Gateway-Schmateway: An Exchange between George Bermann and Alan Rau

The transcript of an interesting discussion between Professor Alan Scott Rau, Mark G. and Judy G. Yudof Chair in Law at the University of Texas at Austin School of Law and affiliated faculty member of the Kay Bailey Hutchison Center for Energy, Law, and Business, and Professor George Bermann, Jean Monnet Professor of EU Law, Walter Gellhorn Professor of Law, and Director of the Center for International Commercial and Investment Arbitration at Columbia University Law School, held last year at Pepperdine University School of Law’s “International Arbitration and the Courts,” symposium has been published.  In “Gateway-Schmateway: An Exchange between George Bermann and Alan Rau,” Pepperdine Law Review, Vol. 43, No. 5, Article 2, p. 469, 2016; KBH Energy Center Research Paper No. 2016-5, the two Professors discuss the currently ongoing Restatement (Third) of the U.S. Law of International Arbitration drafting project.

Here is the abstract:

What role do national courts play in international arbitration? Is international arbitration an “autonomous dispute resolution process, governed primarily by non-national rules and accepted international commercial rules and practices” where the influence of national courts is merely secondary? Or, in light of the fact that “international arbitration always operates in the shadow of national courts,” is it not more accurate to say that national courts and internatonal arbitration act in partnership? On April 27, 2015, the Pepperdine Law Review convened a group of distinguished authorities from international practice and academia to discuss these and other related issues for a symposium on International Arbitration and the Courts.

The issue begins with a transcript of a moderated exchange between Professor Bermann, the Reporter for the American Law Institute’s (ALI) ongoing Restatement (Third) of the U.S. Law of International Arbitration project, and Professor Rau, an ALI-appointed Advisor on the project. Professor Coe poses questions to both scholars that focus on selected issues that are characteristic of matters discussed during the ALI drafting and consultative process, especially so-called “gateway” matters like competence-competence. This exchange revealed several questions on which Professors Bermann and Rau diverged – namely, arbitrability of scope issues, the concept of delegation, and whether an express remedy limitation in a contract should be treated as a limit on a tribunal’s authority. For those interested in the iterative process that creates an ALI Restatement, this is a must read.

This and other publications authored by Professors Rau and Bermann may be downloaded for free from the Social Science Research Network.

Photo credit: David Yahl via Foter.com / CC BY