Gary Born

Transcrição

Gary Born

PERFIL/PROFILE
Gary Born
Um dos maiores e mais experientes nomes
da arbitragem internacional, mostra sua
visão sobre importantes temas
em inédita entrevista
One of the greatest and most experienced
names in international arbitration sets
out his view on important issues in an
unpublished interview
v. 6, n. 15, 2016 - International Commercial Arbitration
2 Sumário
REVISTA COMERCIALISTA | v. 6, n. 15, 2016
5. Editorial
6. Perfil/Profile
Entrevista: Gary Born
v. 6, n. 15, 2016 International Commercial
Arbitration
12. Doutrina/Doctrine
Artigos acadêmicos sobre o que há de
mais atual e relevante/Academic papers
about current and relevant issues
Arbitration agreements and its
validity over time
By Cláudio Finkelstein and Yuri
Pedroza Leite
Optional, Blank and Combined
Arbitration Agreements: Analysis
of the Superior Tribunal de
Justiça’s Judgment in Graal v.
Kieppe
By Victoria Narancio and Antonio
Nachif
Arbitrating and enforcing against
States in Latin America
By Marike R. P. Paulsson
O custo das arbitragens e o
Acesso à Justiça
Por Napoleão Casado Filho
Revista Comercialista
Expediente
EDITORES EXECUTIVOS
PACO MANOLO CAMARGO ALCALDE
PEDRO ALVES LAVACCHINI RAMUNNO
CONSELHO EDITORIAL
CONSELHO DISCENTE
GUSTAVO LACERDA FRANCO
PEDRO ALVES LAVACCHINI RAMUNNO
RODRIGO FIALHO BORGES
CONSELHO DOCENTE
FABIO ULHOA COELHO
JOSÉ ALEXANDRE TAVARES GUERREIRO
MARIANA PARGENDLER
SÉRGIO CAMPINHO
ARTICULISTAS DESTA EDIÇÃO
ANTONIO NACHIF
CLÁUDIO FINKELSTEIN
MARIKE R. P. PAULSSON
NAPOLEÃO CASADO FILHO
VICTORIA NARANCIO
YURI PEDROZA LEITE
REPÓRTER DESTA EDIÇÃO
DIAGRAMAÇÃO
RODRIGO AUADA
FALE CONOSCO
[email protected]
A REVISTA COMERCIALISTA – DIREITO COMERCIAL E ECONÔMICO é uma publicação eletrônica trimestral, independente, com o escopo de fomentar a produção acadêmico-científica nas áreas do Direito Comercial e Econômico. A publicação é mantida pelo IBDCE - Instituto Brasileiro de Direito Comercial e Econômico. Para maiores informações: http://comercialista.ibdce.com. Contato: [email protected].
Nota aos leitores: As opiniões expressas nos artigos são as de seus autores e não necessariamente as da Revista Comercialista nem das instituições em que atuam. É proibida a reprodução ou transmissão de textos desta publicação
sem autorização prévia. Créditos de capa: Montagem feita com fotos da Wikipedia e freeimages.com.
3
4 Apoio institucional e realização
Realização
Apoio institucional
Seja também um apoiador
[email protected]
O Brasil possui um grande número de arbitragens internacionais e está, cada vez mais, assumindo uma posição de destaque no cenário
mundial, principalmente em razão do respeito ao instituto da arbitragem e pela estabilidade trazida pelo judiciário às sentenças arbitrais
estrangeiras que devam ser executadas no país. Todavia, em que pese esse notório desenvolvimento, é certo que ainda temos um longo
caminho pela frente, em busca de maior desenvolvimento e para nos tornarmos um polo amplamente escolhido como sede de arbitragens
internacionais.
Para que alcancemos a vanguarda deste
meio alternativo de resolução de conflitos internacionais, o primeiro passo a ser dado é o
fomento de seu desenvolvimento doutrinário,
pela ampliação da pesquisa acadêmica e pulverização da abrangência dos estudos aos estudantes e aplicadores do direito. Sem um robusto conhecimento dos pilares da arbitragem
internacional por empresários e advogados, o
Brasil poderá tardar em atingir o reconhecimento e respeito que merece.
Compromissada com o desenvolvimento
acadêmico em matérias atinentes ao direito comercial e econômico no Brasil, a revista Comercialista presenteie seus leitores com um seleto
time de renomados especialistas em arbitragem comercial internacional. Temos a honra de
apresentar como entrevistado o Professor Gary
B. Born, certamente um dos mais respeitados
professores, árbitros e advogados do mundo.
Além dessa grande entrevista, contamos com
excelentes artigos de importantes nomes da arbitragem comercial internacional: Prof. Cláudio
Finkelstein, Prof.ª Marike Paulsson, Prof. Napoleão Casado Filho, Victoria Narancio, Antonio
Nachif e Yuri Pedrosa Leite.
Esperamos que esse 15º número seja não apenas um incentivo ao crescimento da arbitragem
comercial internacional no Brasil, mas, principalmente, um marco em nosso desenvolvimento.
Editorial
Brazil has a large number of international arbitrations, and is increasingly assuming a
prominent position in the international scenario, especially due to the respect to the arbitration institute and stability granted by the judiciary to foreign arbitration awards, which are
to be executed in the country. However, despite
this remarkable development, it is certain that
we still have a long way ahead seeking for further development in order to become a center
widely chosen as the place of international arbitrations.
To reach the forefront of this international alternative dispute resolution mechanism,
the first step to be taken is to foster the doctrinal development of the institute, by expanding
the academic research and spraying the scope
of studies to students and law enforcers. Without a robust knowledge of the pillars of international arbitration by businesspersons and
lawyers, Brazil may be delayed in achieving recognition and respect it deserves.
Committed to the academic development in
matters pertaining to commercial and economic law in Brazil, Revista Comercialista gifts its
readers with a select team of renowned experts
in international commercial arbitration. We are
honored to present as interviewed Professor
Gary B. Born, certainly one of the most respected professor, judge and lawyer in the world. In
addition to this unmissable interview, we provide excellent articles written by important
names in international commercial arbitration:
Prof. Cláudio Finkelstein, Prof. Marike Paulsson,
Prof. Napoleão Casado Filho, Victoria Narancio,
Antonio Nachif and Yuri Pedrosa Leite.
We highly expect that this number 15 may
represent not only an incentive to the growth
of international commercial arbitration in Brazil, but mainly a milestone in our development.
Conselho Editorial/Editorial Board
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6 Perfil
Perfil
Interview: Prof. Gary B. Born
Professor, scholar, lawyer and arbitrator,
Mr. Born talks about important issues relating
to international commercial arbitration
By Paco Manolo Camargo Alcalde
Comercialista - Professor Born, first of all, I would like to thank you very much for
your kindness in granting us this interview.
We would firstly like to start by asking you a few questions about yourself.
In your early life, how did you become interested in studying law and how did international commercial arbitration come into the forefront of your life?
Gary Born - I didn’t actually consider becoming a lawyer until I was finished
with my US undergraduate studies. As a student I was interested in history
and religion and it was only relatively late in my studies that it occurred to me
that law would be an interesting, worthwhile possibility. In the 1980s I taught
international dispute resolution for a year and fell in love with the subject,
putting my classroom and scholarly work together with practical experiences.
My first arbitration was Greenpeace v. Republic of France (also known
as the “Rainbow Warrior” case). The “Rainbow Warrior” was a protest vessel belonging to Greenpeace (an environmental advocacy group), which
had been scheduled to sail to Mururoa Atoll, in French Polynesia, to protest French nuclear testing. However, that voyage was prevented by the actions of the French Directorate General of External Security (“DGSE”) agents,
resulting in the vessel’s sinking (and the death of one Greenpeace member).
France eventually acknowledged responsibility for sinking of the Rainbow War-
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rior, and offered to pay reparations to both France and
Greenpeace.
However, the
parties in the dispute were unable to reach an agreement on
reparations, so they concluded
an arbitration agreement, submitting disputes about reparations and treatment of the
DGSE agents to the Secretary
General of the United Nations
for resolution. This experience decisively strengthened
my interest in international
arbitration.
Comercialista - You have a long
history as a professor, advocate
and arbitrator. How do you juggle it all?
Gary Born -I don’t sleep
enough. The various parts of
my professional life – advocate
(which is my true love), arbitrator, writer, head of the practice
– all overlap and complement
one another. One is a better
academic by virtue of having
practised. Especially in our field,
you can’t be a serious academic
without being closely involved
in practice developments. Conversely, it’s hard to be a great
advocate or arbitrator unless
you’re abreast of academic developments in your field that tell
you where things are going.
Comercialista - As a requirement of the competitive legal
market and in seeking greater
expertise in the particular areas
that they work, lawyers are increasingly seeking national and
international
post-graduation
qualifications. In your opinion,
lawyers who are seeking to build
their careers in the international commercial arbitration area
should take courses specifically
tailored for arbitration, I mean
procedural law courses, or should
they take courses aimed towards
substantive law, such as maritime
and corporate law?
Gary Born - Embarking on
arbitration-specific courses is
certainly a good start. However commercial arbitration
in practice is far more than
simply knowing the procedural law, as it only goes as far as
giving lawyers an understanding of how the system works in
international arbitration. Commercial arbitration is ultimately dispute resolution – where
sound legal and factual reasoning, a good grasp of technical
details of the case, and persuasive written and oral advocacy skills are all indispensable.
These skills can be acquired
from a variety of courses in
substantive law.
Comercialista - Any tips for
students trying to start in the
field?
Gary Born - I think the first
step is to develop an interest
and take it to the next level. Arbitration is interesting and exciting, but it is also complex and
requires a tremendous amount
of hard work. I would then focus on three central points.
First, never be afraid to
ask questions or direction on
how to practice law more effectively. The practice of law,
particularly in international
arbitrations, is a collaborative
endeavor.
Second, listen carefully. The
advocate’s first function is to
understand what issues concern the arbitrators, which
means listening to both what
the arbitrators say and sometimes to what they don’t say.
Finally, it is worth recalling
what Einsten once said—99
percent of genius is hard work.
The same thing is true for law,
particularly international arbitration. You don’t get anything out of something unless
you put things into it; putting
the effort that’s necessary into
whatever you do.
Comercialista - Are there still
obvious differences between the
styles of advocacy of common law
and civil lawyers, or does international arbitration have its own
hybrid style?
Gary Born - I think there is an
emerging international style of
advocacy, both in written and
in oral submissions, but not
everyone uses it. You do see
some counsel in international arbitrations that approach
things from their domestic
perspectives and - regardless
of whether a lawyer is from
a civil or common law jurisdiction - local litigation styles
will always seem distinctive to
an international tribunal. The
more experience lawyers have
of international arbitration,
the easier it is to leave their
domestic litigation habits at
home and the more internationalised their style becomes.
Comercialista - Professor, what
issues would classify an arbitration to be international or domestic case?
Gary Born - A domestic arbitration is one concerned with
purely national or domestic
issues. This means, in general
terms, that all aspects of the
arbitration proceedings are
related to a single jurisdiction.
For example, the nationality of
the parties, the governing law
of the contract, the place of
performance of the contract
and the facts giving rise to the
dispute will all relate to the
same jurisdiction.
An international arbitration,
on the other hand, will reach
beyond the borders of a single jurisdiction. In general, the
domestic laws of different jurisdictions adopt one of three
different approaches to determining whether an arbitration
is truly international:
(i) The nature of the dispute
approach – the arbitration is
considered international if the
dispute concerns cross-border
commercial activity;
(ii) The party nationality
approach – the arbitration is
considered international if the
parties have different nationalities or their principal places of
business are in different jurisdictions; or
(iii) The hybrid approach –
both the nature of the dispute
and the nationality of the parties are considered in determining whether an arbitration
is international.1
Comercialista - Belgium’s arbitration law, for example, does not
distinguish international arbitration from domestic. What is the
relevance and impacts of a legislation with such characteristics?
Gary Born - In domestic arbitration, the entirety of the
proceedings, including all jurisdictional, procedural and
substantive issues, is determined in accordance with the
law of a single jurisdiction.
However, in international arbitration, the existence of different local laws can give rise to
various issues during the course
of proceedings. For example:
(i) the validity of an arbitration
agreement will be determined in
accordance with local law; or
(ii) procedural issues will
usually be governed by the
law of the seat of the arbitration. Nevertheless, key proce-
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dural issues, such as privilege
in disclosable documents, can
be controversial between the
parties and parties may seek to
argue that the substantive law
of the contract and/or the law
of the place of incorporation/
nationality of the parties ought
to apply. For example, a Spanish party to a London seated
arbitration might argue that it
is unfair to apply the English
law of privilege to determine
which documents are disclosable in the case where no such
documents would need to be
provided to the opposing party
if Spanish law were to apply.
The distinction between domestic and international arbitration remains significant, because of the different regimes
in place for enforcing arbitral
awards. The recognition and
enforcement of international
arbitration awards is primarily governed by the New York
Convention rather than domestic law. If local law treats
the award as a domestic award,
then the award will have to enforced under local law rather
than under the Convention.
Comercialista - In few words,
what are the differences between
the law governing the underlying
1 The hybrid approach is exemplified by the UNCITRAL Model Law (the Model Law), which has been used by many countries as the basis for establishing a
statutory framework for international arbitration. The Model Law was drafted to apply specifically to international arbitration and article 1(3) of the Model
Law provides that an arbitration is international if:
a) the parties to an arbitration agreement have, at the time of the conclusion of that agreement, their places of business in different States; or
b) one of the following places is situated outside the State in which the parties have their place of business:
i) the place of arbitration if determined in, or pursuant to, the arbitration agreement;
ii) any place where a substantial part of the obligations of the commercial relationship is to be performed or the place with which the subject matter of the
dispute is most closely connected; or
c) the parties have expressly agreed that the subject matter of the arbitration agreement relates to more than one country.
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contract, the law governing the
arbitration agreement and the
law governing the proceedings
of the arbitration? Which one of
these is the law that will give reason for the arbitral award?
Gary Born - The substantive
law governing the contract
refers to the interpretation,
validity, rights of parties, performance, breaches and remedies derived from a contract.
Even though parties usually
choose a national or a state
law to govern the contract,
they are not limited to these
common choices. Parties also
may choose other sets of rules
such as public international law, transnational law (e.g.,
the United Nations Convention
on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods), general principles of law or equitable principles, or even agree
that different parts of the
contract will be governed by
different laws.
The law governing the arbitration agreement, which as a
matter of law is severable from
the underlying contract, and
therefore a separate choice of
law analysis is required to determine the law governing the
substantive validity of the arbitration agreement itself. Five
options exist: (a) the law of the
forum where judicial enforcement of the agreement is sought;
(b) the law expressly or impliedly
chosen by the parties to govern
the arbitration agreement itself;
(c) the law of the arbitral seat; (d)
a “validation” principle; and (e)
international law.
The procedural law that will
apply depends on the place, or
‘seat,’ of the arbitration. The
procedural law determines to
what extent the local courts
will be involved in the process,
for example: any formalities to
be complied with;
the extent to which the arbitration agreement excludes
court jurisdiction; how much
autonomy and discretion the
parties have in choosing the
arbitral procedure; whether the decision of the arbitral
tribunal can be appealed, and
what timescales will apply, and
the enforceability of the award.
When making an award,
arbitrators shall apply substantive law applicable to the
dispute; they may, however,
resolve the dispute according
to the rules of equity, but only
if the parties explicitly authorize them to. In disputes arising from consumer contracts,
arbitrators will abide by consumer protection laws and
regulations.
2 Republic of Ecuador v. ChevronTexaco Corp.,
376 F. Supp. 2d 334 (S.D.N.Y. 2005).
3 TermoRio S.A. E.S.P. v. Electranta S.P., 487 F.3d
928, 929 (D.C. Cir. 2007).
Comercialista - Even with the
American countries signing the
Panama Convention, the New
York Convention still remains the
world’s main legal framework on
international arbitration. Even
when the Panama Convention is
applicable, American Judges are
utilizing the New York Convention for their decision making
process. In your opinion, do you
think that the Panama Convention is still enforceable or is it
completely over shadowed by the
New York Convention?
Gary Born - The Panama
Convention is indeed still enforceable and may be applied
in commercial arbitration cases involving sovereigns – just
like the New York Convention,
as the Ecuador2 and TermoRio3
cases indicate. Additionally, the
Panama Convention has particular significance in investment
arbitrations involving Latin
American sovereigns that are
not governed by the ICSID Convention, including NAFTA Chapter XI arbitrations involving
investment disputes between
investors of the United States
and the government of Mexico
(or vice versa).
Although in many respects
the Panama Convention is a
facsimile of the New York Convention, it has some crucial differences. Notably, the Panama
Convention imposes the rules
of a special arbitral institution,
the Inter-American Commercial Arbitration Commmission
(IACAC), as the default institutional rules when contracting
parties fail to expressly agree
on their governing arbitral
rules. It also includes a specific enforcement mechanism.
Whilst other differences are
minor, it should not be ignored
by practitioners.
It is possible in some circumstances that both the New
York and Panama Conventions could apply to an arbitral
award. Section 305 of the ‘domestic’ U.S. Federal Arbitration
Act (FAA) addresses this issue
by providing that, if a majority of parties to an arbitration
agreement are from countries
that have ratified the Panama
Convention and are members
of the Organization of American States (“OAS”), then the
Panama Convention will apply. In all other cases, the New
York Convention applies. In
Progressive Casualty Insurance
Co. v. C.A. Reaseguradora Nacional de Venezuela,4 the plaintiffs were U.S. companies, the
defendants were Venezuelan,
and both countries had ratified
both the Panama and New York
Conventions and were members of the OAS. The court applied Section 305 and held that
the Panama Convention, rather
than the New York Convention,
controlled.5
Also, and importantly, the
Panama Convention only has
17 signatory states across the
Americas, whereas the New
York Convention has over
150 States, over-shadowing
the Panama Convention in
terms of breadth of application. To avoid any surprises,
4 802 F.Supp 1069 (S.D.N.Y. 1992), rev’d, 991 F.2d
42 (2d Cir. 1993).
parties drafting Latin American arbitration clauses should
take care to specify the application arbitration rules
or disclaim the Panama Convention – unless of course,
they would like to adopt IACAC
arbitration.
Comercialista - In general, the
choice of a particular country as
the place of the arbitration do
not have any direct relationship
to the nationality of the companies whom choose to settle their
disputes by arbitration. That is, a
Brazilian company and an American company may choose to
resolve their conflicts in a particular chamber of Singapore.
Professor, in your opinion, what
are the main factors that would
make some countries more attractive as an arbitration venue
over others countries? What do
you think Brazil could do to become a more attractive place and
venue for international commercial arbitration?
Gary Born - The main factors that contrinute to the
attractiveness of some countries as an arbitration venue include: (i) a generally
pro-arbitration judiciary; (ii)
a well-regarded and efficient
court system; (iii) an internationally-recognised and stable
national law; and (iv) an international arbitration legislation based on the UNCITRAL
Model Law.
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Additionally, the political and
business climate of the country
also have important bearings on
its attractiveness as an arbitration centre. Singapore is a case
in point – many parties that
conduct business internationally value Singapore as a neutral
venue that is free from corruption. They have confidence in
the level of professional service and efficiency, particularly
within the legal industry. The
fact that many of the world’s
largest banks and multinational
corporations (MNCs) have their
regional headquarters or a significant presence in Singapore
gives them further reason to
want to seat their arbitrations
in Singapore.
Brazil similarly embodies
some of the aforementioned
factors, including a generally pro-arbitration judiciary;
an internationally-recognized
and an international arbitration legislation based on the
UNCITRAL Model Law.
As a developmental point
however, Brazil should do more
to market itself as an attractive
arbitration centre for parties
from civil law countries as it offers certain characteristics to
arbitration practioners that are
not available in common law jurisdicitons. For instance, since
legal rules are generally codified in civil law countries, there
may be greater transparency
and ease of access to local laws.
5 Id, at 1074.
12 Doutrina
Arbitration agreements
and its validity over
time
By Cláudio Finkelstein and Yuri Pedroza Leite*
Introduction
For this article, we shall endeavor to understand the limitation
one might have to arbitrate a matter over time. We shall limit our
analysis to the limitation to arbitrate rather than settle or have
a matter resolved by courts, once this is a matter of procedural
law rather than substantive law. We want to analyze the means of
resolution rather than the limitations on a specific matter. The
discussion is centered in the concept of separability of the arbitration clause, and its longevity, or rather, as we shall conclude,
its perpetuity.
