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Compared to foreign court judgments, the ease and simplicity of having an international arbitral award recognised and enforced is a prominent feather in arbitration’s cap, and one of its greatest advantages. In addition, the reluctance of parties to trust foreign courts makes international arbitration a compelling choice for resolving cross-border commercial disputes.

ARGENTINA

Marval O’Farrell Mairal

“Between 2015 and 2018, Argentina modernised its arbitration legislation with the enactment of the Federal Civil and Commercial Code and the International Commercial Arbitration Law, based on the UNCITRAL Model Law, which regulate domestic and international arbitration, respectively. Following these two legislative milestones, we are currently in a phase in which the courts have issued a series of decisions interpreting this new regulatory framework in a pro-arbitration fashion. In this regard, during the last few years, the Argentine Supreme Court has issued several rulings in which it affirmed several fundamental principles of international arbitration”

FRANCE

FLV & Associés

“The French arbitration statutory framework has remained quite stable after the French Civil Procedure Code underwent a major overhaul in 2011. Since then, it has been constantly refined by case law, without being drastically modified. From a more practical standpoint, the recent global pandemic has had an undeniable impact on business in general. Arbitration has unfortunately not been spared, and many arbitration practitioners have witnessed a notable decrease in their workload. Arbitration remains a preferred alternative dispute resolution technique, however.”

SWITZERLAND

Wenger Vieli Ltd

“Enforcement issues do not feature prominently in our court practice; they represent only a small proportion of the jurisdiction of the Swiss Federal Supreme Court compared to challenges against arbitral awards rendered by arbitral tribunals in Switzerland. This may be due, on the one hand, to the fact that Swiss companies losing in arbitration proceedings generally comply with the arbitral award or, on the other hand, to the fact that the Swiss Federal Supreme Court interprets the grounds for refusal of enforcement pursuant to Article 5 of the New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards restrictively.”

SINGAPORE

Ashurst LLP

“Consistent with Singapore’s recent ranking as the equal most preferred seat of arbitration in the world, arbitration activity in Singapore is at an all-time high. The Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC), for example, has posted two consecutive record years in terms of new case filings, with 2020 seeing the SIAC surpass 1000 new filings for the year for the first time, albeit two sets of associated cases accounted for 261 and 145 related cases respectively.”

INDONESIA

Ashurst LLP

“Law No. 30 of 1999 on Arbitration and Alternative Dispute Resolution (the Arbitration Law) came into force in 1999 and has not been amended or replaced since, despite ongoing calls for this to happen. However, in 2021, Indonesia’s best-known domestic arbitration body, the Indonesian National Board of Arbitration (BANI), updated its institutional rules. This was the fifth time BANI has updated its rules since its inception in 1977. The 2021 Rules introduced several new provisions, including with respect to consolidation, the appointment of arbitrators, evidence and hearing procedure.”

UNITED ARAB EMIRATES

Horizons & Co

“Arbitration centres in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have witnessed a considerable increase in case load, particularly as international companies are electing UAE arbitration centres, such as the Dubai International Arbitration Centre (DIAC), the Abu Dhabi Commercial Conciliation and Arbitration Centre (ADCCAC) and the Dubai International Financial Centre-the London Court of International Arbitration (DIFC-LCIA), to govern their disputes, as opposed to international arbitration centres. This is mainly due to parties failing to adhere to their contractual obligations in light of COVID-19.”

SOUTH AFRICA

Herbert Smith Freehills

“After many years of relatively slow development, the law pertaining to South African-seated international arbitrations was given a boost with the passing of the International Arbitration Act, incorporating the UNCITRAL Model Law, which came into force in 2017. Though South African courts have always been supportive of arbitration, the judgments that have been handed down since the enactment of the International Arbitration Act have made it clear that the role of the courts in relation to international arbitration is extremely limited.”

CONTRIBUTORS

Ashurst LLP

FLV & Associés

Herbert Smith Freehills

Horizons & Co

Marval O’Farrell Mairal

Wenger Vieli Ltd