Originally from Inside the Black Box: How Arbitral Tribunals Operate and Reach Their Decisions - ASA Special Series No. 42

ANDREA MEIER:

I have to say it is a great honour to be on this panel with such esteemed and also nice colleagues. I am pleased to start off the discussion with an overview of the different forms of assistance that are potentially available to the tribunal.

In my overview I will talk about expert assistance, expert teaming, special masters, less common forms of assistance by the institutions and last but not least the secretary to the tribunal.

It is safe to say that there is general consensus today that a tribunal may appoint its own expert unless all parties object. However, arbitration laws and rules providing for the appointment of a tribunal-appointed expert normally follow a traditional notion of the expert role. That role consists of the expert writing an expert report on which the parties may comment.