Dispute Resolution and Arbitration Commons^™

Reforming Singapore’S Law On Division Of Matrimonial Assets, Jia En Teo

Singapore Law Journal (Lexicon)

Section 46(1) of the Women’s Charter undergirds the sacrosanct institution that is marriage – it lays out its moral basis and expresses society’s hopes and expectations of the ideal marital relationship: marriage is an equal cooperative partnership of different efforts for mutual benefit. It is thus no surprise that even when a marriage is terminated, the division of matrimonial assets is also founded upon this prevailing ideology. However, as opposed to equal division, Singapore law dictates a “just and equitable” division of matrimonial assets, where wide discretion and power is vested in the judiciary. This legal rule has been criticised …

Giants Of Contract Law – Some Personal Reflections, Hon. Andrew Phang

Singapore Law Journal (Lexicon)

The law of contract may seem mostly technical and, on occasion, even overly theoretical. However, if one looks more closely at its foundations as well as scholarship, it is clear that contract law has much greater value to offer us. In that regard, the present essay has two main aims. The first is the give a brief account of the lives as well as scholarship of four giants of contract law whom we have lost in the past few years. Indeed, it may be said that their scholarship has contributed to the foundational bedrock of the law of contract as …

Re-Formulating The Test For Ascertaining The Proper Law Of An Arbitration Agreement: A Comparative Common Law Analysis, Darius Chan, Jim Yang Teo

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Following two recent decisions from the apex courts in England and Singapore on the appropriate methodology to ascertain the proper law of an arbitration agreement, the positions in these two leading arbitration destinations have now converged in some respects. But other issues of conceptual and practical significance have not been fully addressed, including the extent to which the true nature of the inquiry into whether the parties had made a choice of law is in substance an exercise in contractual interpretation, the applicability of a validation principle, and the extent to which the choice of a neutral seat may affect …

The Importance Of Ethics In The Practice Of Mediation, Dorcas Quek Anderson

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

What is the predominant function of ethics for the mediation profession in Singapore? Do ethical principles assume greater significance in light of increasing institutionalisation of mediation programmes in Singapore? What can mediators, mediation advocates and mediation institutions do to ensure consistent adherence to ethical standards? These and other related issues were discussed in a webinar organised by the Singapore Academy of Law in May 2021 featuring Lim Tat, Chuan Wee Meng and this author as panellists, together with See Chern Yang as moderator. This article highlights the notable discussion points of the webinar, including the significance of mediation ethics, common …

Going Far Together By Being Here Now: Mindfulness Increases Cooperation In Negotiations, Theodore Charles Masters-Waage, Jared Nai, Jochen Reb, Samantha Sim, Jayanth Narayanan, Noriko Tan

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Integrating theorizing across the mindfulness and negotiation literatures, we hypothesize that mindfulness increases cooperation in negotiations. We further propose that processes of self-transcendence, self-regulation, and self-awareness mediate this effect. We test these hypotheses in five studies across different forms of cooperation, in both distributive and integrative negotiation contexts, and for both measured and experimentally induced mindfulness. In Study 1a, individuals higher on measured state mindfulness displayed greater cooperative orientation measured as preference for pareto-optimal agreements. In Study 1b, experimentally induced mindfulness led to greater cooperative orientation measured as the recall of cooperative heuristics. In Study 2, a distributive (fixed-sum) negotiation, …

What’S The Best Way To Give Ground In A Negotiation?, Kian Siong Tey, Michael Schaerer, Nikhil Madan, Roderick Swaab

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

How much should you change your offer at each round of a negotiation? The stakes can be high: Give away too much and you devalue your offer; give away too little and you risk getting stuck in an impasse. The authors’ recent research shows that a rare approach to concessions — reducing the amount by which you reduce your offer each round — can yield the most value because it sends a clear signal about your final offer.