Throughout life, people are constantly interacting in society, and therefore, creating the most diverse types of legal relations amongst them: “ubi societas ibi jus”. These relations can
take the form of legal contracts, business and, more generally,
legal acts between people, physical and/or legal, that could give
rise to both responsibilities
and obligations, creating in
the public and private realms
the acquisition, modification,
maintenance and even the
extinction of rights.
In the private realm, which
encompass the concept of
private autonomy, object of
this study, is the freedom of
contract inherent to the arbitration procedure. To that
sense, article 5, section II of
the Brazilian Constitution
operates as closely to a legal
dogma as possible, affirming that: “No one will be required to do or refrain from
doing something except by
virtue of law”. It was precisely
during the studies regarding
the specific field of contract
freedom in arbitration that
emerged the idea of this article, simply determined by the
need to answer the following questions: “In a contract
with an arbitration clause,
be the contract binding and
enforceable or null and void,
(i) would the parties be eternally bound to an arbitration clause? (ii) if not, at what
time would they be no longer
bound to it? and, finally, (iii)
would the separability prin-
ciple of arbitration clauses apply to terminations of
contracts in which they take
part of?”.
The answers to such questions will be made throughout this article, considering
that, until now, little is the
domestic discussion on the
subject in Brazil.
1 In other words, Carlos Alberto Carmona defines
arbitration as: “[…] a procedure for the settlement of disputes through the intervention of one
or more persons who receive their power from a
private agreement, deciding based on this agreement without state intervention, with the final
decision having the same effectiveness of a court
judgment”. CARMONA, Carlos Alberto. – 3ª ed.
rev., atual. e ampl. – São Paulo : Atlas, 2009, p. 15
Code, Law nº 10.406/2002.
2 As defined in articles 3 to 5 of the Brazilian Civil
The arbitration clause as
a legal issue
Doutrina 13
A. The legal capacity to enter into contracts 2; and
B. Make reference only to
disposable pecuniary rights.
Once concluded, the arbitration clause is binding upon
the parties, and they cannot
unilaterally decide to avoid
the obligation to arbitrate
their disputes once they have
already arisen - becoming
therefore, binding. The Brazilian domestic courts have
consistently upheld this understanding 3. The only way
they could go to the national
courts would be by common
agreement, which will be
further explained. However,
the Arbitration Law and the
new Brazilian Civil Procedure
Code (Law No. 13.105 of 2015)
make no explicit reference to
the forms of termination of
the arbitration clause, speaking so only on the termination of legal or arbitration
proceedings, in hypotheses
that are more concrete 4.
Initially, an analysis of the nature of arbitration clause must
be made, considering it as a
legal contract made between
private individuals, by mutual
agreement, who wish to solve
their disputes away from state
jurisdiction, thus promoting
an alternative solution of current or future disputes, limited or unlimited, through other
adjudicative body (the arbitral
tribunal), recognized by the
law as a legitimate judge of the
disputes encompassed by said
arbitration clause1.
The current Brazilian Arbitration Act (Law No. 9307 of
1996, as amended by Law No.
Kompetenz-kompetenz
13,129 of 2015) establishes the
According to the sole paracriteria, on its Article 1, to le- graph of Article 8 of the Bragally make this type of con- zilian Arbitration Law, the
tract, namely to have:
arbitral tribunal is respon-
3 STF - SE-AgR: 5206 EP, Relator: Sepúlveda Pertence, Data de Julgamento: 12/12/2001, Tribunal Pleno, Data de Publicação: DJ 30-04-2004;
STJ – REsp: 712.566/RJ 2004/0180930-0, Relatora: Ministra Nancy Andrighi, Data de Julgamento: 18/08/2005l, Data de Publicação: DJ
05.09.2005; TJ - SEC: 1210 EX 2006/0185918-6,
Relator: Ministro Fernando Gonçalves, Data de
Julgamento: 20/06/2007, CE - Corte Especial,
Data de Publicação: DJ 06.08.2007 p. 444; TJSP - APL: 00578456420128260100 SP 005784564.2012.8.26.0100, Relator: Rômolo Russo, Data de
Julgamento: 08/05/2014, 11ª Câmara de Direito
Privado, Data de Publicação: 12/05/2014; TJ-PR AC: 5625621 PR 0562562-1, Relator: Elizabeth M F
Rocha, Data de Julgamento: 23/06/2010, 11ª Câmara Cível, Data de Publicação: DJ: 433.
4 See Brazilian Civil Procedure Code, article 485,
item VII; and the Brazilian Arbitration Law, Article 7.
14 Doutrina
sible for the decision on the
existence, validity and effectiveness of the arbitration
clause, as well as of the contract in which it is inserted.
This article consolidates two
major principles of arbitration, namely the principles
of Kompetenz, also developed by French Doctrine under compétence-compétence,5
and the autonomy of the arbitration clause (also named
separability of the arbitration
clause). The latter indicates
that the arbitration clause is
autonomous in relation to the
contract in which it is inserted, in such a way that the nullity of the contract does not
necessarily imply the invalidity of the arbitration clause.
The sole paragraph of said
article expressly entitles the
arbitrators with the power
to interpret the arbitration
clause and to assess if it is or
not valid: “It’s up to the arbitrator to decide ex officio, or
at the request of one of the
parties, the issues concerning
the existence, validity and effectiveness of the arbitration
clause, and the contract containing the arbitration clause”.
Moreover, as further discussed, the Brazilian Civil
Procedure Code contains
express provision allowing
a respondent in a litigation
proceeding to defend itself
from any action by showing
the existence of an arbitration agreement.
The principle of Kompetenz-kompetenz
originated
in discussions of interpretive legitimacy of arbitration
clauses in confrontation with
the intervention of the state
bodies into private relations.
Prior to the consolidation of
this principle, the arbitration
clause was constantly debated in state judicial forums, often by malicious parties seeking to evade its obligation to
initiate the arbitration, reaching, upon occasions to an understanding that arbitration
would be an unconstitutional
legal figure6.
This doctrine protects the
power of the arbitral tribunal to decide on its own jurisdiction7. Messrs. Várady,
Barceló III, Kröll and von
Mehren propose a division
of the court-arbitration process in three stages, where
Stage 1 “encompass litigation, generally at the outset
of the dispute, over whether
the court should hear the
dispute or send the parties
to arbitration”. Stage 2 is the
decision-making process of
the arbitrators as to whether
hear the dispute or deny its
own jurisdiction. Finally, on
Stage 3, the court review the
award, deciding whether to
set it aside or to recognize
it 8.
The Kompetenz-Kompetenz
principle, differing from the
competence-compétence,
does not imply a general
negative effect. That is to say,
only some countries (such
as France), understand that
Stage 1 should be totally absorbed by Stage 2 – the arbitrators must have full control
over the first analysis of their
jurisdiction.
Contrarywise,
for example, is the U.S. decision in First Options of Chicago v. Kaplan [115 S. Ct. 1920
(1995)]. In that case, a problematic arbitration clause
was brought to an arbitral tribunal, while the defendants
contested jurisdiction in the
courts. An issue regarding
the piercing of the corporate
veil was also claimed. While
the arbitrators decided for
their competence, the courts
found that the defendants
had no obligations to partake
5 More considerations about the compétencecompétence principle, as defined by the French
commentators, see: FOUCHARD, Philippe; GAILLARD, Emmanuel & GOLDMAN, Berthold. Traité
de l’arbitrage commercial International. Editions
Litec, 1996. p. 410, ¶651.
Relator Min. Sepúlveda Pertence, disponível em:
http://redir.stf.jus.br/paginadorpub/
paginador.jsp?docTP=AC&docID=345889.
Last
Access 09/02/2016.
2015, p. 180
6 STF, SE 5206 AgR/EP, Ag. Reg. na Sentença Estrangeira, julgada em 12 de dezembro de 2001,
7 VÁRADY, Tibor; BARCELÓ III, John J.; KRÖLL,
Stefan; VON MEHREN, Arthur T. International
Commercial Arbitration – A transnational perspective. 6th Ed. – West Academic Publishing,
8 VÁRADY, Tibor; BARCELÓ III, John J.; KRÖLL,
Stefan; VON MEHREN, Arthur T. International
Commercial Arbitration – A transnational perspective. 6th Ed. – West Academic Publishing,
2015, p. 124
in the arbitration. The understanding of the courts was
upheld by the United States
Supreme Court, thus bringing elements to discuss the
allocation of powers between
judges and arbitrators 9.
However, Brazilian jurisprudence has been making
efforts to modernize itself,
and the judiciary is already
firmly applying the considerably recent law, together
with these two principles10.
There is no evident nor express provision in the law
regarding the acceptance or
not of the negative effect of
the
Kompetenz-Kompetenz
doctrine, which is still yet
to be fully developed by the
courts. With these concepts
in mind, we proceed with an
examination of the ways in
which the arbitration clause
relates to contracts in which
they are inserted.
de l’arbitrage commercial
international”, initially indicate the general methods of
contractual termination, and
then evaluate its effects on
the arbitration clause (as we
do below, regarding Brazilian law). Amongst them, they
indicate the contract performance; statutory limitations;
novation; the transaction;
the termination; and, finally,
the annulment. They are defined as extrinsic causes of
extinction of the arbitration
clause, as they are actually
related to the main contract
where the arbitration clause
is contained, which may or
may not generate effects on
its validity. Moreover, the
authors present later, the
specific causes of extinction of the arbitration clause,
namely the express renounce
or the presence of a specific
provision that may annul it.
Comparative law: the so- Extrinsic causes of exlutions of french law
tinction
During the research for the
present study, the French
arbitration doctrine was of
particular aid to understand
the relationship between
the arbitration clauses and
the main contracts. Philippe
Fouchard, Emmanuel Gaillard and Berthold Goldman, in their work “Traité
The performance of the obligations contained in the
main contract, the authors
point out, is the most natural form of contractual extinction. However, there is
no termination of the arbitration clause present in it,
if there are no discussion of
its terms and conditions. The
9 PARK, William W. Arbitration of International
Business Disputes. Oxford University Press, 2006,
pp. 84-87.
10 STJ. Corte Especial. Reclamação 9.030-SP, Decisão Monocrática, julgada em 24 de abril de 2014,
Min. Rel. Ari Pargendler, disponível em: https://
ww2.stj.jus.br/websecstj/revistaeletronica/
Doutrina 15
arbitrators are recognized
as the sole decision making
body with jurisdiction over
the contract status, even if
they come to understand that
all obligations have been fully
completed and / or the main
contract has lost its purpose:
because of the principle of
autonomy of the arbitration
clause, the arbitrators maintain their jurisdiction over
the contract.
The same argument applies to the questions concerning the statutory limitation of the obligations of
a contract: any discussions
about said limitation will be
submitted to the decision of
the tribunal. Therefore, the
statutory limitation of contractual obligations shall not
affect the validity of the arbitration clause.
However, once considering the existence of a contractual novation, there is a
finer line that must be analyzed. This phenomenon
stems from the extinction
of old binding rules and the
creation of new obligations,
by agreement between the
parties or by external effects to them. The authors
indicate that, according to
French jurisprudence, the
theory has been consolidated
as to give the most complete
Abre_Documento.asp?sSeq=1218649&sReg=20120
1163734&sData=20130424&formato=PDF. Last Access 01/04/2016.
16 Doutrina
autonomy to the arbitration
clause, which ensures saying
that the renewal of contractual terms does not affect
the validity of the arbitration clause itself. They warn,
however, that the novation
can reach the scope of the
arbitration clause, which may
or may not become out of object (for example, in the case
of arbitration clauses which
delineate a specific object to
be treated in arbitration), or
even can reach specifically
the arbitration clause itself,
the object of renewal, by
agreeing on a new arbitration
clause or a conflicting forum
selection clause. In the latter
case, it is not the situation of
a termination or indirect effects of the contract to the
arbitration clause, but actually a direct operation of extinctive or modifying effects
to the arbitration clause.
The transaction is the
method by which the parties find a mutual solution to
avoid bringing a dispute to
the judiciary. As affirmed by
Silvio Venosa, “the transaction is intended precisely to
prevent the parties to have
a recourse to the courts, or
put an end, by agreement, to
an ongoing demand, already
processed in the courts or
not”. 11 So it would only be
natural to think that, because of its contractual and
mutual nature, the transaction would be a way to decide
privately about a possible
dispute arising from the obligations of a contract, without the need for recourse to
arbitration. However, the authors indicate that in French
law, there has been decisions
to interpret the transaction
involving other obligations
of a particular contract does
not affect the validity of the
arbitration clause, whose objects must be submitted to
the jurisdiction of an arbitral
tribunal.
Even less capable of affecting the validity or existence of an arbitration agreement is the termination of
the main contract. In a ruling
from the ‘Cour de Cassation’,
as early as November 25,
1966, in France, the understanding of the separability
of the arbitration clause was
consolidated, whereby “the
termination of a contract is
intended to put an end to the
obligations of the parties; the
appellate court was right to
define that the parties didnot expressly renounce the
arbitration clause as it has
a ‘vested right’ to submit to
arbitrators disputes arising
from the contract, even if su-
pervening to the termination
of the main contract” 12.
Finally, throughout this
analysis about the effect that
the validity of a main contract may have on the arbitration clause, we are left to
evaluate the annulment of a
contract. The response of the
French law on this subject is
the principle of compétencecompétence, that is, the arbitral tribunal deems fit the
allegations or findings about
the nullity of a contract, and
to what extent, if any, such
nullity could affect the validity of the arbitration clause.
If so decided, the panel of
arbitrators could / should
decide on the absence of jurisdiction to proceed with
the analysis of the dispute by
referring the parties to the
judiciary.
11 Translated from the poruguese language: “a
transação tem justamente a finalidade de impedir que as partes recorram ao Judiciário, ou
ponham fim, por decisão conjunta, a uma demanda em curso, já instalada em processo ou
não”. VENOSA, Sílvio de Salvo. Direito Civil : teoria geral das obrigações e teoria geral dos contratos. 5ª ed. – São Paulo : Atlas, 2005 (Coleção
Direito Civil; v. 2), p. 312
12 Free Translation from the French version,
available in: http://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/
af f ichJuriJudi.do?idTexte=JURITE
XT000006973615. Last Access 01/04/2016.
Intrinsic causes of
extinction
The arbitration clause, creation of the common will of
two or more parties who decide to submit their disputes
to an arbitration, may also
be extinguished directly by
expression of said will, common or unilateral, or due to
present vices unknown to the
parties, causing its nullity.
By resignation, the parties
may jointly waive their ob-
Doutrina 17
ligation to go to arbitration.
They may also renounce it
explicitly or implicitly. When
the parties, before any litigation begins, decide to modify the contractual terms,
and among these changes is
the exclusion of the arbitration clause, it may be argued
that there is a waiver of arbitration, through the inclusion of a supervening forum
selection clause. Bringing a
decision of the Cour d’appel
de Paris, dated December 9,
1987, the authors presented
us with a peculiar situation
that illustrates the possibility of express and implied
waiver.
In said decision, the parties have agreed upon a series of related contracts,
which were in turn governed
by an initial and main contract, in which was contained
a broad arbitration clause.
However, on a second contract, the parties formulated
a specific choice of court
clause, appointing the Commercial Court of Paris (State
jurisdiction) to resolve all
disputes arising out of that
contract and future contracts. The Cour d’appel held
that the parties, by agreeing
upon a specific and meticulously written clause, posterior to the main contract,
had no other purpose than
to expressly ward it – as well
as the other subsequent contracts – of arbitral jurisdiction. It is also indicated that,
because it was a complex
relationship between contracts, neither the economic
and legal relationship of the
parties could be under different jurisdictions and legal
systems (denying, thus, the
dépéçage theory), the parties therefore must have also
resigned, even implicitly, to
arbitral jurisdiction for disputes arising out of that first
contract 13.
Furthermore, as also recognized in Brazilian law, the
part that takes their dispute
to a state jurisdiction, disregarding its obligation to
initiate the arbitration, does
not incur in breach of the arbitration clause if the other
party, in its defense, does not
raise the existence of said
clause 14. It is the case of a
tacit waiver of the arbitration
clause, as both parties have
shown their interest in continuing the discussion of the
dispute in the State jurisdiction through their actions.
As previously mentioned,
the annulment of the main
contract does not necessarily affect the arbitration
clause. The reverse is also
true, as there may be in the
arbitration clause a flaw that
renders it null or void, e.g.
having as its scope an inarbitrable matter, or the appointment of a particular
arbitrator who has already
passed away, etc. However,
parallel to what happens in
the other case, it is up to the
arbitrators to decide on this
issue, since the principle of
compétence-compétence will
be summoned yet again to
solve jurisdictional issues.
13 Available in French in: http://www.kluwerarbitration.com/CommonUI/document
.aspx?id=ipn19141 Last Access: 01/04/2016.
14 Article 337, §6 of the Brazilian Civil Procedure
Code states that “The absence of any allegation
of existence of an arbitration agreement, as pro-
vided in this chapter, implies acceptance of state
jurisdiction and waiver of arbitration”.
Termination of contracts
and termination of arbitration clause
Because it is a contract, the
general rules made by the
law, contained in Articles 472
and following of the Brazilian
Civil Code, serve as a parameter to solve the questions
introduced in the beginning
of this research.
Termination of contracts
can occur through rescission, which will take place
in the same form and manner established by law for
the formation of the contract (Article 472); by unilateral termination (Article 473);
the existence of a termination clause, which, when expressed, operates in its own
right and, if tacit, depends on
judicial intervention (Article
474); and, finally, on account
of the excessive hardship
(Articles 478-480).
18 Doutrina
The doctrine already determined the transitory nature of the obligations, understood as personal rights,
assuming that they must
fulfil a function at a given
time (as opposed to property
rights, whose characteristic
is the continuity) 15. Still, as
understood by Silvio de Salvo Venosa, “[a]n agreement
whose obligations have been
regularly performed ceases
to exist normally. The contract is extinguished by its
execution. It is the abnormal
termination, early in time or
changed in its object or form,
that we will find other cases of extinction, a narrower
undoing” 16.
Therefore, regarding the
analysis of more general
legislation, the arbitration
clause, understood as a contract, may be terminated by
an express and written form,
since Article 4, paragraph 1 of
the Arbitration Law requires
this form to the existence
of an arbitration clause. In
our opinion, the termination
cannot be presumed 17, corroborating to this conclu-
sion some reasons examined
below. Still, it may be unilaterally terminated when expressly communicated to the
other party on the intended
termination, before the existence or knowledge of any
dispute between the parties
(as such unilateral termination might be seen as an act
of bad faith).
As previously mentioned,
the unilateral termination
shall be effective only in the
absence of a present or future (but foreseeable) conflict at the time of termination, or if the other party
accepts, expressly or implicitly, to resolve the dispute in
the State courts.
It is also possible to terminate the arbitration clause
by claiming excessive hardship, that is, when there is a
change in the economic reality of one or all contractors,
which would make it impossible to achieve the goals of
the arbitration clause (this is
still an ongoing and very interesting debate about the
cost of arbitration imposed
on the parties and the pos-
sible emptying of the clause
by the default of a party.
Many arbitral institutions
have rules to circumvent this
problem, however it is a hypothesis that can affect many
procedures, especially those
called ad hoc).
In an unpublished French
decision issued by the Tribunal Commercial de Paris in
May 17, 2011, the judges found
that the award issued by an
ICC Tribunal was null since
the arbitrators did not allow
Mil-Tek France to discuss its
claims since it did not had
the necessary funds to advance the costs involved in
the arbitration. The analysis
of the judges considered that
such decision, to continue
arbitration without allowing
a party to present its defenses properly, was against the
principle of due process, and
the ICC Tribunal should have
stricken out the arbitration
clause as incapable of being
performed 18.
Another decision from
Germany,
the
Plumbers
19
Case , has a similar approach.
Two German parties had en-
15 VENOSA, Sílvio de Salvo. Direito Civil : teoria
geral das obrigações e teoria geral dos contratos. 5ª ed. – São Paulo : Atlas, 2005 (Coleção Direito Civil; v. 2), p. 527.
17 Although the exception of the Brazilian Civil Procedure Code, article 337, item X, and its
§6, is valid, since they clearly indicate that the
termination of an arbitration agreement can
be implied whenever a party of the arbitration
agreement, when faced by a notification of a
judicial claim, does not allege the existence of
said arbitration agreement in its defense before
discussing merits of the case.
tribunal a déclarer cette obligation nulle et de nul
effet”. Tribunal de Commerce de Paris, jugement
du 17 mai 2001, RG n° 2011003447. Text available,
in French, in GAILLARD, Emmanuel. Rapport de
synthèse : l’argent de l’arbitrage. HAMIDA, Walid
; CLAY, Thomas (Org.) L’argent dans l’arbitrage.
