INCORPORATION OF UNCITRAL MODEL LAW ON INTERNATIONAL

Globalization has enabled China to rationalize and institutionalize its economic and political system. China has been quite successful in accommodating globalization in its legal reform. As China becomes one of the important trade players in the international market, the commercial disputes between Chinese companies and foreign trade-partners to be resolved through the arbitration are arising substantially. To an extent, China’s accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) has sped up its legal reform in the past decades. However, there are some deficiencies with respect to the mechanism and legislation of China’s arbitration law that arguably is not responsive to the norms of the United Nations Commission on International Trade (UNCITRAL) Model Law (1985) and its Amendment (2006). This paper provides an overview of arbitration in China from the legislative and practical perspectives, covering the arbitration’s evolution history and problems before and after 1994. The paper focuses on some important issues in China’s Arbitration Law (“CAL”), evaluating its legislative defects which are inconsistent with the Model Law and its Amendment, clarifying how the Model Law was incorporated into China’s CAL. Some legislative amendments are recommended for CAL’s modernization and its practices, to align it with international arbitration norms in the future.