ICC Bulletin

Message from the President

The appointment of the new Court members has been marked by an unprecedented effort to ensure renewal and diversity. For the first time, the Court has adopted guidance to National Committees and Groups to the effect that all members having already served for two consecutive terms would have to step down, with an encouragement to appoint significantly more women to the Court. As a result, I was proud to submit to the ICC World Council a list of nominees with complete gender parity, including 88 women and 88 men.

It is not so long ago that one could count the number of women Court members on one hand. These times have now gone. The Court already had the privilege of having an equal participation of men and women to the Bureau of the Court since 2015. Having been able to pursue this effort to the level of the Court in its entirety is only a starting point to now significantly improve the proportion of women in our tribunals. In 2017, only 16,7% of the total number of arbitrators confirmed or appointed by the Court were women. Although the current figure is an improvement compared to previous years (10,4% in 2015 and 14,8% in 2016), it is still not satisfactory and reflects a profession in which the predominance of men remains an obstacle to the entitlement of many outstanding female practitioners. We should commit to change this state of affairs by the end of the Court’s term in June 2021.

As a consequence of our effort to ensure more renewal in the Court’s membership, 46% of Court members are first time appointees. Allowing many excellent arbitration practitioners, who never had this opportunity, to participate in the Court’s work will bring new energy, new perspectives and new ideas. Thanks to the improvement of our governance rules in 2016, ICC can now appoint Court members in countries where there is no National Committee or Group. As a result, the Court will now be represented in many jurisdictions where it had so far been absent, such as Cameroon, Ethiopia, Libya, Tanzania in the African continent, and Iraq, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan in Asia. The creation of new dynamic National Committees, in Kenya and Afghanistan, also contributes to increasing the Court outreach.

The Court can now claim to have unprecedented regional diversity, with 13% of its members originating from Africa, 26% from Asia, 39% from Europe, 4% from North America, 15% from Latin America and 3% from Oceania. As the only truly global arbitral institution, the Court now has an even broader reach and a uniquely international perspective to international arbitration, which serves to satisfy our users’ expectations that the particular context of each case be fully taken into account, especially for important matters such as the choice of the seat and the composition of arbitral tribunals.

Yet, this increased diversity is still not reflected in the composition of ICC arbitral tribunals. 63% of the arbitrators confirmed or appointed by the Court in 2017 still originated from Western Europe and North America, which does not reflect the reality of international arbitration today with the rise of a new generation of practitioners in many emerging jurisdictions, in particular in Asia and in Africa. This rather unsatisfactory statistic is of course only partly due to the Court and the Secretariat, for 74% of ICC arbitrators are nominated by the parties and the co-arbitrators in the case for confirmation by the Court.

Still, it will be incumbent upon the newly constituted Court to double its efforts towards greater regional diversity in our tribunals.

Another groundbreaking change in the new Court is generational renewal, with 55% of its members being below 50 years of age, and 15% below 40. As international arbitration moves to a new phase of its history, the importance of training and promoting a new generation of arbitrators and counsel cannot be overstated. An enlarged and more diverse pool of arbitrators is a fundamental condition for arbitration to remain an acceptable global system of justice and a fair and legitimate way of resolving international disputes. The promotion of younger practitioners has for many years been on top of the Court’s agenda, with the very successful YAF programs and more recently the outstanding Arbitration Academy program, for which we are much indebted to the leadership of Vladimir Khvalei. I would like in this respect to warmly thank our YAF officers, as well as Yves Derains and the ICC World Business Law Institute team for their immense dedication in putting together a unique set of training programs.

Finally, nothing would be possible without the efforts of the entire Secretariat, under the excellent leadership of Alexander Fessas, Ana Serra e Moura and Ziva Filipic. Leading the Secretariat and managing the Court has become a fairly more complex task, in particular with the successful opening in the past three years of two new case management teams (in Sao Paolo and Singapore) and two representation offices (in Shanghai and Abu Dhabi). After a little more than one year in office, the new management of the Court has succeeded in establishing proper management processes as well as a positive working climate and interaction with all members of the teams. My sincere words of appreciation go to the counsel and members of all teams for their hard work, generous commitment and dedication to ICC arbitration. A special word of thanks should also go to Francesca Hill, who ensures the day to day functioning of the complex machinery behind the organization of each of the two to three weekly Court sessions.

The outgoing Court members can be proud of their achievements in the past three years. We have modernized our work and made it more efficient. The Court has introduced novel and bold policies to improve the duration of ICC arbitrations, speed up our procedures, and better control costs. We also have significantly increased the transparency of our institutional procedures, by adopting measures such as the provision of reasons for our decisions and the publication of the composition of our tribunals.

The Court has modernized its Rules, in particular by introducing expedited rules for arbitrations of a limited value, which apply on an opt-out basis. The Court has adopted guidance to ensure that the highest standards of ethics are maintained at all times in ICC arbitrations, in particular as far as conflict disclosures are concerned.

In the next three years, the Court will have to keep improving its procedures to ensure that it remains the most efficient and high quality arbitral institution, providing global excellence to arbitration users worldwide.

The recent Queen Mary and White & Case arbitration survey shows that 77% of interviewees identified ICC as their most preferred arbitral institution (which figure is on top of the previous 2015 result where 68% of respondents identified ICC as their preferred choice). The Court comes on top of all other institutions in all continents, including Asia. This is a testament to our commitment to quality and efficiency, and an encouragement to continue innovating and improving our services.

Much remains to be done. In the weeks to come, we will complete the renewal of the Court’s IT tool, which will result in significant additional efficiencies and allow us to offer new services. We will continue to provide more transparency and to publish more awards, and we look forward to the soon to come publication of the Miami University and Compass Lexecon study on costs and efficiency in ICC arbitrations. The future of the Court is to be a smart, digital and transparent organization at the service of dispute resolution worldwide. Above all considerations, however, should be to maintain the outstanding and unique quality of our award scrutiny process. Scrutiny is the signature service of the Court, allowing thorough and in-depth review of awards by the Secretariat and the Court to increase their quality and reduce the likelihood that they may be annulled or denied recognition. To this, we are and will remain deeply committed.

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