Lextenso Éditions, 2013.
16 Translated from the Portuguese version:
“[u]m contrato regularmente cumprido em
suas obrigações extingue-se normalmente. O
contrato extingue-se por sua execução. É na
extinção anormal, antecipada no tempo ou alterada no objeto ou na forma, que vamos encontrar outras hipóteses de extinção, um desfazimento mais restrito”. Idem. p. 529
18 “l’impossibilité matérielle pour Mil- Tek
France de se pourvoir devant une juridiction en
raison d’une clause contractuelle, constitue une
restriction de l’accès au juge qui doit conduire le
19 Bundesgerichtshof 14 Sept 2000, III ZR 33/00
– Case 404, available in https://www.uncitral.
org/clout/clout/data/deu/clout_case_404_
leg-1628.html. Last Access: 01/04/2016.
Doutrina 19
tered into a contract for the
installation of bathroom appliances and a separate arbitration agreement. A dispute
arose regarding provisional
payments, which Plaintiff
wanted to have resolved by
the state courts. Defendant
rejected that request and insisted on the existence of the
arbitration agreement, but
Plaintiff never started them
for cost reasons. A year later,
Plaintiff informed Defendant
that he terminated the arbitration agreement for the
lack of sufficient funds and
sued Defendant for damages
for breach of contract in the
state courts. Although the
Trial Court and the Court of
Appeals denied the claims on
the grounds of the existence
of an arbitration agreement,
directing the parties to arbitration, the Federal Supreme
Court reversed such decisions, finding the arbitration
agreement to be impracticable, according to section
1032 (1) German Code of Civil
Procedure 20.
Finally, there is the possibility of a party who feel
injured by the breach of an
arbitration clause (that is,
when the other party violates
its obligation to initiate the
arbitration procedure and
forward their demands to
the state courts) to denounce
such clause and to subject itself, therefore, to the state
jurisdiction, and request
that it may be awarded damages, another debate that is
in vogue in the doctrinal and
professional discussions.
Analyzing the specific law,
it appears that it is deficient
as to forecast the forms of
termination of the arbitration
clause (here understood in
its two legal species, the arbitration clauses and submission agreements21). Specifically regarding submission
agreements, the law states,
in article 12, three cases in
which such agreement may
be terminated: when any of
the arbitrators (ii) excuse
him or herself to arbitrate, or
(ii) does not arbitrate due to
death or inability to give his
or her vote, provided that the
parties expressly refuse to
accept a substitute; or when
(iii) the deadline for the delivery of a particular award
in the arbitration clause by
the will of the parties expires,
“since the party has notified
the arbitrator or the presiding arbitrator, giving him or
her ten days for the delivery and presentation of the
award“(Article 12, section III).
The arbitration law, however, provides the means by
which the existence, validity
and effectiveness of the arbitration clause can be identified, as seen in Article 8 and
in its respective sole paragraph: the arbitral tribunal is
the single competent entity
for this evaluation.
20 “The arbitration agreement is null and void,
inoperative or incapable of being performed.”
which the parties to a contract undertake to
submit to arbitration disputes which may arise
in respect of such contract” (article 4º, caput),
whereas a submission agreement is defined as
“the agreement through which the parties sub-
mit a dispute to arbitration by one or more persons, being made judicially or extrajudicially”
(article 9, caput), that is to say, the parties agree
to submit an existing issue to arbitration.
21 The Brazilian arbitration law so defines an
arbitration clause: “the agreement through
Time as a question concerning the validity of
the arbitration clause
In the introduction, the temporal binding effects of the
arbitration clause to the parties was questioned by posing two questions: is the
arbitration clause eternal?
Otherwise, at which point
it ceases to have effect on
the parties?
Through the analysis of
the law, time is an important
figure, because it indicates
the possibility of exercising
a right (with the study of legal provisions) or even the
validity of a certain law (in
this case, with the statutory
period). Studies on the deadlines, whether prescriptive or
statutory, are closely related
to the principle of legal certainty. This principle is extremely important for modern and democratic systems
of law, since, as explained by
J. J. Gomes Canotilho, “man
needs security to lead, plan
and adapt autonomously and
20 Doutrina
responsibly his life. Therefore, the principles of legal
certainty and the confidence
of protection are primarily
considered constituent elements of the rule of law” 22.
So how can the free men
contract at will if he or she
is unsure of the dimension of
the effects being contracted?
As explained by Silvio Venosa, “[i]t is not always easy
to define exactly the temporal effects of a contract. The
contract already fulfilled may
have residual reflections, for
example the period prior
to the contract, can the old
contractor practice actions
or omissions accountable” 23.
In the case of the arbitration clause, we have seen
that there are many ways in
which one can undermine its
validity, which, however, is
increasingly protected by the
principles of compétencecompétence and separability.
Still, except for the express
will of the parties and the
determination of the arbitrators, the arbitration clause
is a particular creation that
necessarily binds the parties to at least two obligations, related to its particular scope: to constitute and
to present their disputes to
the arbitral tribunal, which
has the final jurisdiction over
its own jurisdiction as well as
the bottom line displayed.
Furthermore, when, in
fact, a party may be considered free of such obligations? Analyzing the time
factor, that is, the hypothesis
already excluding the express or implied consent of
the parties to extinguish the
obligation, as seen above, it
can be said that there is no
time limit for the arbitration
clause to operate its effects.
Initially, some will inquire
about the existence of a limitation period to such obligation. However, it can be
already drawn that the law
would be responsible for fixing this period, and there was
complete silence on such
subject. What may happen is
that one party may bring the
claim of such limitation period, and the arbitrator will
be the ones who will decide
whether or not there is a
prescription of such right (to
arbitrate). But again, the parties are obliged to constitute
the arbitral tribunal and to
bring it this question, which
will be judged on a case-bycase analysis and, most probably, on a confidential way.
Furthermore, it may be
claimed that the arbitration
clause is also of a post-contractual mandatory character, when the main contract
(and its subsequent contract)
of a legal relationship to
which it is intended to govern ends. Once it being understood that the analysis of
the contracts allows for the
attribution of past events responsibility, there is no obstacle to the same analysis
to the facts subsequent to
the end of the contract. The
arbitration clause is a separate negotiation from the
main contract, however it is
also intrinsically related to
it because of their common
creator (the parties and their
legal goal), making it imperative to survive the agreement
to continue holding the parties accountable for future
actions.
22 Translated from the Portugese: “o homem
necessita de segurança para conduzir, planificar
e conformar autônoma e responsavelmente a
sua vida. Por isso, desde cedo se consideram os
princípios da segurança jurídica e da proteção
da confiança como elementos constitutivos do
Estado de Direito”. CANOTILHO, J. J. Gomes.
Direito constitucional e teoria da constituição.
7. ed. Coimbra, Portugal: Almedina, 1997. p. 257.
emplo do período anterior ao contrato, pode o
antigo contratante praticar ações ou omissões
responsabilizáveis”. VENOSA, Sílvio de Salvo.
Direito Civil : teoria geral das obrigações e teoria geral dos contratos. 5ª ed. – São Paulo : Atlas,
2005 (Coleção Direito Civil; v. 2), p. 515
23 Translated from the Portugese: “[n]em sempre é fácil delimitar exatamente no tempo os
efeitos de um contrato. O contrato já cumprido
pode apresentar reflexos residuais, pois, a ex-
Conclusion
From this brief study, the following statements are proposed:
(I) The parties are not
eternally bound by arbitration clauses. They may expressly agree to the waver
of the clause, or, in their silence, are bound to it as far
as the legal material relationship exists. However, also
being a procedural relation-
ship, which is not legislated,
the parties will be bound by
the principle of compétencecompétence, leaving the arbitrators to review the validity or existence of the right
and the claims submitted to
them;
(ii) The arbitration clauses
are legal forms that find their
substance and validity in the
private will of the parties. As
such, it is expected that the
parties’ intention is the most
important (though not exclusive) element that can modify, a priori, obligations present in such clauses. Time, by
itself, does not allow anyone
to assume the change of the
intent of the parties, needing
a context of practices or acts
associated to it to proceed
with an interpretative analysis;
(iii) Finally, the Brazilian jurisprudence, although
young on arbitration issues,
is being solidly built with international understandings,
in a simple and homogeneous
way, consolidating the fundamental principles of arbitration and building the most
appropriate interpretations
for filling any legal gaps.
CANOTILHO, J. J. Gomes.
Direito constitucional e teoria da constituição. 7. ed. Coimbra, Portugal: Almedina,
1997
CARMONA, Carlos Alberto.
Arbitragem e processo : um
comentário à Lei nº 9.307/96
– 3ª ed. rev., atual. e ampl. –
São Paulo : Atlas, 2009
FOUCHARD,
Philippe;
GAILLARD,
Emmanuel
&
GOLDMAN, Berthold. Traité
de l’arbitrage commercial International. Editions Litec,
1996
HAMIDA, Walid ; CLAY,
Thomas (Org.) L’argent dans
l’arbitrage. Lextenso Éditions, 2013.
PARK, William W. Arbitration of International Business
Disputes. Oxford University
Press, 2006
VÁRADY, Tibor; BARCELÓ
III, John J.; KRÖLL, Stefan;
VON MEHREN, Arthur T. International Commercial Arbitration – A transnational
perspective. 6th Ed. – West
Academic Publishing, 2015
VENOSA, Sílvio de Salvo.
Direito Civil : teoria geral das
obrigações e teoria geral dos
contratos. 5ª ed. – São Paulo
: Atlas, 2005 (Coleção Direito
Civil; v. 2)
Doutrina 21
* Cláudio Finkelstein
Law Graduate from Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo (1989),
LL.M in Internacional Law from the University of Miami (1991), Ph.d. in Law
from Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo (2000) and Full Tenure from the Pontifícia Universidade
Católica de São Paulo (2011). Currently is a part-time Professor at Pontifícia
Universidade Católica de São Paulo,
in both Graduate and Pos-Graduate
levels. Current Coordinator of International Contracts Course at IICS. Tutor
for Master and Doctorate Programs at
the Pontifícia Universidade Católica
de São Paulo. Lawyer and Arbitrator,
specialized in Public International Law,
Private International Law and International Commercial Contracts.
* Yuri Pedroza Leite
Law Graduate from Pontifícia Universidade Católica de São Paulo (2014),
Professor Assistant in International
Arbitration at Pontifícia Universidade
Católica de São Paulo (2015-2016),
Post-Graduate Studies in International
Law at Pontifícia Universidade Católica
de São (2014-2016). Lawyer at Finkelstein Advogados, focusing his practice
in International Commercial Arbitration, Corporate Law and International
Contracts.
22 Doutrina
Optional, Blank and
Combined Arbitration
Agreements: Analysis
of the Superior Tribunal
de Justiça’s Judgment in
Graal v. Kieppe
By Victoria Narancio and Antonio Nachif*
I. Introduction
Arbitration is almost always consensual and pursuant to an
agreement between the parties. A party’s consent to an arbitration agreement is therefore required for that agreement’s existence. In many circumstances however, a party’s
consent to the agreement to arbitrate is unclear or uncertain, either because there has been a lack of agreement on
essential terms, a poorly drafted provision refers to arbitration as optional, or the provision contains internally contradictory arbitration agreements (referring for instance, to
both arbitration or the jurisdiction of state courts).
In Graal Participações Ltda. (“Graal”) v. Kieppe Participações e Administração Ltda. (“Kieppe”) (“Graal v. Kieppe”)1, the
Doutrina 23
Brazil’s Superior Tribunal de
Justiça (“STJ”) specifically addressed the issue of consent
in a poorly drafted arbitration
agreement. The arbitration
clause in dispute provided
for “arbitration or mediation”,
did not sufficiently specify
important aspects of the arbitration, including the number of arbitrators and procedure for their appointment,
and referred both to arbitration and to the state courts.
Although the STJ’s decision
is not entirely clear with regards to the scope of the arbitration agreement vis-à-vis
the jurisdiction of the state
courts, the STJ ultimately
found that there was a valid agreement to arbitrate. At
least in this respect, the STJ’s
decision appears to follow the
general tendency of courts in
arbitration friendly jurisdictions to uphold putative arbitration agreements.
The purpose of this article is to analyse the issue of
consent in optional, blank or
combined arbitration clauses in the United Kingdom
and France, and determine
er party by ‘arbitration’ and
the right to demand that
such disputes be resolved
in this fashion. These rights
and duties can be contained
in nothing more than the
word ‘arbitration,’ included
in a contract, letter, or email,
by which the parties commit to resolve disputes relating to their transaction by
‘arbitration.’”3
Although the agreement
to arbitrate can be contained
solely in the word “arbitration”,
it is advisable for the parties to
ensure the arbitration agreement has no ambiguities or
gaps, which can create scope
for jurisdictional disputes and
procedural mischief, thereby limiting the ability of a party to enforce its rights under
the contract.4 The arbitration
agreement in Graal v. Kippe
II. Optional, blank and
for instance, contained severcombined arbitration
al ambiguities and apparent inconsistencies which required
clauses
Commentators largely agree the STJ to determine wheththat “[t]he essential core of er or not the parties had conan arbitration agreement sented to submitting their dis… consists of nothing more putes to arbitration.
Specifically, the arbitration
than an obligation to resolve
certain disputes with anoth- agreement in Graal v. Kippe
1 Graal Participações Ltda. v. Kieppe Participações
e Administração Ltda., STJ, REsp No. 1331100, 17
December 2015.
Goldman on International Commercial Arbitration
(Kluwer Law International, 1999), pp. 46-7. For the
relevance of Graal v. Kippe in the interpretation
of international arbitration agreements, see
International Council for Commercial Arbitration,
ICCA’s Guide To The Interpretation Of The 1958
New York Convention: A Handbook For Judges,
2011, pp. 53-56.
2 Although Graal v. Kieppe is a domestic
(not international or foreign) arbitration, the
interpretation of the STJ is likely to be relevant
and have some effect on the interpretation of
international arbitration agreements in Brazil.
For the connecting factors that may characterize
an arbitration as “international”, see Emmanuel
Gaillard & John Savage (eds.), Fouchard Gaillard
whether the STJ has followed
the approach adopted by
these jurisdictions in Graal v.
Kieppe.2 Section II describes
the essential elements of an
arbitration agreement and
defines optional, blank and
combined arbitration clauses. Section III discusses English and French jurisprudence on the issue of consent
in such arbitration clauses.
Section IV describes the approach adopted by the STJ
in Graal v. Kieppe. Section
V considers whether or not
Graal v. Kieppe followed the
general trend adopted by the
English and French courts,
and also what questions regarding consent in arbitration agreements remain unsettled or unclear.
3 Gary B. Born, International Commercial
Arbitration (Second Edition, Kluwer International
Law, 2014), p. 763.
4 At the very minimum, parties are advised to
ensure that the arbitration agreement is not
drafted as optional, and to include important
terms in the arbitration agreement, including the
scope of the agreement to arbitrate, the seat of
the arbitration, the procedural rules applicable to
the arbitration, the law applicable to the merits
of the dispute, and the arbitrator or arbitrators
to be appointed or the procedure for appointing
such arbitrator(s). Merely inserting a clause
from another contract may lead to undesirable
consequences, as occurred in Graal v. Kieppe.
24 Doutrina
presented the following issues: (i) it provided for “arbitration or mediation”; (ii) it did
not contain important terms
of the arbitration including the seat, the procedural rules, the law applicable to
the merits of the dispute, and
the arbitrator(s) or the procedure to appoint arbitrator(s);
and (iii) it referred both to
arbitration and to the state
courts. These issues are explained in detail below.
An optional or non-mandatory arbitration clause is a
provision that “appear[s] only
to consider arbitration as an
alternative or optional means
of dispute resolution if future
disputes arise, but not to require mandatory submission
of such disputes to arbitration.”5 These clauses would
appear to leave both parties
free to decide when disputes
arise whether or not they wish
to arbitrate, often giving rise
to procedural confusion. Nevertheless, the general tendency of national courts and arbitral tribunals is to treat these
provisions as mandatory in
commercial settings.6
A blank arbitration clause
“provid[es] for arbitration,
without specifying the arbi-
tral seat or means for selecting the seat or arbitral tribunal.”7 Most courts and arbitral
tribunals reject claims that an
arbitration agreement is invalid because it fails to specify terms such as scope, seat,
procedural rules, or number of arbitrators.8 However, some national arbitration legislation and national
courts, at least in domestic
settings, have rendered arbitration clauses invalid when
they lacked sufficient detail with regards to the dispute resolution process. Until recently, this was the case
in France, as discussed in in
Section III.B below.
A combined clause is found
when the “parties combine in
a single clause the submission of their disputes to arbitration and the designation of
a state court.”9 Other authors
refer to these clauses as “internally contradictory.”10 As
with blank arbitration clauses, arbitral tribunals and national courts generally seek
to enforce these provisions,
either by deleting unnecessary language that renders
the arbitration agreement invalid or ineffective, or by reconciling apparently inconsis-
tent terms.11 However, where
a clause provides for two
means of resolving disputes,
several national courts have
considered whether the parties wished to resolve their
disputes by arbitration.
5
Gary B. Born, International Commercial
Law, 2014), p. 788.
Law, 2014), pp. 765-767.
10 See Gary B. Born, International Commercial
Law, 2014), p. 782.
6 Gary B. Born, International Commercial
Law, 2014), p. 788.
7
Law, 2014), p. 764.
9 Emmanuel Gaillard and John Savage (eds),
Fouchard Gaillard Goldman on International
Commercial
Arbitration
(Kluwer
Law
International, 1999), para. 487.
III. Optional, blank and
combined clauses in the
united kingdom and france
A. United Kingdom
English courts will generally
seek to give effect to optional, blank or combined clauses,
unless there is clear language
in the arbitration agreement
excluding certain matters
from arbitration.
1. Optional or Non-Mandatory
Arbitration
As mentioned above, English
courts generally seek to enforce optional or non-mandatory arbitration agreements,
even when the arbitration
clause is unclear and there
are doubts as to whether it
is binding on the parties or
provides only an option to
resort to arbitration.
For instance, in Lobb Partnership Ltd v. Aintree Racecourse Co Ltd12, Colman J was
Law, 2014), p. 782.
12 Lobb Partnership Ltd v. Aintree Racecourse Co
Ltd [2000] C.L.C. 431 (22 November 1999).
Doutrina 25
faced with a clause providing
that “disputes may be dealt
with as provided in paragraph
1.8 of the RIBA Condition [i.e.,
arbitration13] but shall otherwise be referred to English Courts” (emphasis added). The claimant alleged,
inter alia, that the clause was
“ambiguous and void for uncertainty”, and that the only
effective part of the clause
referred the parties to the
Englishcourts.14 The claimant argued, in the alternative,
that the dispute could not be
referred to arbitration without the agreement of both
parties. Colman J rejected the
claimant’s submissions, holding that there was a valid arbitration agreement.15 Colman J held that “the mutually
intended meaning of ‘may be
dealt with’ was that either
party could insist on arbitration if he chose to do so, rather than that disputes might be
arbitrated only if both parties
agreed upon that course.”16
Colman J further explained
that:
“The English courts
have consistently taken the view that, provided that the contract gives
a reasonably clear indication that arbitration is envisaged by both parties as
a means of dispute resolution, they will treat both
parties as bound to refer disputes to arbitration
even though the clause is
not expressed in mandatory terms.”17
A similar approach was
taken by the High Court in
Sulamérica Cia. Nacional de
Seguros S.A. and Others v. Enesa Engenharia A.A. – Enesa
and Others18, where the High
Court considered, amongst
others, the validity of an arbitration agreement contained
in an insurance policy (the
“Policy”) that also provided
for other dispute resolution
methods (incliuding the Brazilian courts).
The Policy provided that
“any disputes arising under,
out of or in connection with
this Policy shall be subject to
the exclusive jurisdiction of
the courts of Brazil.” It also
stated that “[i]f any dispute
or difference of whatsoever nature arises out of or in
connection with this Policy
… the parties undertake that,
prior to a reference to arbitration, they will seek to have
the Dispute resolved amicably by mediation” and, if the
mediation failed, “then either
party may refer to arbitration” (emphasis added). Finally, the Policy provided that
“[i]n case the Insured and the
Insurer(s) shall fail to agree as
to the amount to be paid under this Policy through mediation as above, such dispute
shall then be referred to arbitration under ARIAS Arbitration Rules.”
