LL4C6      Half Unit
Advanced Issues in International Arbitration

This information is for the 2025/26 session.

Course Convenor

Availability

Requisites

Additional requisites:

None, but students would benefit from enrolling in LL4E6 International Dispute Resolution: Courts and Tribunals, LL4E7 International Investment Law and Arbitration, and/or LL4C5 International Commercial Arbitration. Commercial lawyers with no background in public international law are invited to read Roberts and Sivakumaran, ‘The Theory and Reality of the Sources of International Law’ in Evans (ed), International Law (2018). Students may also wish to consult one of three recent manuals that address interactions among different forms of international arbitration: Kröll, Bjorklund & Ferrari (eds), Cambridge Compendium of International Commercial and Investment Arbitration (2023); Lim (ed), The Cambridge Companion to International Arbitration (2021); Schultz & Ortino (eds), The Oxford Handbook of International Arbitration (2020).

From the Alabama Claims to climate change, international arbitration remains the preeminent procedure for resolving commercial disputes, protecting foreign investment, and delimiting sovereign entitlements. Such matters may be determined by public international law, when dealing with states in their governmental capacity, or commercial parties’ choice of domestic contract law. The law governing the arbitration agreement and the law of the seat may also play decisive roles. Practitioners of interstate, investment, and commercial arbitration must be able to codeswitch among applicable laws and procedural rules when representing businesses or governments, whilst appreciating where these different types of disputes may overlap. Similarities and differences across these forms are equally important for academics and policymakers who take arbitration as an object of criticism or reform. 
 
The three main forms of international arbitration are introduced in LL4E6 (interstate), LL4E7 (investment) and LL4C5 (commercial). Through a programme of wide reading and discussion, this course connects these specialised forms to develop a generalist perspective on international arbitration as a unified field of practice. Analytical essays should appraise this perspective, whereas problem questions call for strategic choices in making or facing claims that could be brought before any of the three forms of international arbitration and the application of legal techniques to resolve possible conflicts. 
 
The course is organised in two parts. Part A (Forms) presents a conceptual and historical framework for the study of interstate, commercial, and investment arbitration, examining the different bases of consent, sources of applicable law, typical claims, and available remedies across arbitral disputes based on treaties or contracts. Part B (Frictions) turns to cross-cutting problems that are addressed by the three forms of arbitration in different ways, including the protection of public interests, force majeure and other changes in circumstances, parallel proceedings, and the enforcement of arbitral awards. 

20 hours of seminars in the Winter Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Winter Term.

The first half of the course will include a mix of lecture material and class discussion, whereas Weeks 7 to 10 will include group presentations in response to problem questions, thus preparing students for practical scenarios and summative assessment.

One 2,000 word essay.

Alongside excerpts from arbitral awards (mainly ad hoc, ICC, ICSID or PCA) and domestic judgments (mainly UK Supreme Court but also Paris Court of Appeal and others), students will become familiar with key instruments: eg Arbitration Act 1996 (UK); ICC Arbitration Rules (2021); ICSID Arbitration Rules (2022); ICSID Convention (1965); ILC Articles on State Responsibility (2001); New York Convention (1958); UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules (2021); UNCITRAL Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration (2006); UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts (2016); Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969). 
 
Students will engage with foundational texts and recent literature: eg Crawford, ‘Continuity and Discontinuity in International Dispute Settlement’ (2010) 1 JIDS 3; Demirkol, ‘Peaceful Settlement of Inter-State Energy Disputes: Applicable Law, Defence Arguments, and Remedies in the ICC Arbitration between Iraq and Turkey’ (2023) 26 JIEL 786; Douglas, ‘The Umbrella Clause Revisited’ (2023) 38 ICSID Rev 472; Fietta and Upcher, ‘Public International Law, Investment Treaties and Commercial Arbitration: An Emerging System of Complementarity?’ (2013) 29 Arb Intl 187; Gaillard and Younan (eds), State Entities in International Arbitration (Juris 2008); Ho, State Responsibility for Breaches of Investment Contracts (CUP 2018); Kleinheisterkamp, ‘The Myth of Transnational Public Policy in International Arbitration’ (2023) 71 AJCL 98; Mance, ‘Arbitration: A Law unto Itself?’ (2016) 32 Arb Intl 223; Mann, ‘State Contracts and State Responsibility’ (1960) 54 AJIL 572; McLachlan, Shore and Weiniger, International Investment Arbitration: Substantive Principles (2nd edn, OUP 2017); Schinazi, The Three Ages of International Commercial Arbitration (CUP 2021); Viñuales, ‘Defence Arguments in Investment Arbitration’ (2020) 18 ICSID Rep 9 
; Wang and Shan, ‘Force Majeure and Investment Arbitration’ (2022) 37 ICSID Rev 138. 

Key journals, databases, and reports include Arbitration International, ICSID Reports, ICSID Review, International & Comparative Law Quarterly, Investment Arbitration Reporter, Journal of International Arbitration, Journal of International Dispute Settlement, Jus Mundi, and Reports of International Arbitral Awards. 

Exam (100%), duration: 150 Minutes in the Spring exam period