Originally from American Review of International Arbitration - ARIA

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A.  Purpose of This Survey

    Statements to the effect that arbitration is on the rise,  most contracts include arbitration clauses, and there is one ad hoc arbitration for each institutional arbitration, are heard regularly in the arbitration community. However, there is hardly any tangible data. Against this background, the School of International Arbitration at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London conducted a study funded by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP London into the attitudes and choices of various international corporations towards the resolution of international commercial disputes.

      The specific objectives of the study are:

•   To obtain empirical evidence of the attitudes of major corporate entities towards international arbitration and resolving cross-border disputes

•   To set out current perceptions of corporate attitudes towards international arbitration as a means of resolving cross-border disputes, and to use the empirical data to either confirm or challenge these perceptions

      Consequently, the research also sought to verify or falsify various myths, theories, assumptions or presumptions typical in international commercial arbitration literature. To achieve this daunting and ground-breaking task, general counsel or heads of legal departments of various corporations in various industrial sectors and jurisdictions with cross-border economic activities were targeted. In addition to the general survey, 40 in-house lawyers from major corporations, including multinationals and government-controlled entities, were interviewed to shed light on the practices and policies of their corporations in respect of dispute resolution. Most, if not all, corporations involved in this research are international players in their various sectors with experience in international arbitration. Several interviewees had been personally involved in some high-profile, well-known arbitrations and precedent-setting judgments arising from such arbitration proceedings.