Law Commons^™

What Do Consumers Understand About Predispute Arbitration Agreements? An Empirical Investigation, Roseanna Sommers

Articles

The results of a survey of 1,071 adults in the United States reveal that most consumers do not pay attention to, let alone understand, arbitration clauses in their everyday lives. The vast majority of survey respondents (over 97%) report having opened an account with a company that requires disputes to be submitted to binding arbitration (e.g., Netflix, Hulu, Cash App, a phone or cable company), yet most are unaware that they have, in fact, agreed to mandatory arbitration (also known as “forced arbitration”). Indeed, over 99% of respondents who think they have never entered into an arbitration agreement likely have …

Service Out Under The New Rules Of Court, Ian Mah, Aaron Yoong

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The new Rules of Court 2021 seek to provide a more accessible and efficient justice system. The extensiveness of the overhaul, however, brings with it as much unfamiliarity as excitement. This legislation comment examines the changes in the provisions governing service out of jurisdiction and argues that the textual changes also effect substantive changes to how the law is applied. This comment also explores the related issues on the grant of Mareva injunctions in aid of foreign proceedings under the new Rules of Court 2021.

Provisional Measures In Aid Of Arbitration, Ronald A. Brand

Articles

The success of the New York Convention has made arbitration a preferred means of dispute resolution for international commercial transactions. Success in arbitration often depends on the extent to which a party may secure assets, evidence, or the status quo between parties prior to the completion of the arbitration process. This makes the availability of provisional measures granted by either arbitral tribunals or by courts fundamental to the arbitration. In this Article, I consider the existing legal framework for provisional measures in aid of arbitration, with particular attention to the sources of the rules providing for such measures. Those sources …

To Stay Or Not To Stay? A Clash Of Arbitration And Insolvency Regimes, Darius Chan, Sidharrth B Rajagopal

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In the wake of the global Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, a rise in creditorinitiated winding-up proceedings is likely to be impending in coming years (See e.g., RCMA Asia Pte. Ltd. v. Sun Electric Power Pte. Ltd. [2020] SGHC 205). At the same time, geopolitical developments, such as the scale and ambition of Belt & Road Initiative projects, have raised questions over the issue of debt sustainability. Given the prevalence of arbitration clauses in modern international commercial and project agreements, the interplay and relationship between insolvency and dispute resolution, and especially arbitration, requires careful attention. While the intersections between the …

Using Court-Connected Adr To Increase Court Efficiency, Address Party Needs, And Deliver Justice In Massachusetts, Madhawa Palihapitiya, Susan Jeghelian, Kaila Eisenkraft

Massachusetts Office of Public Collaboration Publications

This report presents research and findings from a study of court-connected ADR commissioned by the Executive Office of the Trial Court (EOTC). The study was conducted by the state office of dispute resolution also known as the Massachusetts Office of Public Collaboration at the University of Massachusetts Boston. The office has been serving as a neutral forum and state-level resource for almost 30 years. Its mission is to establish programs and build capacity within public entities for enhanced conflict resolution and intergovernmental and cross-sector collaboration in order to save costs for the state and its citizens and enable effective problem-solving …

Online Dispute Resolution, Ronald A. Brand

Articles

This chapter was prepared from a presentation given by the author at the 2019 Summer School in Transnational Commercial Law & Technology, jointly sponsored by the University of Verona School of Law and the Center for International Legal Education (CILE) of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. In the paper, I review online dispute resolution (ODR) by considering the following five questions, which I believe help to develop a better understanding of both the concept and the legal framework surrounding it:

A. What is ODR?

B. Who does ODR?

C. What is the legal framework for ODR?

D. What …

International Investment Arbitration In Laos: Large Issues For A Small State, Romesh Weeramantry, Mahdev Mohan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Laos is no stranger to international investment arbitration. Despite its status as one of Southeast Asia's least developed countries, it has had an Investment Law for more than two decades and is also a party to several bilateral and Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN)-related investment agreements. More recently, two investment treaty claims have been made against it, one of which has given rise to an award challenge that went all the way to Singapore's highest court. This article will examine the history, evolution and current iteration of Laos' relationship with international investment law and focus on the two …

When To Turn To Mediation In Telco Disputes, Dorcas Quek Anderson

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Ministry of Communications and Information(MCI) proposed the introduction of an alternative dispute resolution schemeto assist telecos and consumers in resolving their disputes. The mediationprocess is likely to be used. In response to this suggestion, Straits Times’ Tech Editor MsIrene Tham questioned whether mediation goes far enough to settle telcodisputes. This op-ed discusses the basic principles involved in the mediation process, as well as when mediation is appropriate and conversely when it is not. Recommendations are made on how to decide on the appropriate mode of dispute resolution for a particular dispute.

