In issue 1/2002 of the ASA Bulletin, Bernhard Berger took on the issue of arbitrators stepping down during the proceedings. Eugen Bucher revisits the problems based on a new decision of the Swiss Federal Tribunal. Bucher compares this case with the Tribunal’s earlier decision (Milutinovic), where an award was set aside on the grounds that one of the arbitrators resigned and had not been replaced.
In Bucher’s view, the contract between the parties and the arbitrators is not a mandate but a contract of its own, i.e., the receptum arbitri. Based on the Roman law tradition, the author contends that arbitrators, except in the case of serious illness, have no right to resign.
ASA Bulletin