The Court held that the
contract did “not give rise to
a binding obligation to mediate and the court would not
be able to determine whether
or not a party had complied
with the “obligations” allegedly imposed”19 and that “all
disputes or differences can
13 Paragraph 1.8.1 of the RIBA provided as
follows: “In England and Wales, and subject
to the provisions of conditions 1.8.2 and 1.8.3
in Northern Ireland, any difference or dispute
arising out of the Appointment shall be referred
by either of the parties to arbitration by a person
to be agreed between the parties or, failing
agreement within fourteen days after either party
has given the other a written request to concur in
the appointment of an arbitrator, a person to be
nominated at the request of either party by the
President of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators
provided that in a difference or dispute arising
out of the conditions relating to copyright the
arbitrator shall, unless otherwise agreed, be an
architect.”
Ltd [2000] C.L.C. 431 (22 November 1999), at p. 2.
Ltd [2000] C.L.C. 431 (22 November 1999), at p. 4
(emphasis added).
of the Court of Appeal’s judgment (mentioned in
section III.A.3 below) because the latter refused
permission for the insured to appeal “against
what they said was a decision by the judge that the
arbitration agreement in this case is mandatory,
rather than merely permissive” – i.e., the Court
of Appeal did not consider the issue of optional
(or non-mandatory) arbitration (see paras. 45-47
of the Court of Appeal’s judgment, Sulamérica
Cia. Nacional de Seguros S.A. and Others v. Enesa
Engenharia A.A. – Enesa and Others [2012] EWCA
42 (Comm) (16 May 2012)).
18 Sulamérica Cia. Nacional de Seguros S.A. and
Others v. Enesa Engenharia A.A. – Enesa and
Others [2012] EWHC 42 (Comm) (19 January 2012).
Here we refer to the High Court’s judgment in lieu
Others [2012] EWHC 42 (Comm) (19 January 2012),
at para. 27.
26 Doutrina
be and must be referred to
arbitration,”20 notwithstanding use of the word “may” in
Clause 11 of the Policy. The
English court therefore once
again held arbtiration to be
mandatory.21
The issue of reconciling of
the arbitration clause with
the exclusive jurisdiction of
Brazilian courts is adressed
in Section III.A.3 below.
2.
Blank
Arbitration
Agreements
As with optional arbitration
agreements, English courts
usually seek to give effect to
the parties’ agreement to arbitrate in the form of blank
clauses. To that end, courts
typically appoint arbitrator(s)
or designate an appointing
authority at the request of
the interested party, pursuant to Sections 18(2) to 18(4)
of the English Arbitration Act
at para. 48.
at para. 46.
22 EAA: “18 Failure of appointment procedure.
(…) (2) If or to the extent that there is no such
agreement any party to the arbitration agreement
may (upon notice to the other parties) apply to the
court to exercise its powers under this section.
(3) Those powers are— (a) to give directions as to
the making of any necessary appointments; (b)
to direct that the tribunal shall be constituted by
such appointments (or any one or more of them)
as have been made; (c) to revoke any appointments
already made; (d) to make any necessary
appointments itself. (4) An appointment made by
the court under this section has effect as if made
with the agreement of the parties.…” However, it
1996 (the “EAA”).22 However,
they will do so only once they
are persuaded the parties did
in fact intend to submit their
disputes to arbitration.23
For instance, in Noble Denton Middle East and Another
v. Noble Denton International
Limited24, given the absence
of the parties’ agreement with
respect to the appointment
of the arbitrators, the High
Court appointed the arbitrator pursuant to Section 18
of the EAA. In summary, the
High Court determined that
Section 18 of the EAA could
be categorized as a gateway,
and found that the test under Section 18 only required
the court to ascertain whether there was a “good arguable
case for an arbitration agreement.” Given that the court
was ultimately satisfied that
there was an arguable case
that “there exists an arbitra-
tion agreement”, it provided that this was “enough … to
operate section 18”, and appointed a sole arbitrator to
make any other decision concerning the dispute.
Similarly, in Chalbury Mccouat International Limited v.
P.G. Foils Limited25, the High
Court considered an application under Section 18 of the
EAA after the parties had disagreed on the constitution of
the arbitral tribunal. The defendant, an Indian company,
decided to acquire a manufacturing plant in the Netherlands, and entered into an
agreement with the claimant, an English company, by
which the claimant agreed to
dismantle the plant for a certain price (the “Contract”).26
A dispute arose with regards
to the payment owed for the
dismantling of the plant. Pursuant to the Contract, any dis-
is worth noting that Section 18 of the EAA is not
mandatory and the courts have discretion on
whether or not to intervene. See Robert Merkin &
Louis Flannery, Arbitration Act 1996 (Fifth edition,
Informa Law, 2014), p. 76.
Ltd and Others [2001] EWCA Civ 34). On the
other hand, the England and Wales High Court
considered that “there is not a binding agreement
to arbitrate but merely an agreement to attempt
to resolve the matter by a process of arbitration”
in a case where the contract provided that “the
parties will endeavor to first resolve the matter
through Swiss arbitration. Should a resolution not
be forthcoming the court of England shall have no
exclusive jurisdicttion” (Kruppa v Benedetti [2014]
EWHC 1887 (Comm)).
23 The England and Wales Court of Appeals has
once stated that “there is no need for a clause
which deals with reference of disputes to say in
terms that the disputes are to be referred to an
‘arbitrator’ or to ‘arbitration’”, considering that
“the important thing is that there should be an
agreement to refer disputes to a person other
than the court who is to resolve the dispute in a
manner binding on the parties to the agreement.”
On this basis, the court was satisfied that there
was an agreement to arbitrate under an insurance
policy providing that “any dispute or difference
arising hereunder between the Assured and the
Insurers shall be referred to a Queen’s Counsel
of the English Bar to be mutually agreed between
the Insurers and the Assured or in the event of
disagreement by the Chairman of the Bar Council”
(David Wilson Homes Ltd v Survey Services
24 Noble Denton Middle East and Another v. Noble
Denton International Limited [2010] EWHC 2574
(Comm) (7 May 2010).
25 Chalbury Mccouat International Limited v. P.G.
Foils Limited [2010] EWHC 2050 (TCC) (3 August
2010).
2010), at paras. 3 and 4.
Doutrina 27
pute between the parties was
to be “referred to arbitration
as per prevailing laws of European Union in the Europe.”27
The claimant invoked this arbitration clause and sought
the defendant’s consent to
the appointment of the arbitral tribunal. The defendant,
however, denied such consent and argued that the dispute should be referred to
“the Arbitral Tribunal in India”, given that the contract
had been signed and executed in India.
Although noting that the
wording of the arbitration
clause “leaves much to be desired”, the High Court found
that “there was an intention
that, if disputes between the
parties to the contract could
not be resolved after discussion, those disputes should
be referred to arbitration”.
Accordingly, Ramsey J emphasised that “the court
should strive to give effect
to that intention and should
2010), at para. 2.
2010), at para. 18.
2010), at para. 35(4).
30 The presumption of one-stop adjudication
can be explained as follows: “it is to be presumed
that rational businessmen who are parties to a
contract intend all questions arising out of their
legal relationship to be determined in the same
forum; and that the presumption is a strong
seek to support the arbitral
process.”28 The High Court
granted the claimant’s application and designated the
President (or, in his absence,
the Vice-President) of the
London Court of International Arbitration to appoint the
arbitrator(s).29
3. Combined Clauses
Although English courts are
less consistent when it comes
to interpreting and enforcing
combined clauses, they also
generally seek to give effect
to the arbitration agreement
relying in most instances on
the presumption of one-stop
adjudication.30 However, they
do not apply this presumption when there is clear language excluding certain matters from the arbitration
agreement.31
In Fiona Trust32, English
courts were required to decide on an application under
Section 9 of the EAA,33 made
by charterers in order to stay
one, and requires clear words to the contrary
if it is to be displaced”, Monde Petroleum SA v.
Westernzagros Ltd [2015] EWHC 67 (Comm) (22
January 2015), para. 33. The presumption of onestop adjudication was described by the High Court
in this case as “the leading modern authority on
the construction of dispute resolution clauses.”
31 See, e.g., Sulamérica Cia. Nacional de Seguros
S.A. and Others v. Enesa Engenharia A.A. – Enesa
and Others [2012] EWCA Civ 638 (16 May 2012),
at para. 35 (“Although clauses providing for
mediation and other forms of dispute resolution
procedure are becoming increasingly common,
I do not think it helpful to go beyond that in
attempting to define the minimum ingredients
necessary to enable such provisions to be given
legal effect. Each case must be considered on its
proceedings involving eight
charter parties initiated before the courts by the owners. The charterers purported to appoint an arbitrator
under the charters. The owners sought declaration that
the charter parties had been
validly rescinded as procured through bribes from a
senior official of the group
of companies affiliated with
the owners. The charterers
in turn sought a stay of the
owners’ s. 72 claim under s.9
of the Act. Two appeals followed.
Specifically, the arbitration clauses provided that
“any dispute arising under
this charter shall be decided by the English Courts to
whose jurisdiction the parties hereby agree”, but also
that “either party may, by
giving written notice of election to the other party, elect
to have any such dispute referred … to arbitration in
London” (emphasis added).
own terms.”).
32 In the House of Lords, Premium Nafta Products
Ltd (20th Defendant) & Ors v. Fili Shipping
Company Ltd & Ors [2007] UKHL 40 (17 October
2007). In the Court of Appeals, Fiona Trust and
Others v Yuti Privalov and Others [2007] EWCA
Civ 20 (24 January 2007).
33 EAA: “9. Stay of legal proceedings. (1) A party
to an arbitration agreement against whom legal
proceedings are brought (whether by way of
claim or counterclaim) in respect of a matter
which under the agreement is to be referred to
arbitration may (upon notice to the other parties
to the proceedings) apply to the court in which
the proceedings have been brought to stay the
proceedings so far as they concern that matter.”
28 Doutrina
The owners argued that the
arbitration clause did not apply because, inter alia, their
claim involved the validity
of the contract and was not,
therefore, a dispute “arising
under” the charter.
When considering whether
the dispute should be heard
by the English courts or referred to arbitration, Lord
Hoffman stated that:
“… the construction
of an arbitration clause
should start from the assumption that the parties,
as rational businessmen,
are likely to have intended any dispute arising
out of the relationship
into which they have entered or purported to enter to be decided by the
same tribunal. The clause
should be construed in
accordance with this presumption unless the language makes it clear that
certain questions were intended to be excluded from
the arbitrator’s jurisdiction.”34
It was on this basis that the
House of Lords found the dispute was within the scope of
the arbitration clauses and,
as a consequence, granted
the stay.
The presumption of onestop adjudication was also
considered by the Court of
Appeal in Sulamérica Cia. Nacional de Seguros S.A. and Others v. Enesa Engenharia A.A. –
Enesa and Others (mentioned
above).35 As explained in more
detail at Section III.A.1 above,
one clause of the Policy set
forth that disputes were “subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of Brazil”,
while another clause provided
that disputes should be “referred to arbitration.”36
Based on the wording of the
provisions that referred to arbitration, the insured submitted that “the current dispute
between the parties, which
concerns the insurers’ liability
to indemnify them under the
policy, falls outside the scope of
the agreement, which is limited
to disputes about the amount
to be paid in respect of any individual loss” (emphasis added). The Court of Appeal rejected this argument and
found that the parties could
“refer to arbitration any dispute arising out or in connection with the policy”, taking
into account, inter alia that,
“[i]t would be unusual for parties to a contract of this kind
to establish separate and dis-
tinct procedures for resolving
what in many cases are likely
to be different aspects of the
same dispute, and there is no
indication that they had that in
mind” (emphasis added) – i.e.,
relying on one-stop adjudication presumption.
To reconcile this with the
exclusive jurisdiction clause,
the Court of Appeal agreed
with and upheld the lower
court’s conclusion that there
was “very little left” to such
clause, which should be limited
to enable the parties “to found
[sic] jurisdiction in a court in
Brazil to declare the arbitrable
nature of the dispute, to compel arbitration, to declare the
validity of the award, to enforce the award, or to confirm
the jurisdiction of the Brazilian courts on the merits in the
event that the parties agree to
dispense with arbitration.”37
However, the presumption of one-stop adjudication
is not absolute. The particular wording of the contractual
provisions and other material circumstances of a specific case may displace the presumption. For instance, in
Secretary of State for Transport (the “Secretary”) v. Stagecoach South Western Trains
Ltd (“Stagecoach”)38, the High
34 Premium Nafta Products Ltd (20th Defendant)
& Ors v. Fili Shipping Company Ltd & Ors [2007]
UKHL 40 (17 October 2007), at paras. 7 and 13.
36
Sulamérica Cia. Nacional de Seguros S.A.
and Others v. Enesa Engenharia A.A. – Enesa and
Others [2012] EWCA 42 (Comm) (16 May 2012), at
para. 5.
at para. 49; and [2012] EWCA 42 (Comm) (16 May
2012), at para. 44.
Others [2012] EWCA 42 (Comm) (16 May 2012).
38 Secretary of State for Transport v. Stagecoach
South Western Trains Ltd [2009] EWHC 2431
(Comm) (09 October 2009).
Doutrina 29
Court considered whether a
dispute was within scope of
an arbitration agreement (i.e.,
within the substantive jurisdiction of an arbitral tribunal, under Section 72(1)(a) of
EAA),39 and after considering
the specific wording of applicable clauses (in particular the arbitration agreement)
and the subject-matter of
the dispute, decided that the
one-stop adjudication presumption did not apply.
The parties had entered
into a franchise agreement
(the “Agreement”), which
provided at paragraph 13 of
Schedule 19 that: “parties
irrevocably agree that the
Court of England and Wales
are to have exclusive jurisdiction to settle any disputes which may arise out
of or in connection with the
Franchise Agreement, except as expressly set out in
the Franchise Agreement.”40
However, paragraph 4.2 of
the same Schedule, provided that where either party
was entitled to seek the resolution of a dispute according to the “Dispute Resolution Rules”41, “such dispute
shall, unless the parties otherwise agree … be resolved
or determined by arbitration
pursuant to the Dispute Resolution Rules.”42 In addition
and relatedly, Schedule 8.1 of
the Agreement provided that
“if either party disputes the
amount of a Franchise Payment, the dispute shall be resolved in accordance with the
Dispute Resolution Rules…”43,
i.e., by arbitration.
Stagecoach initiated arbitration to seek determination
of two substantive issues that
had arisen out of the Agreement, namely the “Car Parking Dispute” (the “CPD”) and
the “Revenue Support Dispute” (the “RSD”), arguing
that both the CPD and the
RSD should be resolved by
arbitration.
In response, and although
conceding that the arbitrator
had jurisdiction to decide the
CPD, the Secretary submitted that the RSD fell outside
the scope of the arbitration
clause. In essence, the RSD
concerned certain factors for
the future calculation of revenue support adjustments (if
any), which should be paid by
the Secretary if there was a
shortfall of revenue to Stagecoach as against the target
revenue. The Secretary asserted that the RSD involved
“an issue of construction
which may, or may not, have
an impact on the amount of
the Franchise Payment ….”44
The Secretary further submitted that the presumption of one-stop adjudication should not apply to the
Agreement, as it was clear
therefrom that the parties
did not intend a one-stop adjudication before an arbitrator; rather, “some disputes
would be litigated and some
arbitrated. There was accordingly no such presumption in this case; the starting
point was an agreement as to
the primacy of court jurisdiction, save where a ‘carve-out’
for arbitration.”45
When discussing whether the RSD should be resolved by arbitration, the
court agreed with the latter
submission and affirmed that
“the ‘one stop shop’ principle of adjudication, contained
in Fiona Trust (supra), is inapplicable here.”46 However,
39 EAA: “72 (1) A person alleged to be a party to
arbitral proceedings but who takes no part in the
proceedings may question … (c) what matters
have been submitted to arbitration in accordance
with the arbitration agreement, by proceedings in
the court for a declaration or injunction or other
appropriate relief.”
41 Referring to the Railway Industry Dispute
Resolution Rules.
(Comm) (09 October 2009), at para. 20.
42
Secretary of State for Transport v.
Stagecoach South Western Trains Ltd [2009]
EWHC 2431 (Comm) (09 October 2009),
at para. 15.
(Comm) (09 October 2009), at para. 29(i).
30 Doutrina
the court rejected the Secretary of State’ argument that
the wording “…disputes the
amount” under Paragraph 4.2
of the Schedule 19 should be
read to limit its application to
disputes as to the “amount”
and exclude disputes concerning the construction of
the Agreement. In view of this,
the High Court ruled that the
RSD was subject to the arbitration clause and denied the
Secretary’s application.
B.
France
French courts usually also
seek to give effect to blank
and combined arbitration
clauses, but not to optional or non-mandatory arbitration agreements.
1. Optional or Non-Mandatory
Arbitration
French courts appear to consider optional arbitration
agreements as non-mandatory rather than binding.
For instance, in MReal Alizay
(“MRA”) v. Thermodyn47 , the
47 MReal Alizay v. Thermodyn, Cass Civ 1, 12 June
2013, [2013] I Bull Civ, 121.
48 By means of the Decree No. 2011-48, 13 January
2011.
49 All of the provision of the FCCP-BA referred
to in this article (in English) have been taken from
the ‘Code of Civil Procedure, Book IV, Arbitration
[ARCHIVED]’ in Jan Paulsson and Lise Bosman
(eds), ICCA International Handbook on Commercial
Arbitration, Kluwer Law International, 1984,
Supplement No. 58, March 2010, pp. 1-12.
50 French courts established that Article 1443 did
not apply to international arbitrations, and the
French international arbitration law did not have
an equivalent requirement. See Limak Insaat San
Supreme Court upheld the
validity and enforceability of
agreement contractual clause
that gave the parties the option to resolve their dispute
by either arbitration or by
the domestic courts. However, the Supreme Court considered that the reference to
an arbitral institution was not
sufficient either to determine
that the parties were required
to submit their disputes to
arbitration or to prevent domestic courts from asserting
jurisdiction.
2.Blank
Arbitration
Agreements
Before the amendment to the
law on arbitration that took
place in 2011 (the “2011 Reform”)48, Article 1443 of the
French Code of Civil Procedure
(the “FCCP”), provided that, to
be valid, an arbitration clause
should “appoint the arbitrator
or arbitrators, or provide for
the method for their appointment.”49 As a result, blank arbitration clauses in domes-
Vetic v. Weatherford Kopp GmbH, CA Paris 1e ch.
(section C), 23 October 2008, where, according
to commentary, the court noted that “while such
[blank] clauses are void under French domestic
arbitration law, they are not void under French
international arbitration law” (see Jennifer Kirby
and Denis Bensaude, ‘A view from Paris’, in MALEY’s
International Report, vol. 24, #2, February 2009, p.
4, http://bensaude-paris.com/app/download/57
79407906/090224ViewfromParis.pdf, accessed 08
March 2016. See also Consorts Legrand v. European
Country Hotels Ltd., CA Paris, 14 November 1991, Rev.
Arb. 545 (1994), and other French Courts’ decisions
referred to in Emmanuel Gaillard & John Savage
(eds.), Fouchard Gaillard Goldman on International
Commercial Arbitration (Kluwer Law International,
1999), p. 267, at footnote n. 125. See also Jean-Louis
Delvolvé, Gerald H. Pointon & Jean Rouche, French
tic arbitrations in France were
considered as invalid.50
French international arbitration law, however, did
not contain an equivalent requirement. Therefore, French
courts did deem valid international arbitration agreements
provided under blank clauses. In the absence of proper
mechanisms for the appointment of arbitrators in international arbitration, issues
relating to the constitution
of the tribunal would in practice be resolved by the President of the Paris Tribunal de
grande instance, pursuant to
Article 1493 of the FCCP.51
The 2011 Reform modified the legal regime of blank
clauses in domestic arbitration and virtually maintained
the same regime of blank
clauses in international arbitration. The current French
Code of Civil Procedure (the
“2011 FCCP”), still requires the
parties to “designate including by reference to arbitration rules, the arbitrator or
Arbitration Law and Practice (Second edition,
WoltersKluwer, 2009), p. 66, at para. 120.
51 See Emmanuel Gaillard & John Savage (eds.),
1999), p. 267. Article 1493 of the FCCP provides
that “[a]n arbitration agreement may, directly
or by reference to arbitration rules, appoint
the arbitrator or arbitrators or provide for the
method of their appointment. If in an arbitration
taking place in France or subjected by the parties
to French procedural law difficulties arise in the
constitution of the arbitral tribunal, the interested
party may bring the matter before the President
of the Tribunal de Grande Instance of Paris as
provided in Art. 1457, unless the parties agree
otherwise.”
