Investigating employment of AI arbitrators in International Commercial Arbitration according to UNCITRAL Model Law (1985)

Constant growth in international commercial practices has increased the demand for dispute resolution in these activities. Because of numerous advantages, arbitration has become one of the most common ways to resolve disputes between parties of an international commercial contract. In recent decades, AI, as one of the pioneer technologies, has been introduced into different fields of human practice. Law and legal procedures are no exception. The idea of involving AI in international commercial arbitration has been proposed in recent years. Technical aspects aside, there are legal issues. In this paper, we investigated the legal impacts of using AI arbitrators from the point of view of the 1985 UNCITRAL Model Law as amended in 2006. The UNCITRAL Model Law has long been accepted as one of the most critical legislations regarding international commercial arbitration. We based our analysis on six subjects: the legitimacy of using an AI arbitrator, the international nature of the arbitration, the appointment of an arbitrator/a group of arbitrators, Challenging an arbitrator, time periods in arbitration, and the AI-Courts Relationship. The results of our investigation show that though there is no explicit prohibition regarding using an AI arbitrator, such a decision may raise many ambiguities and difficulties. In order to address these issues, we suggested that recommendations to the UNCITRAL Model Law should be made. We proposed that these recommendations focus on three issues: The relationship between a company owning an AI system and that system, prior agreements of parties regarding using an AI arbitrator, and the relation between courts and AI arbitrators. Addressing these issues is expected to provide a proper ground for using AI arbitrators in international commercial disputes.