Investor-State Mediation And The Belt And Road Initiative: Examining The Conditions For Settlement, Mark Mclaughlin

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Despite the dominance of arbitration in the realm of investor-state disputes, the variety of proposals for reform suggest considerable stakeholder discontent with the current framework. One suggested reform is the introduction of investor–state mediation, which has been supported by the conclusion of the Singapore Convention on Mediation and the proposal by the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) of a set of mediation rules. This article examines the respective merits of arbitration and mediation to settle investment disputes related to the Belt and Road Initiative. Many of the principles underpinning the implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative …

Proper Characterisation Of The Parol Evidence Rule And Its Applicability In International Arbitration, Darius Chan, Yi Hang Louis Lau

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Most arbitral statutes and institutional rules give great latitude to tribunals on the admissibility of evidence, and do not mandate application of domestic rules of evidence. In common law jurisdictions where the parol evidence rule applies, the issue that arises is whether the parol evidence rule is necessarily a procedural rule of evidence which tribunals are not bound to apply, especially in jurisdictions which have codified the rule under domestic evidence legislation. Notwithstanding any codification, this article argues that the parol evidence rule at common law is a substantive rule of contractual interpretation that should be applied as part of …

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 …

Mediation Ethics: From Theory To Practice, Field, Rachael And Crowe, Jonathan. Edward Elgar Publishing, 2020, Dorcas Quek Anderson

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

For too long within the mediation field, there has been confusion on how the foundational principles of mediator neutrality, impartiality, and self-determination work together to bring about a fair outcome. There has been a corresponding lack of clarity on what the mediator does to ensure that these principles are collectively fulfilled through a consensual settlement. Astor (2007), who has written extensively on mediator neutrality, has described the mediator's role as maximizing party control. However, Astor also comments that making decisions aimed at maximizing party control is not simple and highly dependent on the context. The mediator has to intervene in …

Arbitration By Ssos As A Preferred Solution For Solving The Frand Licensing Of Seps?, Kung-Chung Liu

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In the last decade, the licensing of standard essential patents (SEPs) on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms has been a thorny issue for SEP holders in the US and Europe on the one hand, and major SEP implementers in major Asian economies on the other, such as Japan, Korea, the PRC, Taiwan and even India. With the rise of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, driven by the Internet of Things (IoT), 5G, driverless vehicles, and artificial intelligence (AI), which relies even more on interconnectivity, more and more new standards and SEPs will emerge, and the issue of FRAND licensing of …

Investor-State Mediation: How The Landscape Is Changing [Sidra Survey], Nadja Alexander

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Slowly but surely the dispute resolution landscape is shifting for investment related disputes. More than half the respondents to the International Dispute Resolution Survey published by the Singapore International Dispute Resolution Academy (SIDRA) last year indicated that they have been involved in an investor-state dispute between 2016 and 2018. And, it is of course no surprise the majority of survey respondents indicated that institutional arbitration was the mechanism of choice to resolve investor-state disputes.

Digital Readiness Index For Arbitration Institutions: Challenges And Implications For Dispute Resolution Under The Belt And Road Initiative, Allison Goh

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Post-COVID-19, a paradigm shift has occurred in the adoption of technology in arbitration. Leading arbitral institutions have adapted quickly, highlighting the foresight of institutions who have existing technological infrastructure in place. This article proposes a ‘Digital Readiness Index’, which aims to evaluate arbitral institutions on their level of digital readiness based on five evaluative indicators. Cross referenced against Institute for Management Development (IMD’s) 2019 World Digital Competitiveness Rankings, the findings reveal synergies between an economy’s digital competitiveness and the adoption of technology in dispute resolution. To further the development of dispute resolution processes under the Belt and Road Initiative, strategic …

The Emergence Of Mediation Law In Asia: A Tale Of Two Cities, Nadja M. Alexander

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Contemporary mediation systems are emerging throughout Asia. In 2019, 16 jurisdictions from Asia and the Pacific region signed the UN Convention on International Mediation Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation (the Singapore Convention). Asian signatories include its three largest economies, five ASEAN countries and seven members of the RCEP.

Why is this important? In a strict legal sense, the Singapore Convention is an instrument to facilitate the enforcement of international mediated settlement agreements (iMSAs), however its broader objective is to facilitate cross-border trade and investment as is reflected in its Preamble.