Doutrina 31
arbitrators, or provide for a
procedure for their appointment.”52 However, it also provides that if the parties fail to
agree on aspects of the formation of the tribunal, especially
the appointment of the arbitrators, this will be resolved by
the judge acting in support of
the arbitration (juge d’appui).53
This procedure applies both
to domestic and international
arbitrations by way of Article
1506 of the 2011 FCCP.54
In view of the current legal
framework, blank clauses are
likely to be given effect under
French law in both domestic
and international arbitrations.55
3.
Combined
Agreements
Arbitration
52 Article 1444 of the 2011 FCCP.
53 Article 1452 of the 2011 FCCP provides that “[i]f
the parties have not agreed on the procedure for
appointing the arbitrator(s): (1) Where there is to
be a sole arbitrator and if the parties fail to agree
on the arbitrator, he or she shall be appointed
by the person responsible for administering the
arbitration or, where there is no such person, by
the judge acting in support of the arbitration (…)”;
and Article 1454 of the 2011 FCCP provides that
“[a]ny other dispute relating to the constitution
of an arbitral tribunal shall be resolved, if the
parties cannot agree, by the person responsible
for administering the arbitration or, where there
is no such person, by the judge acting in support
of the arbitration.”
54 2011 FCCP: “Article 1506. Unless the parties have
agreed otherwise, and subject to the provisions of
the present Title, the following Articles shall apply
to international arbitration: …(2) 1452 through
1458 and 1460 regarding the constitution of the
arbitral tribunal and the procedure governing
application to the judge acting in support of the
arbitration.”
55 See Jean-Pierre Harb and Christophe Lobier,
‘France: New Arbitration Law In France: The
Decree Of January 13, 2011’, in Mondaq, accessed
French courts are also likely to give effect to agreements
to arbitrate contained in combined clauses, holding that arbitration should prevail where
one or more contractual provisions refer to both arbitral
and court proceedings.56
French courts usually rely
on the principle of effectiveness (or effective interpretation), pursuant to which the
decision-maker should adopt
an interpretation that gives
meaning and effect to all the
terms in a contract rather
than interpreting it in a way
that prevent part of the contract from having any effect.
This principle is adopted not
only in French law57, but also
in the international context.58
An illustrative case is Distribution Chardonnet v. Fiat Auto
France.59 This case involved
contracts with one clause establishing the jurisdiction of
“the Paris courts” “in the event
of a dispute”, and other clause
conferring “jurisdiction on arbitrators in the event of a dispute concerning the interpretation of the contract.” The
Court of Appeals upheld the
agreement to arbitrate in the
second clause, holding that the
clause referring to the Paris
courts “can only be interpreted as an attribution of territorial jurisdiction, subordinate to
the arbitration agreement, to
cover the eventuality that the
arbitral tribunal is unable to
rule.”60
08 March 2016 (“…a significant improvement and
novelty in domestic arbitration introduced by
the Decree is the validity of ‘blank clauses’’, i.e.
arbitration agreements that do not provide for the
designation of the arbitrators or for the modalities
of their appointment (new Article 1444). Such
a clause would have been invalid for domestic
arbitration though acceptable for international
arbitration under the decree of 1981”).
clause can be interpreted in two different ways,
the interpretation enabling the clause to be
effective should be adopted in preference to that
which prevents the clause from being effective”
(translation into English in Emmanuel Gaillard
& John Savage (eds.), Fouchard Gaillard Goldman
on International Commercial Arbitration (Kluwer
Law International, 1999), p. 258).
56 See Emmanuel Gaillard & John Savage (eds.),
Commercial
Arbitration
(Kluwer
Law
International, 1999), p. 270 (“…when faced with an
appparent contradiction between an arbitration
clause and a clause providing for the jurisdiction
of courts, the French courts have systematically
attempted to ensure that the former prevails
over the latter” - emphasis added). See also
Jean-Louis Delvolvé, Gerald H. Pointon & Jean
Rouche, French Arbitration Law and Practice
(Second edition, WoltersKluwer, 2009), p. 68
(“Where clauses provided incongruously for
both arbitration and litigation in national courts,
in several cases the courts have held in favour of
resolution of the relevant disputes by arbitration,
that being the intention of the parties in a true
interpretation of the clause”).
57
French Civil Code, Article 1157: “Where a
58 See, e.g., Unidroit principles of international
commercial contracts 2010: “Article 4.5 (All terms
to be given effect) Contract terms shall be
interpreated so as to give effect to all the terms
rather than to deprive some of them of effect.” One
leading commentary described the approach of
the French courts – and of other jurisdictions – as
a “tendency to salvage the arbitration agreement”,
Emmanuel Gaillard & John Savage (eds.), Fouchard
Gaillard Goldman on International Commercial
Arbitration (Kluwer Law International, 1999), p.
271.
59 Distribution Chardonnet v. Fiat Auto France,
CA Paris, 29 November 1991, Rev. Arb. 617 (1993).
60 Emmanuel Gaillard & John Savage (eds.),
1999), p. 271.
32 Doutrina
In
2011,
the
French
courts’ tendency of upholding agreements to arbitrate
in the context of combined
clauses was further reaffirmed by the Court of Appeal in Répub. Guinée Equatoriale v. Société Fitzpatrick
Equatorial Guinea Ltd (the
“Fitzpatrick” case).61
Here the court considered
the validity of an arbitration
clause providing that “in the
event of a dispute”, the parties “shall refer to the courts
of equatorial Guinea or, in
the last instance, the dispute
shall be resolved in accordance with the arbitral proceedings of the International Chamber of Commerce.”62
Taking into account the intention of the parties in light
of the principle of good faith,
and also the principle of effectiveness, the court found
that the parties’ intention to
refer their disputes to an efficient arbitration mechanism
should be presumed, and
hence ruled that the arbitration agreement was valid.63
61 Répub. Guinée Equatoriale v. Société Fitzpatrick
Equatorial Guinea Ltd, Paris, 7 April 2011, Rev. Arb.
747 (2011).
62
Translation by Ileana M. Smeureanu,
Relationship Between Courts and Arbitral
Tribunals (France), in the context of the SemiAnnual Meeting of the International Section of
the New York Bar, 22-26 October 2013 (Hanoi,
Vietnam), p. 7.
63 The description of Fitzpatrick herein combine
3information in English with respect to it
available in Ileana M. Smeureanu, Relationship
Between Courts and Arbitral Tribunals (France),
in the context of the Semi-Annual Meeting of
Finally, it should be noted that challenges to agreements to arbitrate, and hence
to arbitral tribunal’s jurisdiction shall be initially resolved
by the arbitrators in France
– in general, there will be no
interlocutory judicial decisions on this matter.64
IV. Graal v. Kieppe: the
STJ’s approach
Graal v. Kieppe involves a dispute relating to rights over
shares in ODBINV S.A., one of
the holding companies of the
construction-driven
business of the Odebrecht family. These rights are governed
by a Shareholders Agreement
(the “SHA”), of which both
Graal and Kieppe, along with
other Brazilian companies
and individuals, were parties.
Pursuant to Section 11 of the
SHA: “doubts and disagreements arising out of” the SHA
“shall be resolved by mediation
or arbitration, in the terms
of the law; except for what is
provided under Section 8” (the
“Arbitration Clause”). Section
the International Section of the New York Bar,
22-26 October 2013 (Hanoi, Vietnam), p. 7, and
in Yves Derains and Laurence Kiffer, ‘National
Report for France (2013)’ in Jan Paulsson & Lise
Bosman (eds.), ICCA International Handbook
on Commercial Arbitration, Kluwer Law
International, Supplement No. 74, May 2013, pp.
1-98, at footnote n. 30.
64
Law, 2014), pp. 776-777 (“Challenges to arbitration
agreements based upon their alleged indefiniteness,
ambiguity, or internal inconsistency do not
ordinarily implicate the separability doctrine. Rather,
they are directed specifically at the agreement to
8, in turn, provides that “in the
event of breach of the obligations undertaken under the
SHA,” the parties “will be able
to … sue for specific performance, applicable to affirmative and negative covenants,
pursuant to the Corporations
Law and the Code of Civil Procedure”65. Section 8 also allows
the parties to “seek judicial relief … to supply the consent of
the party that refuses to comply with any of the obligations
undertaken under” the SHA.66
Graal initiated court proceedings in Salvador, Brazil67,
asserting that the parties had
agreed to resolve the dispute
by arbitration. Graal’s application was based on Article 7 of the Brazilian Arbitration Law (Law No. 9307/1996,
“BAL”), which requires the
parties to attend a hearing
and sign a submission agreement filling in any missing
gaps (such as the seat and
arbitrator(s) or method for
selection the arbitrator(s)).
Article 7 of the BAL is aimed
at giving effect to the agree-
arbitrate itself. In jurisdictions such as France and
India, where jurisdictional objections are generally
for initial decision by the arbitrators, these types of
issues are not the subject of interlocutory judicial
resolution.”).
65 It should be noted that, unlike France the law
on arbitration in Brazil is mostly governed by the
Brazilian Arbitration Law rather than the Code of
Civil Procedure.
66 The Arbitration Clause and Section 8 are
drafted in the SHA in Portuguese language only.
They have been translated by the authors.
ment to arbitrate, and is comparable to Section 18 of the
EAA (England)68 and Articles
1451 to 1454 of the 2011 FCCP
(France).69
The first instance court
of Salvador decided “ex parte” that the SHA “leaves no
room for doubt” that the parties intended to submit their
disputes to arbitration70, and
ordered Kieppe to be summoned for a hearing where
the parties would be required
to sign a submission agreement to fill in the incomplete
provisions of the arbitration agreement, as described
above.
Kieppe in turn, appealed
this decision, arguing that
Section 8 of the SHA applied
and referred the parties to
the Brazilian courts to resolve any issues arising from
the SHA.
The Court of Appeals partially upheld Kieppe’s interlocutory appeal holding that
“by scheduling a hearing for
the signing of a submission
agreement” the court of Salvador had “overrruled the
parties agreement”, particularly given that the parties
had included a reference to
“mediation to resolve their
disputes.” As such, the Court
of Appeals ordered the judge
of Salvador: (i) to schedule a
new hearing, with the “preliminary scope of allowing
the parties to determine in
a consensual manner if they
choose mediation or arbitration to resolve the dispute”
and the conditions thereof,
and (ii) in the abscence of an
agreement by the parties, to
decide on this issue, as he is
specifically enabled under of
Article 7 of the BAL. Kieppe
challenged the Court of Appeal’s decision, requesting
amongst others, that the STJ
“recognize the inexistence of
the arbitral clause.”
Kieppe’s Special Recourse
to the STJ was based on two
main grounds:
67 Section 11.10 of the SHA provided that “[t]he
forum of this contract is the City of Salvador,
Capital of the State of Bahia”, in Brazil.
69 See above, at footnote n. 50.
68 See above, at footnote n. 24.
a. First, that the arbitration agreement was merely
optional and not binding on
the parties, as it referred to
mediation or arbitration (the
“First Issue”).
b.Second, that Section
8 of the SHA should apply
and, consequently, the state
courts should have jurisdiction over the dispute. Kieppe
argued that the dispute involved the specific performance of the share options
exercised by Kieppe to buy
Graal’s stake at ODBINV S.A
(which Graal had refused to
sell). According to Kieppe,
70 Authors’ translation from Portuguese to
English (emphasis added).
Doutrina 33
this was a matter that fell
within the ambit of Section
8 of the SHA (the “Second Issue”). As such, Kieppe argued that the dispute should
be resolved in the court
proceedings.
The STJ rejected these arguments and denied Kieppe’s
Special Recourse by majority (with three justices out
of the five justices rejecting
Kieppe’s arguments).
With regards to the First
Issue, the STJ held that the
arbitration agreement was
mandatory. According to the
STJ, the parties had in fact
agreed to a multi-tier clause,
requiring them to seek to resolve their disputes by mediation first and, if this failed,
by arbitration.71 The STJ rejected Kieppe’s submission
that there was no arbitration
agreement because “the contract shall not be interpreted
as if it contained void, useless
or superfluous provisions”.72
This is a clear application of
the principle of effectiveness,
discussed in more detail at
Section III.B.3 above.
The STJ also confirmed that
“the lack of further details in
the mediation or arbitration
provision does not invalidate
the original agreement of the
contracting parties, it just
December 2015, p. 44.
December 2015, p. 51.
34 Doutrina
means that, in relation to the
second [arbitration], there is
a ‘blank’ clause, a valid type
[of clause] under art. 7 of the
Law 9.307/96”.73
With regards to the Second Issue, STJ held that the
parties had agreed that their
“disputes shall be resolved by
mediation or arbitration, except for the matter expressly referred to under Section 8” which were reserved
for judicial review74. It further clarified that “the arbitration clause under an
agreement that excludes or
reserve certain special situations to be submitted to the
Judiciary cannot be considered void, especially when
these situations require urgent relief”.75 The STJ however, did not clarify if the issues in dispute by the parties,
namely whether Kieppe had
exercised – or intended to
exercise – the share option
to buy Graal’s stake at ODBINV S.A. in accordance with
the SHA, fell within the scope
of Section 8 of the SHA. Instead, it appears to have limited the scope of Section 8 of
the SHA to urgent measures,
which does not follow the
wording of that contractual
provision.
One of the justices, Judge
Isabel Gallotti, issued a dissenting opinion, stating that
the SHA was not mandatory
as it provided the parties with
an option between mediation
or arbitration, and the state
courts.
Specifically, Judge
Gallotti stated that “there was
no agreement to arbitrate in
the legal sense”, because “the
contract provided three dispute resolution methods: mediation or arbitration and the
courts. Since there was no
agreement on arbitration as
the only method, there is no
arbitration clause, not even
the so-called ‘blank clause’
….”.76 Nothwitstading, Judge
Gallioti confirmed that, if she
had to reinterpret the contract, she would hold that
“the present dispute falls
within the exclusion under
Section 8”.77 In Gallotti’s view,
“this is precisely the type of
dispute that the shareholders intented to exclude from
arbitration”.78
On 29 February 2016,
Kieppe issued a motion for
clarification of this decision. The STJ will therefore
have an opportunity to clarify any omission, obscurity
or contradiction within the
judgment, including with regards to the First and Second
Issues.
December 2015, at pp. 51-52. In the same sense,
Judge Noronha’s concurring opinion asserted
that “in the present case, it is common that the
contract clause does not provide this level of
detail [with respect to the seat of the arbitration,
procedure to appoint the arbitrators etc.]; the
clause in which the parties agreed that any
disputes arising from the contract shall be settled
by arbitration is often short. In these cases, the
clause is classified by acholars as an empty or blank
clause. Nonetheless, it is understood that such
clauses contain the aimed effect of excluding the
state jurisdiction in favor of arbitration.... Then,
the submission agreement will be firstly sought
by out-of-court invitation of the interested party
to the other, aiming at reaching the contractual
consensus. Failure of this attempt due to either
disagreement or simple omission of the invited
party triggers the entitlement to seek specific
relief for this purpose.” (Graal Participações Ltda.
v. Kieppe Participações e Administração Ltda., STJ,
REsp No. 1331100, 17 December 2015, at pp. 85-86).
December 2015, at p. 45 (emphasis added).
December 2015, at p. 21. In the same sense, Judge
Galloti`s affirmed that “[t]he mere provision, in the
contract, of the possibility of the parties resorting
to arbitration does not constitute an arbitration
clause within the meaning of the Law 9.307/96”,
because “only the express, unequivocal, clear
intention of the contracting parties to avoid
the consideration of certain disputes arising in
the course of a given contract by the Judicial
Power, referring them exclusively to an arbitrator
falls within the legal concept of arbitral clause.”
(Graal Participações Ltda. v. Kieppe Participações
December 2015, at p. 17).
December 2015, at p. 50. In the same sense, another
passage of Judge Raul Araújo’s opinion state that
the parties “reserved exceptional situations to
the state jurisdiction” (Graal Participações Ltda.
v. Kieppe Participações e Administração Ltda.,
STJ, REsp No. 1331100, 17 December 2015, at p. 51),
and “[c]ertain urgent matters, especially those
preceding the constitution of the arbitral tribunal
not only can but shall be brought in the Judiciary,
so that the parties do not see themselves in the
absence of any jurisdictional void, where they
could not find either judicial or arbitral relief
(because arbitration has not commenced yet)”
(Graal Participações Ltda. v. Kieppe Participações
December 2015, at p. 47).
December 2015, at p. 37.
December 2015, at p. 38.
Doutrina 35
V.Does Graal v. Kieppe tion clauses stating that the arbitration” in the SHA confollow the general trend of parties may choose to resort stituted a valid and enforceenglish and french courts? to arbitration or state courts, able arbitration agreement
The STJ clearly intended to
give effect to the arbitration
agreement, by reconciling the
apparently inconsistent terms
(“mediation or arbitration”)
through a liberal and creative
interpretation; i.e. that the
parties in fact intended this
clause to be a multi-tier arbitration provision, and also
by confirming (at least indirectly) that the arbitration
agreement was valid, even if
it failed sufficiently to specify terms such as scope, seat,
or number of arbitrators. The
STJ also confirmed that some
matters may be excluded from
agreement, and that this will
not necessarily invalidate the
arbitration agreement. In this
regard, the STJ’s approach in
Graal v. Kieppe would appear
to follow the tendency of national courts in other jurisdictions, including the English and French courts, to
uphold putative arbitration
agreements.
However, the
STJ’s reasoning is somewhat
dissimilar to the reasoning
adopted by the English and
French Courts.
whereas in Graal v. Kieppe,
the STJ had to address the
issue of an optional arbitration clause which stated the
parties shall pursue mediation or arbitration. Notwithstanding this distinction, it
would appear the STJ’s approach is more in-line with
the approach adopted by the
English Courts, insofar as it
sought to enforce the arbitration agreement, even when
the parties intent wasn’t sufficiently detailed or explicitly clear.79 The STJ’s decision certainly did not follow
the approach taken by the
French Supreme Court in
MReal Alizay v. Thermodyn,
which held that the optional arbitration provision did
not oblige the parties to refer
their disputes to arbitration,
nor prevent them from seeking judicial relief.80
although it did not provide
any further details. Accordingly, Brazilian courts have
followed the general trend of
English and French courts of
giving effect to blank clauses.
A.
Optional
Arbitration
Clauses
English and French courts
typically deal with arbitra-
B. Blank Arbitration Clauses
As noted above, Brazil’s Arbitration Law contains a default provision in cases which
the parties have not addressed material aspects of
the arbitration agreement.
Brazil’s arbitration statute is
therefore similar to those of
both the United Kingdom and
France. The STJ held that the
reference to “mediation or
C. Combined Clauses
Although the STJ confirmed
that some matters may be excluded from the scope of the
arbitration agreement, without invalidating the arbitration agreement, the STJ’s reasoning is unclear and leaves
many issues unaddressed, including in particular, whether
the parties’ specific dispute
under the SHA fell outside
agreement.
Given that Kieppe’s motion for clarification is still
pending, the real approach of
Brazilian courts on the controversial issue of unclear
agreements to arbitrate, such
as the one in Graal v Kieppe,
is yet to be seen.
Arguably, it is possible that
the STJ applied the presumption of one-stop adjudication
(as adopted by the English
Courts in Fiona Trust81), or
the presumption that parties
intended to have an effective
arbitration method for dispute resolution (as adopted
by the French Courts in Fitz-
79 See above, at section III.A.1.
80 See above, at section III.B.1.
81 See above, at section III.A.3.
36 Doutrina
which steps should be taken
to meet such condition); and
(iii) whether the dispute falls
within the ambit of the matters that the parties intended
to exclude from resolution by
arbitration (essentially clarifying the scope of Article 8
of the SHA). In doing so, the
VI. Conclusion
The STJ’s decision confirms STJ can support the BrazilBrazil’s efforts to become a ian legal community (includmore arbitration-friendly ju- ing Brazil’s lower courts) to
risdiction. In the words of one the correct and uniform incommentator, the STJ’s rul- terpretation and application
ing in Graal v. Kieppe is “one- of Brazilian Law, and therestep further in the direction fore the enforcement of arbiof the most prominent juris- tration agreements in Brazil.
dictions in arbitration” and it
“signals to the international arbitration community that
parties can trust in Brazilian
legal system in aid of arbitration procedures.”83
However, before determining that Graal v. Kieppe follows the trend of the arbitration-friendly jurisdictions,
such as the United Kingdom
and France, the STJ must confirm a number of unclear or
unaddressed issues, including: (i) the effect of the reference to mediation in light
*
Victoria Narancio is a Senior
of the principle of effective- Associate at Wilmer Cutler Pickering
ness; (ii) whether the parties Hale and Dorr LLP, specializing in
are obliged to submit their international arbitration.
disputes to arbitration be- Antonio Nachif is a Visiting Foreign
fore any mediation has taken Lawyer at Wilmer Cutler Pickering
Hale and Dorr LLP, specializing in
place – i.e., whether media- international arbitration. The views
tion is a condition precedent expressed in this article are the
to arbitration, and if it is, personal views of the authors.
patrick82). However, the STJ
must delve further in the issue of whether the parties
true intention was to submit
their dispute to arbitration,
and the scope of the arbitration agreement.
