Digitalization and the future of arbitration – An (re-)evaluation of the fundamentals of arbitration.

This research proposal addresses the broader topic of how legal proceedings (in particular, arbitration proceedings) have changed and will continue to change through the use of new technologies. The digital revolution has given rise to a number of technological innovations in international arbitration. At the same time, however, the use of technology in arbitration practice thus far appears to be limited to moving offline communications online and to exploratory use of data based tools. Despite these first steps towards digitalisation, a broad consensus exists that a lot of potential is left untapped. The main challenge in that respect lies in finding the right balance between efficiency and safeguarding the parties’ fundamental procedural rights. The proposed research seeks to pave the way for further implementation of technology use, by looking into the many different ways in which technology could improve arbitration, and by verifying if and to what extent this could be reconciled with prevailing (fundamental) procedural and technology law norms. In doing so, the proposal seeks to break through the current ‘better safe than sorry’ policies of major arbitration stakeholders, and to significantly lower cost and processing time in each of the thousands of arbitration procedures that are initiated every year.