The Singapore Convention promises to leave a significant impact on …

Choice Of Law Governing A Contract Where Its Existence Is In Dispute: Clarifications From The Singapore International Commercial Court In Lew, Solomon V Kaikhushru Shiavax Nargolwala, Shou Yu Chong

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Singapore International Commercial Court’s judgment in Lew, Solomon v Kaikhushru Shiavax Nargolwala [2020] 3 SLR 61 is noteworthy as it heralds a modest development in Singapore private international law, especially in respect to the not uncommon issue of disputes over cross-border contracts where its existence is challenged. This case represents one of the handful of Singapore precedents which directly addresses the difficult conundrum where both the governing law and the existence of the underlying contract are in dispute. Under this context, it articulates a default choice of law position – the lex fori – where it is impossible to …

What’S Happening In International Mediation In 2021? [Sidra Survey], Nadja Alexander, Samantha Clare Man Xin Goh, Ryce Lee

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Singapore International Dispute Resolution Academy (“SIDRA”) issued the global International Dispute Resolution Survey: 2020 Final Report (the “SIDRA Survey”) on 3 July 2020, which studied the preferences, experiences, and perspectives of legal users (lawyers and legal advisers) and client users (corporate executives and in-house counsel) with regard to, among other mechanisms, international commercial mediation. Previous blogs have commented on the Survey findings. The SIDRA Survey was followed by a qualitative study conducted between November to December 2020, consisting of in-depth interviews held with 18 Legal Users and Client Users from 11 countries (“SIDRA Interviews”). This post focuses on some …

Recommendations To Develop International Commercial Mediation In Singapore, Nadja Alexander

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In this post on the Kluwer Mediation Blog, the recommendations of a Working Group established in April 2013 by Singapore’s Chief Justice and the Ministry of Law to transform and develop its international commercial mediation sector are presented.

Accrual Of Cause Of Action In Negligence: Ipp Financial Advisers Pte V Saimee Bin Jumaat, Gary Kok Yew Chan

Singapore Law Journal (Lexicon)

Damage is the gist of the action in negligence. An action in negligence is said to accrue only when damage arises. The precise timing of the damage is an important factor in an application to strike out a claim in negligence on the ground that it was filed out of time contrary to the Limitation Act. Consequently, the lawsuit may have to be initiated within a specified period from the accrual of the cause of action.

Evolution Of International Investment Agreements In Africa: Features And Challenges Of Investment Law “Africanization”, Makane Moïse Mbengue, Stefanie Schacherer

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

African States, African Regional Economic Communities (RECs), and the African Union have adopted a number of new investment instruments in recent years. Many of these instruments are highly innovative and mark a clear departure from old European-styled IIAs. The Africanization of international investment law or, in other words, the prise en main of African States and organizations to design the regulation of international investment according to their policy and development priorities has become an evident contemporary phenomenon. At the same time, the most innovative approaches can be found in intra-African IIAs, i.e., in IIAs concluded between two or more African …

Seven Keys To Unlock Mediation’S Golden Age: The Introduction, Nadja Alexander, Lela P. Love

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Mediate.com has published a series of peer reviewed articles under the collective title Seven Keys to Unlock Mediation’s Golden Age. The objective of the Seven Keys is to encourage discussion among all stakeholders on navigating mediation’s best future. The seven keys are: Leadership, Data, Education, Profession, Technology, Government and Usage. Each key has between two and four articles, each no more than 1,200 words in length, contributed by some 40 leading authors around the world. Professors Nadja Alexander and Lela P. Love introduce the series with “Imagine.” The Seven Keys articles portray a variety of images and understandings of mediation. …

Mediating Consumer Financial Disputes: Financial Industry Disputes Resolution Centre's Unique House Style, Eunice Chua, Beverly Wee

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The Financial Industry Disputes Resolution Centre (“FIDReC”) was established in August 2005 with the purpose of providing a low-cost avenue for consumers to resolve their disputes with financial institutions. This article seeks to outline the role of FIDReC and its processes and, at the same time, seeks to define the house style of mediation that has served FIDReC well over the years. This article also highlights some of the different techniques adopted by FIDReC mediators in the course of facilitating the mediation.

