Arbitration is a private and consensual method of dispute resolution, which (generally) results with issuing of an arbitration award. Arbitration agreement or arbitration clause represents a foundation stone of any arbitration proceedings; therefore it is crucial for the parties who by concluding the arbitration agreement wanted to exclude jurisdiction of the courts to decide on their dispute, that arbitration agreement is valid and enforceable. Arbitration agreement as a foundation of arbitration therfore represents the main difference between arbitration and court proceedings.
In the first part of the thesis main features of arbitration agreement are analyzed, its elements (voluntary and obligatory) and legal nature. Arbitration agreement entails also two widespread and in most countries recognized principles of arbitration, namely doctrine of severability of arbitration agreement and competence rule. The first chapter of thesis will be concluded with a thorough analysis of relation between the court and the arbitral tribunal regarding the question of who and when decides on the (in)validity of arbitration agreement in practice.
The thesis represents a comparative study. However the object of this thesis does not involve only a comparison of international and (some) national legal sources and arbitration rules, but also analyzes a development of understanding of consent of parties to resolve their disputes through arbitration. The main focus of the thesis is therefore an analysis of material validity of arbitration agreement, namely interpretation of consent of parties to conclude arbitration agreement, law governing material validity of arbitration agreement and objective and subjective scope of arbitration agreement.
In the last part of the thesis the object of study is formal validity of arbitration agreement. Today it is still a widely recognized rule (subject to few exemptions in national legislations) that arbitration agreement is valid only if it is concluded in writing. However, similar as the development of understanding of parties’ consent to conclude an arbitration agreement, also writing requirement of form of arbitration agreement has gone through changing process in the last decades. Especially under influence of popularization of international commercial arbitration the writing form requirement of arbitration agreements became more liberalized and in some countries even completely abolished.
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