THE UNCITRAL ARBITRATION RULES: A COMMENTARY

David D. Caron, Boalt Hall School of Law, UC Berkeley
Lee Caplan
Matti Pellonpää

Abstract

This commentary takes a unique approach. In addition to the authors’ commentary on the Rules based on their drafting history, the Iran-US Claims Tribunal practice, and the blooming practice of NAFTA Chapter Eleven tribunals and other tribunals constituted in accordance with the UNCITRAL Rules, this work reproduces the actual texts of the procedural decisions of these various sources. The authors’ experiences have repeatedly shown the infinite variations possible on procedural matters. Invariably, commentary misses the particular issue at hand or suffers from not having the particular question as an incentive for more rigorous analysis. For this reason, access to the procedural decisions is essential. Some of these decisions have been reprinted in various sources, but many have not. In preparing this study, thousands of procedural orders and decisions have been reviewed and many of those orders are reprinted for the first time in this volume. It is the authors’ hope that this study’s dual function of analysis and access will lead to a more refined system of arbitral procedure, provide a sounding board for parties and arbitrators who seek to understand the issues before them, and promote the arbitration regime we each feel is essential to more complex systems of order and interdependence.