Mediation And Appropriate Dispute Resolution, Nadja Alexander, Shou Yu Chong

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

2019 was a significant year for mediation. On 7 August 2019, 46 states – an unprecedented number – came together in Singapore to sign the United Nations Convention on International Mediated Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation (“Singapore Convention”). The Convention, which comes into force on 12 September 2020, provides a legal framework for the recognition and enforcement of mediated settlement agreements across borders and thereby addresses one of the major criticisms of international mediation, namely, the lack of an internationally recognised expedited enforcement mechanism. The Singapore Convention aims to be for mediation what the Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement …

The Singapore Convention On Mediation And The New York Convention On Arbitration: Comparing Enforcement Mechanisms And Drawing Lessons For Asia, Eunice Chua

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This article considers the enforcement mechanism for international mediated settlement agreements proposed by the Singapore Convention on Mediation and critically examines this mode of enforcement as against enforcement as an arbitral award in Asia, including through a hybrid process like Arb-Med-Arb. Similarities and differences between the New York Convention and the Singapore Convention on Mediation will be discussed and used to consider how Asian jurisdictions may respond to the Singapore Convention on Mediation and what lessons may be learnt from the arbitration context.

To Boycott Proceedings Or Not? Recourse Against Arbitral Awards On Jurisdictional Grounds By Different Categories Of Respondents Under The Model Law, Darius Chan, Claire Neoh

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The remedies that award debtors have under Articles 16(3), 34 and 36 of the Model Law, and more critically the inter-relationship between those remedies, has attracted much debate. Yet there is a dearth of analysis on how the availability of each remedy may differ according to the award debtor’s degree of participation in the arbitral pro- cess. Such analysis carries significant practical value for parties in considering whether and to what extent they should participate in any arbitral process when they harbour jurisdictional objections. This article distils Singapore’s experience, describing how Singapore has implemented the ‘choice of remedies’ principle for …

Mediation: The New Normal?, Nadja Alexander

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Imagine a tightrope walker, walking along a tightrope, holding a long, light rod. To help her balance, the performing artist continually moves the rod, changing the angle of the rod to maintain a constant – her balance in space. If she were to hold the rod in a fixed position, what would happen? She would fall off. In other words, the variation of the rod has the function of maintaining the deeper continuity which enables the artist to make it to the other end, alive. In this essay, the tightrope walker offers a metaphor for dispute resolution systems. In order …

Law And Covid-19, Aurelio Gurrea-Martinez, Yihan Goh, Mark Findlay

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This book is a collection of essays from scholars at Singapore Management University School of Law analysing the challenges and implications of COVID-19 from the perspective of different areas of law, including private law, corporate law, insolvency law, data protection, financial laws, public law, privacy law, commercial law, constitutional law, law and technology, and dispute resolution. It also analyses how the COVID-19 pandemic will affect the judicial system, the study of law, and the future of the legal profession. Beyond considerations of the pandemic’s influence on law and legal service delivery the authors consider how law can help facilitate the …

Ascertaining The Proper Law Of An Arbitration Agreement: The Artificiality Of Inferring Intention When There Is None, Darius Chan, Jim Yang Teo

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

The common law choice of law principles for determining the proper law of an arbitration agreement previously thought to be settled by the English Court of Appeal’s decision in Sulamérica v. Enesa [2013] 1 W.L.R. 102 have now been thrown into disarray after a recent string of three judgments: starting with the Singapore Court of Appeal’s decision in BNA v. BNB [2019] S.G.C.A. 84, followed by two decisions from the English Court of Appeal in Kabab-Ji v. Kout Food Group [2020] EWCA Civ 6 and Enka Insaat Ve Sanayi A.S. v. OOO ‘Insurance Company Chubb’ [2020] EWCA Civ 574.This article …

12 September 2020: The Singapore Convention On Mediation Comes Into Force, Nadja Alexander, Shou Yu Chong

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In this post on the Kluwer Mediation Blog, the potential impact of the Singapore Convention on Mediation is analysed.

Taking Disputes Online In A Pandemic-Stricken World: Do We Necessarily Lose More Than We Gain?, Dorcas Quek Anderson

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Online dispute resolution (ODR) used to be a secondary feature of the courts, arbitration institutions and mediation providers. ODR systems involving problem diagnosis, facilitation and online adjudication were primarily utilised for low value claims and not extended to all legal claims. Private mediation was largely conducted only on online platforms to bridge physical distances. However, the COVID pandemic has very abruptly compelled the courts and other dispute resolution practitioners to shift face-to-face processes to the virtual environment. ODR is likely to be the mainstream, and no longer the alternative, way of managing disputes in the immediate future.

The rapid migration …

Japan-Singapore Joint Mediation Protocol Announced, Nadja Alexander

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

In this post, the potential impact of the Japan-Singapore Joint Mediation Protocol is analysed.