No Alternative: Resolving Disputes Japanese Style, Eric Feldman

All Faculty Scholarship

This article critiques the simple black/white categorisation of mainstream versus alternative dispute resolution, and argues that what is needed is a cartography of dispute resolution institutions that maps the full range of approaches and traces their interaction. It sketches the first lines of such a map by describing two examples of conflict resolution in Japan. Neither can justly be called “alternative”, yet neither fits the mould of what might be called mainstream or classical dispute resolution. One, judicial settlement, focuses on process; the other, compensating victims of the Fukushima disaster, engages a specific event. Together, they help to illustrate why …

Recourse Against An International Arbitration Award Made In Singapore, Darius Chan

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In Astro Nusantara International BV v PT Ayunda Prima Mitra [2012] SGHC 212, the Singapore High Court set out the available recourse against an international arbitration award made in Singapore. This case has significant implications for Singapore as a seat of arbitration, and this note contrasts the position between Singapore and Hong Kong against the backdrop of this case. In October 2008, after a failed joint venture, the Claimants, which belonged to the Astro group of companies of Malaysia, commenced arbitration in Singapore against the Respondents, which belonged to the Lippo group of companies of Indonesia. In May 2009, the …

A Tea Party At The Hague?, Stephen B. Burbank

All Faculty Scholarship

In this article, I consider the prospects for and impediments to judicial cooperation with the United States. I do so by describing a personal journey that began more than twenty years ago when I first taught and wrote about international civil litigation. An important part of my journey has involved studying the role that the United States has played, and can usefully play, in fostering judicial cooperation, including through judgment recognition and enforcement. The journey continues but, today, finds me a weary traveler, more worried than ever about the politics and practice of international procedural lawmaking in the United States. …

A Moral Contractual Approach To Labor Law Reform: A Template For Using Ethical Principles To Regulate Behavior Where Law Failed To Do So Effectively, Zev J. Eigen, David S. Sherwyn

Faculty Working Papers

If laws cease to work as they should or as intended, legislators and scholars propose new laws to replace or amend them. This paper posits an alternative—offering regulated parties the opportunity to contractually bind themselves to behave ethically. The perfect test-case for this proposal is labor law, because (1) labor law has not been amended for decades, (2) proposals to amend it have failed for political reasons, and are focused on union election win rates, and less on the election process itself, (3) it is an area of law already statutorily regulating parties' reciprocal contractual obligations, and (4) moral means …

Arbitral And Judicial Proceedings: Indistinguishable Justice Or Justice Denied?, Pat K. Chew

Articles

This is an exploratory study comparing the processes and outcomes in the arbitration and the litigation of workplace racial harassment cases. Drawing from an emerging large database of arbitral opinions, this article indicates that arbitration outcomes yield a lower percentage of employee successes than in litigation of these types of cases. At the same time, while arbitration proceedings have some of the same legal formalities (legal representation, legal briefs), they do not have other protective procedural safeguards.

Wikitruth Through Wikiorder, David A. Hoffman, Salil K. Mehra

All Faculty Scholarship

How does large-scale social production coordinate individual behavior to produce public goods? Hardin (1968) denied that the creation of public goods absent markets or the State is possible. Benkler (2006), Shirky (2008), Zittrain (2008), and Lessig (2008) recently countered that the needed coordination might emerge though social norms. However, the means to this coordination is under-theorized. Focusing on Wikipedia, we argue that the site’s dispute resolution process is an important force in promoting the public good it produces, i.e., a large number of relatively accurate public encyclopedia articles. We describe the development and shape of Wikipedia’s existing dispute resolution system. …

Book Review - The Science Of Settlement: Ideas For Negotiators, Rebekah K. Maxwell

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Argentine Financial Crisis: State Liability Under Bits And The Legitimacy Of The Icsid System, William W. Burke-White

All Faculty Scholarship

This essay examines the jurisprudence of the International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) arbitral tribunals in a series of cases brought against the Republic of Argentina in the wake of the 2001-2002 Argentine financial collapse. The essay considers the ICSID tribunals' treatment of non-precluded measures provisions in Argentina's bilateral investment treaties (BITs) and the customary law defense of necessity and argues that the ICSID tribunals have sought to radically narrow the opportunities available to states to craft policy responses to emergency situations while strengthening investor protections beyond the intent of the states parties to the BITs under …

Parallel Courts In Post-Conflict Kosovo, Elena Baylis

Articles

Even as American attention is focused on Iraq's struggle to rebuild its political and legal systems in the face of violent sectarian divisions, another fractured society - Kosovo - has begun negotiations to resolve the question of its political independence. Kosovo's efforts to establish multi-ethnic rule of law in the context of persistent ethnic divisions offer lessons in transitional justice and in managing legal pluralism for Iraq and other states.

In Kosovo today, two parallel judicial systems each claim sole jurisdiction over the province. One system was established by the United Nations administration in Kosovo, while the other system is …

Beyond Rights: Legal Process And Ethnic Conflicts, Elena Baylis

Articles

Unresolved ethnic conflicts threaten the stability and the very existence of multi-ethnic states. Ethnically divided states have struggled to build safeguards against such disputes into their political and legal systems by establishing federal political structures, designing elections to encourage participation, and entering complex power-sharing arrangements, but such measures cannot be expected to prevent all conflict. Human rights and minority rights guarantees likewise have proven unable to accommodate all relevant groups and interests. Accordingly, multi-ethnic states facing persistent ethnic conflicts need to develop effective dispute resolution systems for resolving those conflicts as they arise. This presents an important question: what kinds …