Confira também
as edições
anteriores em
novo site:
www.
comercialista.
ibdce.com.
82 See above, at section III.B.3.
83 Nikolai Rebelo, Brazil: Superior Court of Justice
confirms its position pro-arbitration, 21 December
2015,
http://law-and-arbitration.blogspot.
co.uk/2015/12/brazil-superior-court-of-justice.
html, accessed 17 February 2016.
Doutrina 37
Arbitrating and enforcing
against States in Latin
America
An agreement without strings
attached: imposing parochial notions
of the sovereign
By Marike R. P. Paulsson*
Introduction
States do not only enter into — and perhaps unwillingly — arbitrations
with investors under BITs. States enter — and more so willingly — into
commercial engagements with businessmen: construction contracts,
telecom, oil & gas: the sovereign needs to engage in acte de iure gestionis: governing a country is a business after all.
38 Doutrina
Governments,
government entities, ministries but
also State owned companies engage in commercial
acts and often in the international context, both sides
agree to arbitration. A subsequent award against such
State might need enforcement elsewhere whether that
is because assets are located
around the globe or whether
the State — having lost the arbitration — might not willingly allow for its organs — the
courts — to facilitate an enforcement order and subsequent execution.
If the award is foreign, international, non-domestic or
a-national: if under the scope
of the Convention, the question then becomes whether
the fact that the losing party is a sovereign State, is a
problem. The development
of arbitration and the judicial
practice of enforcing awards
have evolved in Latin America. The good, the bad and the
ugly? The unhappy few? Or
a pattern of States willingly
engaging in business with investors but less willingly arbitrating when disputes arise
and not willingly complying with internationally ac-
ceptable and binding awards?
States avoid enforcement by
setting aside awards rendered against their entities or
organs (Mexico)1, renounce
BITs when faced with asset
freezing or withdrawing from
the ICSID Convention (Venezuela)2 or engage in acts of
denial of justice vis-à-vis foreign investors (Uruguay and
Ecuador)3. Finally, the implementation and application of
the 1958 New York Convention is still developing in Latin America.
1
http://hsfnotes.com/arbitration/2013/09/18/us-district-court-confirmsarbitral-award-against-pemex-that-was-nullified-at-its-seat/.
5854f237ba0d/tv11-1-article14_is_there_a_
life_after_icsid_denunciation.pdf.
2
http://cadtm.org/Bolivia-Venezuela-andNicaragua and http://www.wti.org/media/
filer_public/6c/7e/6c7e7212-f47f-4a07-9bc9Revista Comercialista
Latin American Decisions
jurisdictions 4 rendered
under
the 1958
New York
Convention
reported in the
ICCA Yearbook
Argentina
4
Brazil
37
Chile
1
Columbia
9
Ecuador
1
Guatemala
2
Mexico
4
Peru
3
Venezuela
4
3 http://www.chevron.com/chevron/pressreleases/article/01222016_dutchcourtdecisiononarbitralawards.news.
4 Nine jurisdictions in Latin America have re-
Arbitrating
against
the
Sovereigns from Latin America
Arbitrating and enforcing
against States has led to a series of casualties — whether in
the realm of investment arbitration or commercial arbitration: whether the refusal of a
sovereign to comply; whether
counsel for these sovereigns
to manipulate the system;
whether arbitrator consistently deciding in favor of the
State; whether corruption or
perversion of a system that
can simply not hold States accountable with the aid of the
ICJ Statute and must rely to
a great extent on voluntary
compliance with investment
treaties: users — investors —
are going to walk away from
arbitration. If only they good:
as the alternative is often corrupted courts of the country
against whom they want to
bring a legitimate action.
The difficulties vary from
little enforcement problems
to serious denial of justice
and then there are the good
ones. Zooming in on the jurisdictions, the sovereigns
and their organs will allow
for a glimpse of the challenges that come with arbitrating
and enforcing against States,
ported decisions in the Yearbook, in total 63
of 1800 reported decisions in the Yearbook.
To date 156 States are a party to the Convention. Most of the Latin American countries have
signed on to the Convention. Most of those
countries were present at the conclusion and
signature of the Convention in 1958.
Doutrina 39
in this case those of Latin
America.
Costa Rica, a rising star;
a community of pro-arbitration judges and lawyers
and those in training. No enforcement decisions under
the New York Convention
from Costa Rica have been
reported internationally even
though Costa Rica became a
party to the Convention in
1987. None have been reported in the Yearbook of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration. None
have been reported by UNCITRAL. Although Costa Rica
is not yet known for its enforcement of foreign awards
under the New York or Panama Conventions, Costa Rica
itself is an attractive seat for
users of arbitration: there is
an constitutional right to arbitration in Costa Rica and no
amparo:
The Costa Rican Supreme Court has held
consistently that the constitutional remedy of amparo is not the appropriate means of dealing with
alleged violations of due
process in arbitral proceedings.5
For a change, Costa Rica is
one of the Latin American ju-
risdictions with a good track
record in investor-state dispute settlement:
Costa Rica is arguable
the strongest democracy
in Latin America, known in
the international community for its political stability, strong institutions,
rule of law and respect for
international law.6
Costa Rica has been a respondent in 10 ICSID cases (pending and concluded),
a number that is not nearly
close to the number of cases against Venezuela and Argentina. The Costa Rican Supreme Court is ahead of the
Latin time with a specialized
chamber dealing with arbitration matters. Is their arbitration attitude, with that,
favorable? Many judges still
feel some review or even supervision is necessary as the
high fees paid to arbitrators
might lead to corruption. Or
at least, that seems to be the
perception. That perception
is not endorsed by the New
York Convention as the treaty
is glossed with a pro-arbitration attitude and operates on
the premise that the system
is not perverted by corrupted arbitrators. However, that
might have been the view in
1958 but is that the dominant
view today?
Mexico, a star that has risen, yet only has four reported cases internationally, has a
Supreme Court that is favorable to arbitration and one
that highlights the importance of transparency. However, now this jurisdiction is
affected gravely by Commissa v. Pemex.7 The US court
glossed Article V(1)(e) with
public policy: the US notion of public policy.8 Whatever may be said about the
retroactive application of
an administrative law: setting aside an award against
a Mexican State owned entity: whether there was denial of justice or the perception
of denial of justice: will investors when entering into business with Mexico want to arbitrate in Mexico again? Does
the protection of US courts
by enforcing annulled awards
suffice to remedy States’ potential or alleged Denial of
Justice? Is that the role of the
US courts: to safeguard the
rule of law in Latin America? How about international
comity: a lower US judge reviewing a Mexican court of
appeal in light of international comity?
5
Dyalá Jiménez & Patricio Grané Labat, The Arbitration Review of the Americas
2016. Costa Rica, Global Arbitration Review,
p. 57.
Rica, Global Arbitration Review, p. 59-60.
at 537-541.
7
Corporacion Mexicana de Mantenimiento Integral, S. de R.L. de C.V. v. PEMEX - Exploracion y Produccion (Southern District for New York 2013), in Yearbook
Commercial Arbitration XXXVIII (2013),
8 Marike Paulsson, The 1958 New York Convention in Action, Kluwer Law International (2016),
p. 212.
6 Dyalá Jiménez & Patricio Grané Labat, The
Arbitration Review of the Americas 2016. Costa
40 Doutrina
Brazil has the highest number of enforcements: 37 cases have been reported in the
Yearbook of the International
Council for Commercial Arbitration9 with 34 cases handled by the Superior Tribunal
de Justica: Brazil’s judiciary is
favorable towards working on
a uniform application of the
New York Convention. A jurisdiction set apart.
Peru: only three reported cases in the Yearbook. But
how about Peruvian awards
enforced elsewhere under
the New York Convention?
A successful party cannot enforce an award because that
would violate a Peruvian cap
statute (of a mandatory nature). Enforcement in the
United States is stopped under the prism of rules of procedure under Article III: is
this a notion of international comity that destroys a party’s right to an award?10 In
Figueiredo, the US Court of
Appeals for the Second Circuit held that forum non conveniens is a procedural matter and thus fall under Article
III’s rules of procedure and
on that premise refused to
enforce the award.11 The US
court relied on notion of international comity toward
Peru and one wonders why
as the courts in Peru had reviewed the award and considered the award proper.
Ecuador: it has become
such a Telenovela that a procedure between a foreign investor against a Latin American nation leads to multiple
court litigation in both the
US and the Netherlands. It is
such a perversion of the system of arbitration; fraudulent
acts of sovereigns have then
led to courts of various countries in the old Westphalia
having to “grade the papers”
and put them in the time out.
Did we forget that opting for
arbitration was to opt out of
the right to court?
Problems when enforcing
against States and their organs? The first thought that
comes to mind is immunity.
The second is having to deal
with immunity of jurisdiction
and then immunity of execution. What is the point of preserving assets when a head of
State renounces BITs as a way
of retaliation? Such nebulous
acts create cross-overs from
The Convention does not
provide any rules on immunity from jurisdiction. Despite
the views of some, the convention simply does not govern immunity issues, does not
provide for any uniform rule
on immunity nor does it indicate which law would be applicable to determine any issues of immunity. The best
illustration of this simple
fact is the decision rendered
by the District Court for the
District of Columbia between
Belize Social Development
Limited (“BSDL”) and the
Government of Belize.12 One
must look locally. Contracting States to the Convention
have their regimes on immunity. In some jurisdictions the
matter is entirely regulated
by case law. Thus, the successful party must look locally in order to anticipate how
immunity issues might or
might not be a stopper to the
enforcement of the award.
9
http://www.newyorkconvention.org/
court+decisions/decisions+per+country.
Ltda. v. The Republic of Peru, Ministerio de Vivienda, Construccion y Saneamiento, Programma
Agua Para Todos (PAPT) (successor by intergration to Programa De Apoyo A La reforma Del Sector Saneamiento (PARSSA), formerly known as
Proyecto Especial Programma Nacional De Agua
Ptable & Alcantarillado (PRONAP) (2nd Cir. 2011),
2011 US App. Lexis 24748.
12 Belize Social Development Limited v. the Government of Belize, US Court of Appeals for the
District of Columbia (14-7002), 21st of July 2015:
the Government of Belize had invoked sovereign immunity under the US Sovereign Immunities Act to argue that there was no jurisdiction
for the District Court. The court relied on the
arbitration exception of this act.
10 Marike Paulsson, The 1958 New York Convention in Action, Kluwer Law International (2016),
p. 130.
11
Figueiredo Ferraz Engenharia De Projecto
Awards
against
Latin
American States and their
enforcement
commercial arbitration to investment arbitration that do
not, in any way, contribute
to proper enforcement of the
Rule of Law.
Immunity from jurisdiction
under the Convention
However, most enforcement
courts have used their discretion to find ways to hold that
States signing an arbitration
agreement are held to have
waived their immunity from
jurisdiction.
Therefore, there are no
uniform rules in international law or under the Convention providing any guidance
as to when and how a State
party would have immunity.
Of course, there is the dominant judicial application under the Convention but as always with the Convention,
one must look locally.13
Even so, the take away
that States by signing on to
an arbitration agreement
are deemed to have waived
their immunity from jurisdiction is one that we would all
agree to. It would be in line
with generally recognized
principles in international law and commercial arbitration. Furthermore, immunity is not one of the refusal
grounds as exhaustively listed in Article V of the Convention. Therefore, immunity can only find its way to
the Convention under Article
III — rules of procedure — and
with that it becomes, again, a
local matter.
13 See Albert Jan van den Berg in his commentary on the New York Convention: “The Convention is frequently applied to States and State
agencies. In this field, the defence of sovereign
immunity against recognition of the arbitration agreement and enforcement of the arbitral
award is virtually always rejected on the basis of
theories such as restrictive immunity, the waiver of immunity, the distinction between acta de
jure gestionis and acta de jure imperii, the reliance on pacta sunt servanda and the creation
of an ordre public réellement international.How-
ever, there remains a sharp (though, it is submitted, illogical) distinction between immunity
from jurisdiction and immunity from execution. Thus, notwithstanding the fact that many
courts endorse the aforementioned theories,
a substantial number of them still considers
sovereign immunity to be absolute when, after
having obtained the leave for enforcement, a
party attempts to seek actual execution of the
award against the State or State agency.”
Two salient unexpected
problems arising under the
Convention: the courage to
enforce against States
What is more interesting are
the effects other than those
of immunity from jurisdiction. Indeed States — having
lost an arbitration — can attempt to invoke that immunity or rely on its sovereign
“right” when the successful party in an arbitration requests another State — its
courts —to grant the enforcement title under the Convention. Even if an immunity defense would not have been
invoked, is there no peril in
dealing with States?
Two salient issues have
surfaced under the application of the Convention: first,
States having lost an arbitration will attempt to defy
the rule of law by using other channels to exert pressure
when faced with an arbitral
procedure or enforcement of
an award.
Doutrina 41
In Consorcio Rive, following an arbitration in Mexico, the US Court of Appeals
for the Fifth Circuit held that
courts were to apply a narrow idea of due process under Article V(1)(b) and align
that interpretation with a
pro-enforcement attitude.14
The parties had entered into
an agreement which included
an arbitration clause providing for arbitration in Mexico
pursuant to the rules of the
Inter-American Commercial
Arbitration
Commission.15
The respondent had refused
to participate in the arbitration on the grounds that its
chief executive was afraid to
enter Mexico after the claimant had filed papers requesting a criminal investigation
against him. The respondent argued that it was thus
prevented from presenting
its case. The court was not
persuaded:
BC had ample opportunity to defend itself even
without David Briggs’
physical presence at the
arbitration. … The strong
federal policy in support
of encouraging arbitra-
of Cancun, Inc. (US) v. David Briggs Enterprises,
Inc. (US) (5th Cir. 2003) in Yearbook Commercial Arbitration XXXI (2006) (US no. 472) at
1429–1438.
15 Consorcio Rive, S.A. de C.V. (Mexico) v. Briggs
Inc. (US) (5th Cir. 2003) in Yearbook Commercial
Arbitration XXXI (2006) (US no. 472) at 1429–
1438, under “Facts.”
42 Doutrina
tion and enforcing arbitration awards dictates
that we narrowly construe
the defense that a party was “unable to present
its case”. … BC could have
simply sent an attorney
or other corporate representative to represent it
at the arbitration. Briggs
himself could have participated by telephone. Additionally, BC participated
in the arbitration to the
extent that it designated an arbitrator and filed
over 80 pages of legal argument and documentation in support of its position at the arbitration.16
Second, and quite a cause
for concern as far as a successful application of the
Convention is concerned,
State courts of the country
where enforcement is sought
have been, at times, reluctant
to grant the request for the
enforcement of an award that
was rendered against a State.
This might be out of notions
of international comity; or a
hesitance to perform an act
that might be one for the executive rather than for the
judiciary; or for fear of political or diplomatic backlash. A
fear of reversed reciprocity.
Courts will in those instances rely on the discretion that
has been expressly attributed to them to refuse the enforcement of the award. They
do not always do so under
Article V of the Convention
which lists the exhaustively
listed grounds for refusal. At
times, refusal is done under
the banner of “rules of procedure” under Article III.
In Figueiredo, the US Court
of Appeals for the Second
Circuit denied the request for
the enforcement of an award
rendered in Peru, on the basis of the US common law
doctrine of forum non conveniens:17
International comity is
the recognition which one
nation allows within its
territory to the legislative,
executive or judicial acts
of another nation, having
due regard both to international duty and convenience, and to the rights
of its own citizens or other persons who are under
the protection of its laws.18
A Peruvian statute limited
the amount of money that an
agency of the Peruvian government may pay annually to
satisfy judgments or awards,
to an aggregate of 3% of the
agency’s annual budget. When
an applicant having secured
an arbitral award against a
Peruvian state agency filed
for the confirmation of the
award in the US, the Republic
of Peru et al. objected thereto on the ground that recognition of the award would violate this statute. The court
dismissed the request on the
basis of forum non conveniens: the Second Circuit held
that Peru was an adequate alternate forum because defendants were undoubtedly amenable to process there
and Peru provided a remedy.
That Figueiredo might recover less in Peru than it would in
the US did not alter the conclusion that Peru was an adequate alternate forum.19 However, the Ministry of Peru had
previously attempted to challenge the award in Peru. The
Court of Appeals in Lima had
denied that challenge: it considered the award to be do-
Inc. (US) (5th Cir. 2003) in Yearbook Commercial
Arbitration XXXI (2006) (US no. 472) at 1429–
1438, ¶¶ 10–11.
as Proyecto Especial Programma Nacional De
Agua Potable & Alcantarillado (PRONAP) (2nd
Cir. 2011), 2011 US App. Lexis 24748.
Cir. 2011), 2011 US App. Lexis 24748.
17 Figueiredo Ferraz Engenharia De Projecto
Ltda. V. The Republic of Peru, Ministerio de Vivienda, Construccion y Saneamiento, Programa
Agua Para Todos (PAPT) (successor by intergration to Programa De Apoyo A La reforma Del
Sector Saneamiento (PARSSA), formerly known
Cir. 2011), 2011 US App. Lexis 24748, ¶ 391.
Doutrina 43
mestic and to be rendered in
equity. The US Court, however, found it relevant that the
prevailing party had not requested the exequatur of the
award in Peru. Figueiredo’s
choice of forum, the US and
not Peru, was not entitled
to much deference; and private and public interest factors, especially the Peruvian
cap statute, in its view favored dismissal. Accordingly,
the Second Circuit dismissed
Figueiredo’s enforcement request on the ground of forum
non conveniens notwithstanding that the doctrine is
not listed in the New York or
Panama Conventions as a basis for refusing to recognize
foreign arbitral awards:20,21
[T]here is nonetheless
a public interest in assuring respect for a sovereign
nation’s attempt to limit
the rate at which its funds
are spent to satisfy judgments. … [T]hat deferring
to litigation in another jurisdiction is appropriate
where the litigation is intimately involved with
sovereign prerogative and
it is important to ascertain the meaning of another jurisdiction’s statute from the only tribunal
empowered to speak definitively. …The rate at
which public funds may
be disbursed to satisfy
public obligations is surely intimately involved with
sovereign prerogative and
the Peruvian courts are
the only tribunals empowered to speak authoritatively on the meaning and operation of the
cap statute.22
The court reasoned that
forum non conveniens is a
procedural matter and thus
is to be applied under the
rules of procedure as referred to in Article III of the
Convention.23
Previously, the Second Circuit had found that the parties and the dispute had no
connection to New York and
thus held, on the basis of Article III, that:
[E]ach
Contracting
State shall recognize arbitral awards as binding
and enforce them in accordance with the rules of
procedure of the territory
where the award is relied
upon and because forum
non conveniens is a procedural rule, courts are
permitted to dismiss cases if there is an adequate
alternative forum and if
the movant can meet the
familiar factors in favour
of dismissal.24
Applying forum non conveniens to enforcement actions as an additional ground
for refusing to recognize or
enforce arbitral awards is on
its face contrary to the US’s
treaty obligations.25 Forum
non conveniens arises from
courts’ inherent authority to control their dockets
and manage their affairs. It
is not found in the texts of
the treaties.26
20 Although the court dismissed the enforcement action in favor of the alternate forum in
Peru, Figueiredo remained free to pursue recognition and enforcement of its arbitral award
in any country that is a signatory to the New
York or Panama Conventions.
Cir. 2011), 2011 US App. Lexis 24748.
25 In 2013, the American Bar Association’s
House of Delegates adopted Resolution 107c
criticizing the use of forum non conveniens to
block recognition and enforcement of foreign
arbitral awards. The resolution and accompanying report was submitted by Barton Legum, the
chair of the ABA’s section of international law.
http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/
aba/uncategorized/international_law/2013_
hod_annual_meeting_107C.authcheckdam.
pdf-92k-2013-11-08.
21 See Art. V, New York Convention; Art. 5, Panama Convention.
23 Monegasque de Reassurances s.a.m. (Monde
Re) v. NAK Naftogaz of Ukraine, et al. (2nd Cir.
2002), in Yearbook Commercial Arbitration XXVIII (2003) (US no. 422), at 1096–1111.
