ABSTRACT
What makes an arbitration ‘ international ’ ? 1 .02 Essentially, international commercial arbitration is founded on the same judicial process as that of domestic arbitration, but distinguished in its widest sense by some element that transcends state boundaries, thereby making it ‘ international ’ and subject to other legal regimes. There is no defi ning criterion for what that international element might be. In England the law does not now distinguish between domestic and international arbitration, except when it comes to enforcement of foreign awards made in states which are signatories to the New York Convention. This is addressed later in this chapter. However, those states or arbitral institutions which do distinguish between domestic and international arbitrations generally do so by reference to:
● the nature of the dispute, e.g. if it involves international trade or the application of international law or the performance of the contract in a state other than that of the nation of the contracting parties; or
● some factor connected to the parties, e.g. their nationalities or their place of residence or business.
