A Step in the Ladder

The thesis is a socio-legal examination of the post of Tribunal Secretary in International Commercial Arbitration. A tribunal secretary is an assistant to the arbitral tribunal to whom the tribunal delegates certain duties and tasks. This research asks the question - what does it mean to be a tribunal secretary. As a result, the thesis is an investigation on tribunal secretary’s engagement with the arbitral record, carrying out any drafting responsibilities, role during the deliberations of the tribunal and relationship with the ICA community.

In order to study this, the thesis relies on a sociological approach that brings together values, practices and institutions to canvas a holistic picture. By values, what is meant are the ideas and norms that the practitioners want to be seen to be adhering to. By practices, what is meant are the actual activities that are repeated by the practitioners. By institutions, what is meant are the external sanctions that would have a bearing on the actions of the arbitrators and tribunal secretaries.

This is done through a study of the existing literature and combining it with empirical study through semi-structured interviews of arbitrators who have been or worked with tribunal secretaries and tribunal secretaries themselves. The practitioners are largely based in the western jurisdictions though there is a still a large group of practitioners from East Asia.

The thesis explores the question of why tribunal secretaries have become inevitable to the practice of ICA. This is due to judicialization and increasing complexity of disputes and moreover, due to historical affinity towards having tribunal secretaries by arbitrators.

It zooms into practices of mastering the file, engaging with drafting responsibilities and role during deliberations in order to construct the picture of what it means to be a tribunal secretary in practice. This zooming in allows to see in fine detail the tasks that tribunal secretaries do while at the same time being mindful of the principle of intuitu personae, that is, there are certain duties that the arbitral tribunal has to carry out itself and cannot delegate to the tribunal secretaries. This discussion benefits from the inputs of both the arbitrators as well as tribunal secretaries as to how they navigate this relationship without breaching this principle.

It finally discusses the role this position plays in the formation of the legal profession of ICA. ICA practice lacks any formal licensing requirements. Therefore, carrying out the role and responsibilities of tribunal secretary has a strong correlation with joining the legal practice of ICA because of three reasons, namely, learning by doing, gaining familiarity with the existing practitioners and ability to network among peers. It presents various career strategies employed by those who act as tribunal secretaries.