24 Monegasque de Reassurances s.a.m. (Monde
Re) v. NAK Naftogaz of Ukraine, et al.) (2nd Cir.
2002), in Yearbook Commercial Arbitration XXVIII (2003) (US no. 422), at 1096–1111. See also
Milantic Trans. S.A. v. Ministerio de Producción
de la Provincia de Buenos Aires, et al. (Cámara de
Apelación en lo Contencioso Administrativo, La
Plata, 2007), in Yearbook Commercial Arbitration XXXIII (2008) (Argentina no. 2) at 327–330.
26 William W. Park, Respecting the New York
Convention, 18 ICC Int’l Ct. of Arb. Bull. 65, 70
(2007) (The “language relates to how recognition will be granted, not whether recognition
44 Doutrina
What to do with the
sovereign when enforcing
awards?
al arbitration to thrive, there
is a need for visible dialogue
in South America and Central
America: in one region the
application of the Convention
should be harmonized.
Training of judges and lawyers is necessary in order to
create more seats in Central
And South America. Voices in
the global community talk of
Latinization. The new term of
art after Americanization of international arbitration. It might
be a term that is en vogue but
one is in want of a clear definition. Two things are clear: first,
the term of art is not invented
by those from the region and
second, it might not be meant
as a compliment.
Corruption and Denial of
Justice: the examples are sad
and endless: whether investment arbitration or commercial arbitration: denouncing
the ICSID Convention, pulling out of Bilateral Investment Treaties, the number
of claims of investors against
certain States such as Argentina and Venezuela.28 What is
the point of natural recourses when investors have all inLatinization?
The efforts towards a pro-ar- centive to be paranoid for yet
bitration attitude under the another denial of justice?
Is it in Latin America that
Convention are fragmented
we
should pose the valid
and localized: for internation-
will be granted at all.”). Professor Park’s view was
rejected by the court of appeals in Figueiredo,
665 F.3d at 390, n. 8, but he was not alone in his
criticism of Monegasque as Judge Lynch pointed out in his dissent. 665 F.3d at 399 (citing numerous articles in which the author argued that
the decision in Monegasque placed the United
States in violation of its treaty obligations).
We all recognize that the New
York Convention feels its effect mostly locally as implemented by national legislators and as applied by national
courts. However, the Convention although implemented in
156 States is still a text that is
defines as an international legal instrument by drafters who
wanted to bump up the idea
of party autonomy and contain the sovereign rights. It
is a text that is identified as a
treaty, convention, international agreement and as such
falls under the realm of international public law and the Vienna Convention on the Law of
Treaties. With that one must
then determine the scope of
the treaty, the proper application and interpretation of the
treaty and any implication if
the treaty is violated by States.
It is on that premise that
we must return to the origin of the Convention which
gives us ammunition, for example, to hold courts accountable for the inappropriate use of discretion and
international comity as a
stopper
to
enforcement
against States.
[T]he draftsman of the
New York Convention
of 1958 were very conscious of the fact that international law respected, the full-blown theory
of national sovereignty,
and they decided that
they there was no point
to confront this head-on,
or there would be no New
York Convention.27
However, the delegates
wanted to find a fine balance
between party autonomy on
the one hand and sovereign
rights of states on the other hand. The delegates anticipated problems with States
not willing to surrender their
sovereign rights and wanted
to contain that risk. It is unacceptable for modern courts
to rely on international comity vis-à-vis another sovereign as a stopper to enforcement even if that sovereign
had waived its immunity by
engaging in acte de iure gestionis and signing arbitration
agreements and participating
in arbitral proceedings.
27 Fali Nariman in his speech at the occasion
of ICCA’s NYC Judicial Dialogue in New Delhi,
2013
at
http://www.arbitration-icca.org/
media/2/13916005409590/nyc_roadshow_
speech_23rd_nov_nariman.pdf.
28 Over 25 BIT cases against Argentina and
there are currently 39 ICSID cases against Venezuela (both pending and concluded) and this
count does not include UNCITRAL and whatever other cases could be filed such as ad hoc
cases. For the latest on Venezuela’s attempts
to undermine the effectiveness of international
question again: does sovereignty and old archaic hostility towards arbitration and
pure and simple corruption
and denial of justice mean
that arbitration only works
with the protection of foreign
courts and tribunals of the
West? If not, how can foreign
investors find some sort of
protection under the rule of
law? What are today’s sanction mechanisms that work?
Claims of denial of justice under treaties or national laws
on the protection of foreign
investment ought to work
on the premise that States
act for reasons of self-interest, quid-pro-quo and simple good will: the order that
international law would naturally create. Unfortunately
some Latin American States
attempt to undermine that
system. Does “Latinization”
then leads to not only Americanization but also Westphalianation?
Does arbitrating and enforcing against sovereigns
lead to distrust of arbitration? Fortunately Latin America has shown signs of engaging in a tour of duty in Latin
America to engage with judges, to give the arbitration
community a platform where
judges and lawyers can interact to see how they can improve the arbitration culture:
to go from Latinization to
globalization.
Stepping into the future of
arbitration, one looks to the
past and present to place the
idea of Latinization and any
distrust in context. I would
conclude with urging counsel
to persuade courts and tribunals to rethink their role and
mandate and show courage to
hold States in Latin America
to their obligations entered
into under the realm of international law. State responsibility also means that valid
arbitration agreements must
be recognized and binding
awards enforced: intimidation antics such as renouncing BITs, withdrawing from
the ICSID Convention, setting
aside valid awards, relying on
some reversed notion of international comity and pressuring courts into stopping
enforcement are all State actions that destroy trust in the
system of international arbitration and international law
and it is then that we must
not forget:
International law has
not achieved much, but it
is good that it is there.29
arbitration as a means of dispute resolution
against States: http://globalarbitrationreview.
com/news/article/34834/fortier-standingfifth-topple-attempt/
and the latest efforts of Venezuela to derail the
procedure process: http://globalarbitrationreview.com/news/article/34855/resignationbrings-further-chaos-conoco-case/.
29 Fali Nariman in his speech at the occasion
Doutrina 45
* Marike Paulsson
Director of the University of Miami
School of Law’s International
Arbitration Institute and Lecturer
in Law. LL.M in International Law
from the University of Miami.
Expert on the 1958 United Nations
Convention on the Recognition and
Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral
Awards (The New York Convention).
of ICCA’s NYC Judicial Dialogue in New Delhi,
2013
at
http://www.arbitration-icca.org/
media/2/13916005409590/nyc_roadshow_
speech_23rd_nov_nariman.pdf.
46 Doutrina
O custo das
arbitragens
e o Acesso à
Justiça
A) Introdução
Por Napoleão Casado Filho*
O instituto da arbitragem tem se mostrado de grande
valia e utilidade no direito brasileiro, desde sua regulamentação na Lei 9.307/1996. Desde então, o fenômeno que era visto em todo o mundo há quase um
século desembarcou no Brasil e produziu efeitos bastante claros.
Doutrina 47
Hoje, boa parte dos conflitos empresariais de maior vulto
é resolvida por este método alternativo de solução de litígios.
O Judiciário nacional, especialmente nos litígios internacionais, sempre foi visto com maus
olhos, afinal, como confiar no
aplicador do Direito se ele é do
mesmo país da parte adversa?
A arbitragem, mormente em
sua vertente internacional, traz
uma solução que tem sido bem
aceita pelo mercado e pelos operadores do Direito. Contudo, realizar arbitragens internacionais
é uma atividade que demanda
recursos. São honorários de árbitros, de advogados, custas da
Câmara e de deslocamento.
Em virtude disso, a arbitragem é vista como a Justiça dos
Ricos. Já é célebre a frase de
Sir James Matthew,1 em versão
adaptada para a arbitragem: “A
arbitragem é aberta a todos, assim como o Hotel Ritz”. Ocorre
que, muitas vezes, a parte prejudicada na relação comercial se
vê impossibilitada de iniciar um
procedimento arbitral por falta
de fundos para tal.
Recentemente, no caso Pirelli,2 a Cour de Cassation de
Paris anulou um laudo Arbitral
CCI porque o Tribunal Arbitral
se negou a ouvir os pedidos reconvencionais apresentados pela parte requerida em virtude da
impossibilidade de o requerido
realizar o depósito prévio exigido por aquela instituição arbitral
nesse tipo de situação. Entendeu a Corte francesa que tal fato seria ofensivo ao princípio do
acesso à justiça e da igualdade.
Em outra situação, no caso
Mil-Tek,3 envolvendo uma relação de franchising mal sucedida,
o Tribunal Comercial de Paris
entendeu que a arbitragem seria inoperante no caso concreto
por uma das partes não ter como
custear o processo, dado o pouco faturamento ocorrido nos últimos anos em que funcionou. O
mesmo entendimento teve uma
Corte alemã em um contrato envolvendo arbitragem para solucionar um conflito decorrente
dos serviços de um encanador.4
Por outro lado, as instituições
arbitrais e os árbitros necessitam de remuneração para continuar seu trabalho, uma vez que
não são entes públicos como os
magistrados em geral, tornando impossível que trabalhem julgando e administrando casos
sem a devida contraprestação.
É evidente que há, nesse tipo
de situação, uma tensão entre a
necessidade de custear um procedimento arbitral que envolve
vultosas somas e o acesso à justiça. Temos um desafio concreto
que vem sendo enfrentado pelo
mundo e que praticamente passa ao largo na doutrina e jurisprudência brasileiras,5 e também
em nossa prática arbitral.
Seria a ausência de recursos
para custear o procedimento arbitral uma causa superveniente
de nulidade da cláusula compromissória? O sistema da arbitragem deve se preocupar com
princípios de política pública,
como o do acesso a uma ordem
jurídica justa?
1 Sir James Matthew foi um juiz inglês na era Vitoriana. Sua frase original é: “Royal Courts are open
to everyone, like the Ritz Hotel”.
lid; CLAY, Thomas (Org.). L’argent dans l’arbitrage.
Paris: Éditions L’extenso, 2013.
4 Bundesgerichtshof 14 Sept 2000, III ZR 33/00 –
Clout Case 404. Também disponível no DIS – Online Database on Arbitration Law – <http:// www.
dis-arb.de>. Acesso em: 10 maio 2014.
competence-competence (Caso Amebrasil Construções Ltda. – TJRJ, 2.ª Câmara Cível, Ap. Cível n.º
0031966-20.2010.8.19.0209, Rel. Des. Alexandre Freitas Câmara, j. 06.2014. Disponível em: <http://www1.
tjrj.jus.br/gedcacheweb/default.aspx?UZIP=1&GEDID=0004A2BBBEF6500EC33729E418B69118230EC50314621B4F>. Acesso em: 8 nov. 2014).
5 Em um único caso analisado no Brasil, o Caso
Amebrasil Construções Ltda., a posição do TJRJ foi
bastante avançada, reconhecendo o princípio do
6 Cf. art. 6.º da Convenção Europeia de Direitos
Humanos e art. 8.1 da Convenção Americana da
Direitos Humanos.
2 Cour de Cassation de Paris. Cass. Civ 1er, March
28, 2013, n. 392 (11-27.770).
3 Caso Mil-tek Ile de France. Tribunel Commercial de Paris. 17 Mai 2011. RG 2011003447. Apud
FONTMICHEL, Maximin. Le financement de l’arbitrage par une partie insolvable In: HAMIDA, Wa-
B) O princípio do acesso à
ordem jurídica justa
O princípio do acesso à justiça é
um direito fundamental previsto no art. 5.o, XXXV, da Constituição Federal e nas principais
Convenções Internacionais de
Direitos Humanos.6 Tal princípio também é conhecido como
princípio da inafastabilidade da
jurisdição, consagrado na expressão constitucional de que “a
lei não excluirá da apreciação do
Poder Judiciário lesão ou ameaça de direito”.
A interpretação que se dá a esse princípio vem sofrendo gran-
48 Doutrina
de debate no mundo inteiro, e a
obra dos professores Cappelletti e Garth, cujo lançamento data
de 1978 e se insere no denominado Projeto de Florença, foi seminal nesse sentido. A partir desse
estudo, do qual o Brasil não participou, o tema passou a atrair a
atenção de uma grande quantidade de estudiosos no mundo.
Cappelletti e Garth sustentam que:
Nos estados liberais “burgueses” dos séculos dezoito e
dezenove, os procedimentos
adotados para solução dos
litígios civis refletiam a filosofia essencialmente individualista dos direitos, então
vigorante. Direito ao acesso
à proteção judicial significava essencialmente o direito
formal do indivíduo agravado de propor ou contestar uma ação. [...] O Estado,
portanto, permanecia passivo, com relação a problemas
tais como a aptidão de uma
pessoa para reconhecer seus
direitos e defendê-los adequadamente, na prática. [...]
A justiça, como outros bens,
no sistema do laissez-faire, só podia ser obtida por
aqueles que pudessem en-
frentar seus custos; aqueles
que não pudessem fazê-lo
eram considerados os únicos
responsáveis por sua sorte.
O acesso formal, mas não
efetivo à justiça, correspondia à igualdade, apenas formal, mas não efetiva.7
Essa ideia de que o Estado deveria assegurar o acesso a uma
ordem jurídica justa8 a todos os
seus cidadãos, independentemente da condição financeira, é
que fomentou a consolidação das
Defensorias Públicas e a universalização da gratuidade processual para aqueles que declaram
não poder arcar com as custas
sem prejuízo do seu próprio sustento. Tal fenômeno se deu nos
Judiciários nacionais, sobretudo
ao longo da segunda metade do
século XX.9
Após o Movimento de Florença, vários países passaram
a analisar o princípio do acesso à justiça como algo essencial
à garantia de uma ordem jurídica justa. A partir desse princípio,
decorreu outro direito fundamental em nossa Constituição: o
da assistência jurídica, previsto
no inciso LXXIV da Carta Magna.
Há, inclusive, quem entenda
que a substituição da expressão
“assistência judiciária”, presente na Constituição de 1967, por
“assistência jurídica”, opção do
constituinte de 1988, implicou a
extensão desse direito não apenas a um auxílio no acesso ao
Poder Judiciário, mas também a
serviços de consultoria jurídica
e mecanismos extrajudiciais de
solução de conflitos.10
Hoje, parece-nos que a interpretação extremamente benevolente que o Judiciário tem do
princípio acesso à justiça precisa de uma maior reflexão. Interpretar tal princípio como
um direito ilimitado de provocar o Judiciário, sem custos, para praticamente todo e qualquer
desentendimento entre particulares é um dos principais
motivos que tem provocado a
impressionante marca brasileira
de ser campeão de litigiosidade
no mundo.11
A garantia do acesso à justiça
não significa que o processo deva ser necessariamente gratuito.
Na verdade, o exercício de todo
direito fundamental requer limites, sob pena de se inviabilizar
sua efetivação.
De toda forma, entendemos
que, embora mereça reflexão e
uma aplicação mais efetiva pe-
7 CAPPELLETTI, Mauro; GARTH, Bryant. Acesso à
justiça. Tradução de Ellen Gracie Northfleet. Porto Alegre: Fabris, 1988. p. 10.
Paulo: RT, 1988. p. 128).
toria e atividade jurídica extrajudicial” (TORRES,
Ana Flávia Melo. Acesso à Justiça. Disponível em:
<http://www.ambito-juridico.com.br/site/index.php?n_link=revista_artigos_leitura&artigo_
id=4592>. Acesso em: 19 out. 2014).
8 “A problemática do acesso à Justiça não pode
ser estudada nos acanhados limites dos órgãos
judiciais já existentes. Não se trata apenas de
possibilitar o acesso à Justiça enquanto instituição estatal, e sim de viabilizar o acesso à ordem jurídica justa” (WATANABE, Kazuo. Acesso à justiça
e sociedade moderna. Participação e processo. São
9 BORGE, Felipe Dezorzi. Defensoria Pública:
uma breve história. Disponível em: <http://jus.
com.br/artigos/14699/defensoria-publica-uma-breve-historia>. Acesso em: 5 out. 2014.
10 Observe-se que “o termo assistência judiciária da Constituição anterior foi substituído pelo
termo assistência jurídica, que é gênero daquela
espécie por ser mais amplo e abranger a consul-
11 Notícia veiculada no site da OAB/RJ: <http://
www.oabrj.org.br/noticia/63113-Brasil-e-campeao-mundial-de-reclamacoes-trabalhistas>.
Acesso em: 5 mar. 2016.
los magistrados, o princípio do
acesso à justiça é um dos pilares da democracia brasileira.
Cabe, de fato, ao Estado custear o serviço público de solução
de litígios e assegurar que seus
cidadãos menos privilegiados
tenham um acesso minimamente semelhante ao dos cidadãos
mais abastados.
Não há dúvidas de que a gratuidade no acesso à justiça estatal é uma conquista histórica
e irreversível, fundamental ao
Estado Democrático de Direito
brasileiro. Contudo, é necessário
repensar a forma como esta tem
sido aplicada, de modo a evitar
que, em demandas frívolas, ou
no caso de demandas habituais,
possa haver algum tipo de abuso
do direito de ação.12
C) O princípio do acesso à
justiça dentro do sistema
da arbitragem (nacional e
internacional)
Vimos o princípio do acesso à
justiça tal como concebido no
sistema processual judicial. Contudo, quando migramos para o
sistema arbitral, esse acesso é
bem diferente.
Há oportunidades em que
uma das partes não possui re-
12 Uma boa análise sobre os efeitos econômicos dessa interpretação ampliativa do princípio do acesso à
justiça é feita por: MARCELLINO JUNIOR, Julio César.
O direito de acesso à justiça e a análise econômica da
litigância: a maximização do acesso na busca pela efetividade. 2014. Tese (Doutorado) – UFSC, Florianópolis.
13 SACHS, Klaus. La protection de la partie faible
en Arbitrage. Gazette du Palais, n. 21, p. 22, 13 a 17
jul. 2007.
Doutrina 49
cursos suficientes para custear
o procedimento arbitral. Nessas
situações, é inevitável nos questionar: a falta de recursos de uma
das partes é um motivo para suspender ou para privar de efeitos
a convenção de arbitragem?
Há um interessante aspecto nessa questão, pois, a nosso ver, inexiste na arbitragem
a possibilidade de se recorrer à
gratuidade processual.13 Assim,
diferentemente do sistema judicial, não há como recorrer ao
Estado para solucionar o fato de
que a parte não tem recursos para custear a oitiva do seu caso.
Alguns países já enfrentaram
esse tema do conflito entre uma
cláusula arbitral excessivamente
onerosa e o acesso à justiça. Um
deles foi o Judiciário alemão no
Caso dos Encanadores.14
Nesse caso, em um contrato envolvendo serviços de encanador para instalação de um
banheiro, as partes entenderam
por bem estabelecer um procedimento arbitral em caso de conflito. Como ocorreu divergência
quanto ao momento em que o
pagamento seria devido, uma das
partes pensou em recorrer à arbitragem e, então, percebeu que
o custo de iniciar o procedimen-
to seria maior do que o custo da
própria obra em si. Um processo
judicial foi então iniciado.
As
Cortes
locais
alemãs rejeitaram a demanda e
remeteram as partes para arbitragem, invocando o art. 1.032 do
Zivilprozessordnung, Código de
Processo Civil alemão,15 que prevê tal medida para situações em
que há convenção de arbitragem
e que, além se ser reprodução do
art. 8(1) da Lei Modelo da Uncitral, também tem um paralelo na
legislação brasileira no art. 267,
VII, do Código de Processo Civil e no art. II(3) da Convenção
de Nova York,16 da qual o Brasil é
signatário.
Contudo, o Tribunal Federal
da Alemanha (Bundesgerichtshof),
corte suprema para matérias cíveis naquele país, reverteu a decisão. Entendeu o Tribunal que a
Convenção de Arbitragem havia
se mostrado impraticável naquelas circunstâncias.
O referido art. 1.032 confere
poderes ao juízo de não remeter
as partes à arbitragem quando
a Convenção de Arbitragem for
impossível de ser exercida. Para o Tribunal, o direito ao processo estatal só seria excluído se
ficasse provado que a parte que
14 Bundesgerichtshof 14 Sept 2000, III ZR 33/00
– Case 404. Também disponível no DIS – Online
Database on Arbitration Law: <http:// www.dis-arb.de>. Acesso em: 10 maio 2014.
commencing, unless the court determines the arbitration agreement to be null and void, invalid, or
impossible to implement.
15 Art. 1.032 (1) Should proceedings be brought
before a court regarding a matter that is subject
to an arbitration agreement, the court is to dismiss the complaint as inadmissible provided the
defendant has raised the corresponding objection prior to the hearing on the merits of the case
16 II.3. O tribunal de um Estado signatário, quando de posse de ação sobre matéria com relação
à qual as partes tenham estabelecido acordo nos
termos do presente artigo, a pedido de uma delas, encaminhará as partes à arbitragem, a menos
que constate que tal acordo é nulo e sem efeitos,
inoperante ou inexequível.
