – as the dinosaur.2 Reassessing the situation today, I suggest that while all international arbitrations may have not yet developed the swiftness of the gazelle, some progress has been made toward curing the slothfulness of arbitrations and averting the fate of the dinosaur. Perhaps the most significant development in this regard has been an increasing recognition by the arbitration community – users, practitioners and arbitrators – that there is a pressing need to improve the efficiency of arbitral proceedings. In a group as resourceful as the arbitration community, attention to problems is likely to beget solutions, and, therefore, it is encouraging that this has become a popular subject for discussion. International conferences now concern themselves not only with traditional topics such as arbitrability, enforceability and law reform, but are beginning to focus on how to achieve more efficient conduct of cases. For example, the Congress of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration (ICCA) to be held in Vienna …