Originally from:

Journal of American Arbitration (JAA) - Vol. 4, No. 2

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ARTICLES

Party-Designated Arbitrators: Ethical Codes
and Guidelines
By Donald P. Arnavas

I. INTRODUCTION
“No one would dream of having a judicial panel composed of one
part-time judge and two representatives of the parties—but that is the
standard arbitration panel,” so said a distinguished jurist in
commenting on one of the key characteristics of tripartite arbitration
proceedings.1 In the arbitrations to which the court referred, each
party independently selects an arbitrator (the party-designated
arbitrators) and those individuals then jointly select the third (the
neutral arbitrator).
The use of a panel of arbitrators has several positive aspects to it
that are not present in its single arbitrator counterpart.2 Perhaps the
principal one is that a collegial approach to the award process makes
it more likely that each of the parties’ contentions will be thoroughly