Study On The Extensional Validity Of International Commercial Arbitration Agreement

Arbitration is an ancient way for resolving disputes. The principle of parties' autonomy is the foundation of arbitration agreement. The international commercial arbitration agreement is the parties' common intention on submitting disputes' which have arisen or which may arise to arbitration. Compared with the lawsuit, arbitration is more flexible and even more respects the parties' opinion. According to traditional arbitration theories, the legal feature of arbitration agreement is commercial agreement. And therefore the legal effect of arbitration agreement should be decided pursuant to the basic principles and rules of contract law. The arbitration agreement binds only the parties who have signed the arbitration agreement. After World War II, the international commercial arbitration has been the mostly used instrumentality for resolving disputes arising out of international commercial transactions. During the process, the old international commercial arbitration is also changing and developing. In order to meet the times' needs and the economical developments, it had many new meanings. At the end of the 20th century, because of the domestic and foreign supports and encouragements, the arbitration theory no longer scrupulously followed the traditional theory-- the arbitration agreement binds only the parties who have signed the arbitration agreement. As the economic and legal environment changes, a series of exceptions to the principle have been developed out of practice. Under these exceptional circumstances, the arbitration clause can be extended to non-signatories.There are four parts of the study of the extension of international commercial arbitration agreement:Part one introduces the concept of arbitration agreement. The concept and legal character are introduced at the beginning. Then the author brings up the background of the extension of international commercial arbitration agreement, points out the modern tendency of arbitration agreement is to extend the parties' autonomy by adopting more flexible regulations and safeguards and attempts to bring forward a personal opinion about the concept of the extension of international commercial arbitration agreement; The second part researches which law and legal theory should be applied to settle this issue, analyses the estopple rule, piercing the corporate veil and fair and reasonable expectation in the extension of arbitrational agreement, and tries to point out the procedural legal foundation of the extension of arbitrational agreement;Part three deals with the law obstacles which prevent the extension of arbitrational agreement. Firstly, the author points out that the theory obstacle of the extension of arbitrational agreement is the relativity of the arbitration and analyses the range of arbitration agreement has been changed along with the breakthrough in the theory of contract relativity. Then the author points out that the written form of arbitration agreements is the form obstacle of the extension of arbitrational agreement. With the development of electronic technology, many new arbitration agreements forms come to us. At the supports and encouragements' background, we cannot deny the arbitration agreements' effectiveness only because of lacking of the written form. The breakthrough in the theory of contract relativity and the written form can clear the obstacles of the extension of arbitrational agreement;The forth part introduces the extension of arbitrational agreement in the universal and individual transfers, guarantee clauses, the corporate governance and so on, attempts to make a systematical and comprehensive analysis of the issue of extension of arbitration agreement during the practice.