Originally from Dispute Resolution Journal

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Arbitrators of commercial disputes do not generally write opinions, and even when they do, the opinions are not published. It is sometimes said that, as a result of this circumstance, there is less predictability about the outcome of an arbitrated case than there would be of the same case litigated conventionally in court. But the author found a way to judge predictability through statistical and analytical procedures he devised for a doctoral dissertation. His data—several hundred commercial arbitration cases growing out of transactions between textile manufacturers and purchasers of fabric—was made available to him for study by the American Arbitration Association. One of his conclusions is that there is no predictability "in the sense of a rational legal system," but that in certain types of cases ("where formally debts have gone bad and where the buyer is not a likely prospect for future business") there is substantial basis to predict the outcome.