Studying our International Dispute Resolution LLM course will equip you with specialist knowledge and skills in the areas of legal theory and international legal practice. You will be provided with a solid grounding in traditional, common law as well as EU law rules that regulate International Commercial Litigation to understand the current development and trends in the field. At the same time, you will be introduced to the fundamental principles and legal institutes of international commercial litigation. You will also develop a critical understanding of the principles and legal theories in International Commercial Arbitration by exploring its practice, the relevant laws and international treaties that govern it. In particular, you will apply this knowledge and relevant legal rules to case scenarios to gain an awareness of the contemporary challenges and developments in the field.

As a crucial skill, Settlement of International Disputes will allow you to explore the law, practice and institutional design of international courts that will enable you to effectively conduct a comparative analysis. To add to this, you will learn how different dispute settlement bodies interact, and understand its multiple functions and influences. With a critical approach, you will also consider the tensions, challenges and possible solutions in the practice of international dispute settlement. Furthermore, you will study the core principles of Investment Treaty Arbitration and learn to apply this alongside relevant legal rules to case problem scenarios. Here, you will discuss a range of issues and criticisms in the investment treaty arbitration regime, different procedures for settlement of investment disputes and the growing number of arbitral decisions in this field.

In Transnational Human Rights and Climate Change Litigation, you will gain a critical understanding of strategic human rights litigation, its role in fostering change and its potential pitfalls and ethical considerations on a national, regional and global scale. You will learn the mechanisms for the protection of human rights while critically evaluating practices in strategic human rights litigation, such as in the area of human rights-based climate change litigation. Finally, you will bring this acquired theory and practice together to complete an LLM Dissertation where you will conduct a major research project into a topic of your interest that is relevant to your field of study. Here, you will engage with various sources such as statues, treaties, regulations, policy documents and other academic literature alongside the relevant research methods to help you analyse and critically evaluate your research.

International Commercial Arbitration

What can the party from the US do to uphold the arbitration agreement?  Can the party turn to the US Courts, English Courts or the Indian courts? These are some of the issues that this unit will address. The growth of international commerce and infrastructure projects over the last three to four decades has led to the increase in the use of arbitration as a dispute resolution mechanism. Since 1998 more than 4,500 ADR and arbitration cases were recorded annually in London alone. International Commercial Arbitration is a highly specialised and engaging area of study. Increased globalisation has enabled many business transactions to be conducted across borders resulting in many business contracts containing complex arbitration clauses. For example, party A, a US entity contracts with B from India for the supply of engineering equipment. The contract contains an arbitration clause providing for arbitration in London. Before the tribunal is constituted the party from India commences proceedings in another jurisdiction. 

You will understand the core principles of International Commercial Arbitration deriving from international conventions (especially the New York Convention), national laws (especially the English Arbitration Act 1996 and the UNCITRAL Model Law), arbitration rules (especially the ICC, LCIA, UNCITRAL).

This unit also examines the jurisprudential basis and practices of International Commercial Arbitration dealing with both historical evolution and current developments. It examines the theory and practice of International Commercial Arbitration and gives a practical insight into fundamental principles from an international perspective by reference to the principal conventions and model laws and the current approaches in different jurisdictions. There are also opportunities to participate in practical “moot” sessions.

In the past years, arbitration has also been the proper dispute resolution mechanism for energy disputes, in particular for those arising out of large projects or against States. Leading surveys in the field point out that oil and gas companies favour international arbitration because it enables them not only to resort to a neutral dispute resolution mechanism, but in particular because they can select specialised arbitrators with substantial knowledge of the industry and they can easily enforce the arbitral awards worldwide. The unit will take a look at the particularities of energy disputes in the context of international arbitration and will briefly examine the provisions of the Energy Charter Treaty in regards to arbitration (with focus on the recent disputes arising out of renewable energy from photovoltaic plants).