Defining the boundary between questions of law and fact is a critical challenge in designing credible international appellate mechanisms. This paper examines how this structural safeguard shapes who decides what on appeal in two contrasting systems: the World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) now-paralysed Appellate Body (AB) and United Nations Commission on International Trade Law’s (UNCITRAL’s) ongoing efforts to create an investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) appellate mechanism. While the WTO’s dispute settlement rules initially drew a clear doctrinal line between law and fact, its AB blurred this boundary through expansive reinterpretations and its procedural reliance on the ‘objective assessment’ safeguard, contributing to institutional breakdown. In contrast, UNCITRAL’s Draft Statute begins with a vague ‘manifest error’ standard for factual review, offering no clear threshold or procedural filter to prevent excessive factual relitigation. Recent Working Group III (WG III) discussions, including a possible revision to require errors to be ‘apparent on their face’, highlight that textual drafting alone cannot ensure consistency or finality. Through a comparative doctrinal and procedural analysis, the paper argues that lessons from the WTO’s trajectory demonstrate that even precise treaty text is insufficient unless reinforced by practical safeguards, such as procedural filters and clear interpretive guidance. In practice, sustaining the law-fact divide is essential to preserve legitimacy, efficiency, and predictability for states, investors, and the broader dispute settlement system.

This article examines the Supreme Court of Norway’s (Court) judgment in case HR-2025-921-A, which addresses the independence and impartiality of arbitrators. The case concerned an application to set aside an arbitral award based on the alleged incorrect composition of the arbitral tribunal in an ad hoc arbitration. The judgment considers inter alia the threshold for disqualification of arbitrators v. court judges, the threshold to disqualify a lawyer from acting as an arbitrator because of their law firm’s client relationship with a party to the case, and the arbitrator’s duty of disclosure. The judgment is significant for international arbitration practitioners due to its detailed consideration of the 2024 International Bar Association (IBA) Guidelines on Conflicts of Interest in International Arbitration. The Court ultimately found that the arbitrator’s law firm’s client relationship with one of the parties to the arbitration did not give rise to justifiable doubts about the arbitrator’s impartiality and independence, despite a breach of the duty to disclose. The case highlights the importance of making a specific assessment of the nature, scope, and duration of client relationships in assessing arbitrator impartiality, and builds upon the general rule ‘if in doubt, disclose’, to add ‘and ensure the parties are aware of the disclosure’.

When lawyers speak of comparative law, they mostly think of the ‘civil’ and the ‘common law’ − two legal traditions that are widely viewed as isolated from one another. In the realm of international arbitration, however, these traditions inevitably collide. Accordingly, authors have rightly referred to arbitration as a ‘real-life laboratory for the development of a procedural Esperanto’. But much of the academic work emerging from this laboratory seems to draw primarily on anecdote and the authors’ personal experiences. This paper moves beyond such anecdotal approaches and examines the alleged civil v. common law divide empirically. Based on generative interviews with twenty-six of the world’s ‘most in demand’ arbitrators, it concludes that, within international arbitration, significant differences between civil and common law have largely faded over time. By contrast, experienced international arbitrators apply a de facto ‘Uniform Code of Arbitral Procedure’. Exploring the content of this framework − and borrowing from Francis Fukuyama’s famous theory − the article argues that international arbitration today has reached its own ‘End of History’. That is, the common law − including many of its typical features − has triumphed and now represents the dominant approach in international arbitration.

This article reassesses the reach of the 2022 Cartabia Reform on Italian arbitration. It focuses on three levers: (1) arbitrators’ interim measures when conferred by the parties (Article 818 c.p.c.) and their enforcement through state courts; (2) corporate arbitration; and (3) jurisdictional objections and the codified competence-competence rule (Article 817 c.p.c.). Using comparative sources and recent case law, the article argues that what affects outcomes is not an inherent ‘structural asymmetry’ but coordination frictions – namely: the need for judicial intervention to give effect to non-pecuniary orders; heterogeneous procedural pathways across fora and rules; and contact points with EU law (public-policy review, intra-EU enforcement constraints, and state immunity). The reform does not create a self-contained regime; it yields a court-supported model whose performance turns on how legislators, courts, and arbitral institutions implement the new powers (e.g., by drafting clauses that grant interim powers, streamlining enforcement protocols, and clarifying court – arbitration interfaces). The conclusion sets out targeted proposals to foster a more coherent and predictably enforceable arbitral order.

Upon the Swedish Court of Appeal’s request to the Court of Justice of the European Union (‘ECJ’) for preliminary ruling in NV Reibel v. JSC VO Stankoimport, the article examines the arbitrability of disputes related to EU sanctions regimes using the example of claims under Article 11(1) of Council Regulation (EU) 833/2014 (‘Regulation’). The article establishes the relevant understanding of the concept of arbitrability in the EU before discussing and rejecting the notion that the arbitrability of matters pertaining to the Regulation follows from the Regulation itself, namely from its Article 11(3). The article subsequently takes note of the ECJ’s jurisprudence precluding the interpretation of EU law by arbitral tribunals. While acknowledging the fact that commercial arbitration is commonly exempt from this jurisprudence, the article questions whether this also applies to sanctions-related disputes. The article further assesses jurisprudence on the arbitrability of claims under the Regulation and other EU sanctions regimes from Member-State courts. In this regard, the article points out the lack of civil penalties for transactions in breach of the Regulation as considered by courts in some of these jurisdictions to determine the arbitrability of related disputes. The article concludes that claims under Article 11(1) of the Regulation are arbitrable under EU law.

The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into international arbitration raises significant public policy challenges, particularly when AI is used to render arbitral awards autonomously. This paper evaluates the enforceability of AI-generated awards under the 1958 New York Convention (NYC), with particular emphasis on the public policy exception and associated due-process guarantees. It discusses three principal concerns: namely, the requirement that arbitrators be natural persons, the necessity of reasoned awards, and the risk of algorithmic bias compromising impartiality and fairness. Drawing on comparative jurisprudence and emerging soft-law guidance, the analysis demonstrates that, although party autonomy may in principle accommodate technological innovation, prevailing legal frameworks present significant obstacles to recognition and enforcement.

In international commercial arbitration, a delicate balance exists between safeguarding procedural integrity and preventing tactical disruptions. However, the Singapore Court of Appeal’s (SGCA’s) decision in DJP v. DJO threatens this equilibrium by establishing new standards for arbitral conduct that significantly impact repeat appointments. To that end, this article critically examines two problematic principles emerging from this decision: the ambiguous threshold for permissible ‘copying’ in arbitral awards and the impractical ‘equality of information’ requirement among tribunal members. Although intended to protect procedural fairness, these standards place arbitrators in an untenable position, demanding artificial mental segregation between related proceedings while failing to acknowledge how human cognition naturally incorporates accumulated knowledge. Moreover, by importing judicial standards into arbitration without corresponding remedial mechanisms and treating all copied content equally regardless of type, this decision risks transforming natural justice principles into strategic weapons against unfavourable awards, potentially undermining arbitration’s core advantages of expertise, efficiency, and finality.