Legal theory of international arbitration

International arbitration law readily lends itself to a legal theory analysis. The fundamentally philosophical notions of autonomy and freedom are at the heart of its field of study. Similarly essential are the questions of legitimacy raised by the parties' freedom to favor a private form of dispute resolution over national courts, to choose their judges, to tailor the procedure as they deem appropriate, and to determine the rules of law that will govern the dispute even where the chosen rules are not those of a given legal system, as well as by the arbitrators' freedom to determine their own jurisdiction, to shape the conduct of the proceedings and, in the absence of an agreement among the parties, to choose the rules applicable to the merits of the dispute. The present work, which is based on a Course given at The Hague Academy of International Law in the Summer of 2007, seeks to identify the philosophical postulates that underlie this field of study, to show their profound coherence and the practical consequences that follow from these postulates in the resolution of international disputes.