50 Doutrina
o requereu provocou esse impedimento de pagar as custas em
má-fé.
É evidente que tratamos, aqui,
de um caso de teratologia. As
partes, claramente, não refletiram sobre as consequências que
a escolha da via arbitral traz para
as suas relações jurídicas. Assim,
a solução alemã nos parece acertada para o caso concreto, mas
preocupante pelo seu fundamento e pelo risco de ser utilizada como precedente em outros
casos, mesmo tratando-se de arbitragem nacional e versando
sobre um caso em que a inviabilidade da arbitragem pactuada
era evidente.
Há outra decisão, contudo,
em que essa clara inadequação
não era possível de ser vislumbrada no momento em que as
partes convencionaram a arbitragem. É uma decisão não publicada do Tribunal Comercial
de Paris17 envolvendo um contrato de franquia.
A franquia fracassou e teve um faturamento de apenas
13.000 euros nos quatro anos em
que esteve em atividade. Tal fato
tornou impossível que esta arcasse com as custas que seriam
entre 20.000 e 80.000 euros para iniciar o procedimento. O Tri-
bunal de Paris, então, entendeu
que a arbitragem seria inoperante no caso concreto, remetendo
as partes ao Judiciário.
Uma análise muito similar foi
adotada recentemente, em 2013,
no Caso Pirelli.18 Naquela oportunidade, a Cour de Cassation de
Paris anulou um laudo arbitral
CCI porque o Tribunal Arbitral
se negou a ouvir os pedidos reconvencionais apresentados pela parte requerida em virtude da
impossibilidade de o requerido
realizar o depósito prévio exigido por aquela instituição arbitral
nesse tipo de situação.
Entendeu a Corte francesa que tal fato seria ofensivo
ao princípio do acesso à justiça e da igualdade, ofendendo assim a ordem pública. Assim nos
resume o Maximin de Fontmichel19 a decisão francesa do
Caso Pirelli:
Les Hauts Magistrats posent comme solution inédite
que le refus par un tribunal
arbitral d’examiner des demandes reconventionelles ne
porte atteinte au droit d’accès a la justice et au príncipe d’égalité entre les parties
que si ces demandes sont indissociables de la demande
principale.20
Os casos acima citados não
são tão freqüentes e não se pode
afirmar que apontam para uma
tendência na interpretação dos
Tribunais europeus. A jurisprudência francesa, por exemplo,
por meio da Cour d’Appel de Paris, um órgão mais técnico que
o do caso Mil-tek , decidiu em
200521 de forma distinta das anteriormente narradas.
O litígio versava também sobre franquias e havia sido submetido a uma arbitragem sob o
regulamento da Federação de
Franquias, que continha um mecanismo de dois níveis pelo qual
os árbitros entregavam um Projeto de Sentença que não se tornava definitivo, se as partes não
apresentassem um Pedido de
Exame de Segundo Nível.
Uma das partes, a autora, não
possuindo recursos para solicitar o Exame de Segundo Nível,
teve seu “recurso” não conhecido e o Projeto de Sentença tornou-se a sentença final. A Cour
d’Appel rejeitou a ação anulatória da autora que pleiteava a nulidade do procedimento,
sob o argumento de que a falta
de recursos a privava de acesso
à justiça, sob a seguinte fundamentação: “[...] les griefs formulés par lerecourant à l’encontre
17 Caso Mil-tek Ile de France. Tribunel Commercial
de Paris. 17 maio 2011. RG 2011003447, non publié.
Apud FONTMICHEL, Maximin. Le financement de
l’arbitrage par une partie insolvable In: HAMIDA,
Walid; CLAY, Thomas (Org.). L’argent dans l’arbitrage. Paris: Éditions L’extenso, 2013. p. 40.
18 Cour de Cassation de Paris. Cass. Civ 1er, March 28, 2013, n. 392 (11-27.770).
19 FONTMICHEL, Maximin. Le financement de
l’arbitrage par une partie insolvable In: HAMIDA,
Walid; CLAY, Thomas (Org.). L’argent dans l’arbitrage. Paris: Éditions L’extenso, 2013. p. 42.
à justiça, nem ao princípio da igualdade entre as
partes se tais demandas forem indissociáveis da
demanda principal”.
20 Tradução livre: “Os altos magistrados apresentam como solução inédita que a recusa de um
tribunal arbitral de examinar as demandas reconvencionais só é atentatória ao direito de acesso
21 Cour ‘d Appel de Paris (1re ch., sect. C), 14 avril
2005, Me Stebler c/ Société La Croissanterie,
Cahiers de l’arbitrage, Recueil III, p. 359.
Doutrina 51
de l’institution d’arbitrage relèvent de leurs relations mutuelles
et sont étrangers à la qualification de la décision du tribunal
arbitral”.22
Nos Estados Unidos, temos
uma decisão da Suprema Corte,
no caso American Express Co v.
Italian Colors Restautants.23 Na
oportunidade, a Suprema Corte americana entendeu que não
existe garantia de que o processo arbitral será acessível e que
“a Lei Americana de Arbitragem
não permitia às cortes que invalidassem uma provisão contratual prevendo arbitragem, sob o
argumento de que os custos excederiam o potencial retorno da
ação”.24
Mesmo inexistindo um padrão jurisprudencial no sentido
de privar de efeitos as cláusulas arbitrais por falta de dinheiro para custear o procedimento,
tais decisões trazem, de imediato, a pergunta: seria a ausência
de fundos para custear o procedimento arbitral uma causa superveniente de nulificação da
cláusula compromissória?
A resposta, a nosso ver, é claramente negativa e tivemos
oportunidade de expor nossa
opinião em nossa tese de doutorado defendida junto á PUC/
SP25. Primeiro, por inexistir qualquer provisão legal nesse sentido
no Brasil, tampouco nos principais tratados sobre o tema, como a Convenção de Nova York de
1958.
Segundo, porque tal entendimento simplesmente esvaziaria
por completo o instituto da arbitragem, uma vez que permitiria à
parte fugir do procedimento arbitral, invocando um argumento
de difícil constatação e verificação para voltar atrás na sua escolha.
A decisão alemã, na verdade,
terminou por declarar a cláusula ineficaz por uma completa
inadequação da via eleita pelas
partes. Afinal, o custo do procedimento de solução de controvérsias era mais elevado do que a
própria disputa em si. A convenção de arbitragem era impossível
ipso facto.
Trata-se, pois, de caso absolutamente distinto da realidade
cotidiana da arbitragem comercial internacional, em que as disputas envolvem corporações
que, ao menos à época da escolha da via arbitral, possuíam
capacidade de arcar com os referidos custos.
A decisão do caso Mil-Tek, por
sua vez, seguiu a mesma lógica
da decisão alemã, porém merece
mais preocupação. Aqui, não se
estava tratando de um caso que,
a olhos vistos, não teria na arbi-
tragem uma solução apropriada.
Pelo contrário, as relações
entre franqueado e franqueadora são habitualmente resolvidas
por arbitragem em virtude de
um interesse da Rede Franqueadora em uma solução rápida e sigilosa sobre problemas com seus
franqueados. Assim, permite-se que a Rede siga normalmente, sem a delonga e o desgaste
que um processo judicial costuma trazer.
A ideia de que a incapacidade
financeira de uma parte de fazer
face aos custos da arbitragem
priva de efeitos a Convenção Arbitral parece-nos extremamente
perigosa pelo subjetivismo que a
ideia de incapacidade financeira
traz consigo. Afinal, dificuldade
financeira é algo muito recorrente, não apenas entre pessoas físicas, mas igualmente entre
grandes empresas.
Ao se estabelecer que a falta de recursos para enfrentar o
procedimento arbitral é causa
suficiente para deixar a convenção de arbitragem inoperante,
põe-se todo o instituto da arbitragem em risco.
Quando, no processo estatal,
uma parte declara que não possui recursos para arcar com as
custas judiciais sob pena de prejudicar seu próprio sustento, a
consequência disso é o Estado
22 Tradução livre: “As alegações feitas pelo recorrente contra a instituição de arbitragem dizem
respeito a suas relações mútuas e são estranhos à
análise da decisão do tribunal arbitral”.
<http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-133_19m1.pdf>. Acesso em: 9 nov. 2014.
potential recovery.”
23 Caso American Express Co v. Italian Colors
Restautants. US Supreme Court. Disponível em:
24 “The FAA does not permit courts to invalidate a contractual waiver of class arbitration on
the ground that the plaintiff’s cost of individually
arbitrating a federal statutory claim exceeds the
25 CASADO FILHO, Napoleão. Arbitragem Comercial Internacional e Acesso à Justiça : o novo paradigma do Third Party Funding. Tese de doutorado
defendida na PUC/SP em fevereiro de 2015.
52 Doutrina
custear seu processo. O processo
judicial seguirá de forma idêntica
ao que já era esperado antes de
tal declaração.
No entanto, quando tal declaração se dá para fugir da arbitragem, a consequência é muito
mais grave. O procedimento arbitral não ocorrerá. Tal fato desequilibra por completo a relação
inicialmente pactuada. É uma
reversão total, especialmente
quando tratamos de arbitragem
internacional, em que se busca,
dentro do possível, formar um
painel que não esteja ligado à jurisdição das partes signatárias.26
Ressalte-se, ainda, que a verificação sobre se a parte tem
ou não recursos é algo extremamente complexo e sujeito a disfarces contábeis. Klaus Sachs27
bem o aponta, afirmando que,
diferentemente da insolvência ou da falência, quando há
uma declaração oficial que atesta a situação jurídica, não temos
tal paralelo na impecuniosité
ou falta de recursos pura e simples, que é o problema para
a arbitragem:
(Sur la insolvabilité) Son
caractere officiel et sa procédure la distinguent clairement de l’impécuniosité,
terme plutôt vague. Une partie peut manquer des fonds
nécessaires au paiement des
coûts d’une procédure arbitrale sans pour autant être
insolvable. En raison de l’absence de toute règle établie
sur le traitement de l’impécuniosité dans l’arbitrage
international et des problèmes que pose cette absence de règlementation,
cette question est assez intéressante pour être étudiée
séparément.28
Como se vê, o problema não
é simples. As decisões francesas
Mil-Tek e Pirelli, a nosso ver, estão equivocadas. Na verdade, o
fundamento para afastar a eficácia da cláusula arbitral deve ser
a clara inadequação da via eleita
que, para tanto, deveria ser baseada não nos balanços da empresa, mas sim na natureza do
negócio. Além disso, o momento
de analisar essa adequação deve ser o da formação do negócio
jurídico.
No momento da celebração
do Contrato de Franquia, a solução arbitral era apropriada. Se o
negócio não prosperou por culpa da franqueadora ou da franqueada, trata-se do mérito do
procedimento arbitral que as
partes pactuaram. A franqueada, ao contratar a arbitragem,
deveria ter se preparado financeiramente para um eventual
conflito, em que, além das cus-
tas procedimentais de um processo arbitral, enfrentaria outras
despesas. É um custo que precisa ser refletido e alocado pelas
partes no instante da assinatura
da convenção.
Em outras palavras, a arbitragem era possível e viável no
momento em que as partes a
pactuaram. Assim, entendemos
que a cláusula deve ser entendida como válida, remetendo
as partes para o procedimento arbitral e, caso não tenha recursos naquele momento, para
entes que decidam investir em
seu caso ou outras soluções que
permitam o acesso à prestação
jurisdicional.
Pode-se ainda, argumentar que, mesmo que consideremos a cláusula como válida, ela
seria inoperante ou inexequível, atraindo, assim, a parte final do art. II.3 da Convenção de
Nova York:
3. O tribunal de um Estado signatário, quando de
posse de ação sobre matéria
com relação à qual as partes
tenham estabelecido acordo
nos termos do presente artigo, a pedido de uma delas,
encaminhará as partes à arbitragem, a menos que constate que tal acordo é nulo e
sem efeitos, inoperante ou
inexequível.
26 RACINE, Jean-Baptiste. Réflexions sur l’autonomie de l’arbitrage commercial international.
Revue de L’arbitrage, Paris, n. 2, p. 305, 2005.
28 Tradução livre: “(Sobre a insolvência) Seu caráter oficial e seu procedimento a distingue claramente da ‘falta de dinheiro’, um termo um pouco
vago. A Parte pode não ter os recursos necessários para pagar os custos de um procedimento
arbitral sem ser insolvente. Devido à ausência
de qualquer regra estabelecida no tratamento da
‘falta de dinheiro’ em arbitragem internacional e
os problemas que isso causa por falta de regulamentação, temos um tema muito interessante
para ser estudado separadamente”.
27 SACHS, Klaus. La protection de la partie faible
en Arbitrage. Gazette du Palais, n. 21, p. 24, 13 a 17
jul. 2007.
Doutrina 53
Igualmente, não nos parece
correto entender que uma cláusula compromissória que preveja
uma arbitragem que, a posteriori,
fique por demais onerosa às partes seja inoperante ou inexequível. Tal entendimento, que
sequer é possível em casos mais
graves, como o da falência29 de
uma das partes, fica ainda mais
frágil em situações de simples
falta de dinheiro.30
Ressalte-se que o texto atual
da Convenção de 1958 é, inclusive, objeto de críticas na doutrina internacional, em que Albert
Jan Van den Berg, talvez o principal estudioso da Convenção,
propôs um draft31 de uma Revisão, cujo um dos artigos, em que
é sugerida mudança na redação,
é o art. II.3. Eis a proposta de Van
den Berg:
I.3. If a dispute is brought
before a court of a Contracting State which the parties
have agreed to submit to arbitration, the court shall, at
the request of a party, refer
the dispute to arbitration,
subject to the conditions set
forth in this article.32
Perceba que Van den Berg claramente suprime as expressões
nulo e sem efeitos, inoperante ou
inexequível. Tal fato se deve, a
nosso ver, ao caráter problemático em termos interpretativos
de tais expressões.
O próprio Van den Berg,33 ao
comentar a expressão “incapable of being performed” constante no texto da Convenção,
assevera que a falta de dinheiro
(impecuniosity) não torna a cláusula inexequível no sentido dado pelo legislador internacional
ao termo:
The words “incapable of
being performed” would seem to apply to those cases
where the arbitration agreement cannot be effectively set into motion. This
may happen where the arbitral clause is too vaguely
worded, or other terms of
the contract contradict the
parties’intention to arbitrate. It would also apply to
other cases where the arbitrator named in the agreement refuses to accept his
nomination, or the appoin-
ting authority designated in
the agreement refuses to the
make the appointment of the
arbitrator. The possibility of
a lack of financial resources
to satisfy an award must be
deemed not to render an arbitration agreement incapable of being performed
within the meaning of article II (3).
O Judiciário inglês, país que
contém uma provisão em sua
Lei de Arbitragem34 muito semelhante ao art. II.3 da Convenção
de Nova York, também entendeu, recentemente, no caso
BDMS Limited v. Rafael Advanced Defence Systems,35 que a falta de dinheiro para enfrentar as
despesas de uma arbitragem ICC
não era motivo suficiente para
declarar a convenção de arbitragem nula, inoperante ou incapaz
de ser realizada.
O mesmo entendimento foi
exposto no caso Haendler & Natermann GmBH v. Janos Paczy36.
Esse viés adotado pela High
Court of London é muito semelhante ao utilizado pela Suprema Corte norte-americana
29 TJSP, Agravo de Instrumento 531.020.4/3 -00,
Desembargador Pereira Calças.
sentada a uma corte de um Estado signatário, a
Corte deve, após requisição de uma parte, direcionar a disputa à arbitragem, sujeita às condições estabelecidas neste artigo”.
incapable of being performed.
30 Cf. ainda LEVY, Laurent. Insolvency in Arbitration: Swiss Law. Financial Capacity of the parties:
a condition for the validity to Arbitration Agreements?. Berlin: Pieter Lang, 2002. p. 89-91.
31 Draft de uma Revisão na Convenção de Nova
York:
<http://www.newyorkconvention.org/
draft-convention>. Acesso em: 8 nov. 2014.
32 Tradução livre: “Se uma disputa que as partes
concordaram em submeter à arbitragem é apre-
33 VAN DEN BERG, Albert Jan. The New York Arbitration Convention of 1958: towards an uniform
judicial interpretation. The Netherlands: Kluwer,
1981. p. 159.
34 English Arbitration Act 1996 – Section 9 (4) –
On an application under this section the court
shall grant a stay unless satisfied that the arbitration agreement is null and void, inoperative, or
35 Caso BDMS Limited v Rafael Advanced Defence
Systems [2014] EWHC 451 (Comm). Comentários
sobre a decisão disponíveis em: <http://www.
internationallawoffice.com/Newsletters/Detail.
aspx?g=2f9254e8-3688-46f9-9894-7d8827d47c0b&utm_source=ILO+Newsletter+-+A%2fB+Test+-+Group+B&utm_medium=email&utm_
campaign=Arbitration+%26+ADR+Newsletter&utm_content=Newsletter+2014-10-23>.
Acesso em: 9 nov. 2014.
36 Caso Haendler & Natermann GmBH v Janos
54 Doutrina
54
no caso American Express Co. v.
Italian Colors Restaurant supramencionado, nos parece o mais
apropriado, pois preserva a convenção de arbitragem e entende
que tal incapacidade não afeta a
existência da convenção.
Parece-nos que a falta de recursos para enfrentar os custos
da arbitragem poderia ser encarada como um exemplo de ineficácia parcial superveniente da
convenção de arbitragem, pois,
embora existente e válida, a convenção encontra dificuldades
para produzir seus efeitos, de
forma semelhante às cláusulas
vazias ou patológicas.
É importante destacar que a
ausência de recursos não torna a
convenção inexequível ou inoperante. Apenas dificulta sua produção de efeitos. Nesse sentido,
tendo o legislador brasileiro buscado prestigiar o instituto da arbitragem com mecanismos como
os arts. 6.o e 7.o da Lei de Arbitragem, que preveem possibilidades
ao magistrado de suprir a vontade das partes de forma a viabilizar
o procedimento arbitral, parece-nos que estamos diante de um
fato superveniente que atrai a
possibilidade de intervenção das
cortes estatais não para declarar
nula a convenção, mas para viabilizar o procedimento arbitral.
Nesse sentido, o magistrado poderia, inclusive, alterar a
vontade inicial das partes de,
por exemplo, ter três árbitros
ou o processo administrado por
uma entidade cujo regulamento de custas torne inacessível
o procedimento.
Tal interpretação é a exata lição que nos traz Carlos Maximiliano,37 ao falar
de hermenêutica:
Desde que a interpretação
pelos processos tradicionais
conduz a injustiça flagrante, incoerências do legislador, contradição consigo
mesmo, impossibilidades ou
absurdos, deve-se presumir
que foram usadas expressões impróprias, inadequadas, e buscar um sentido
equitativo, lógico e acorde
com o sentir geral e o bem
presente e futuro da comunidade. O intérprete não traduz em clara linguagem só
o que o autor disse explícita e conscientemente; esforça-se por entender mais
e melhor do que aquilo que
se acha expresso, o que o autor inconscientemente estabeleceu, ou é de presumir
ter querido instituir ou regular, e não haver feito nos
devidos termos, por inadvertência, lapso, excessivo amor
à concisão, impropriedade
de vocábulos, conhecimento imperfeito de um insti-
tuto recente, ou por outro
motivo semelhante.
Além disso, a interpretação
dos Tribunais brasileiros tem
sido no mesmo sentido de entender que ao juiz é dada ampla liberdade para superar todos
os óbices que impedem a convenção de arbitragem de produzir seus efeitos, definindo o
conteúdo que as partes não previram, preservando-a em sua
essência.38
No nosso sentir, a incapacidade de uma das partes de
arcar com os custos do procedimento, desde que provada,
poderia, no máximo, dar margem a uma intervenção das
cortes estatais para modificar a cláusula, mas preservando
a arbitragem.
É bem verdade que a ampla liberdade do magistrado de definir o conteúdo da cláusula vazia
não vai ao limite de permitir alterar a vontade manifestada das
partes. Contudo, tal concepção
se dá nas cláusulas que podem
operar seus efeitos imediatamente. Nas que, por qualquer
motivo, tais efeitos não podem
ser produzidos, a intervenção
estatal nos parece razoável.
Não podemos deixar de mencionar que a jurisprudência brasileira, recentemente, exerceu
um papel de vanguarda no assunto de analisar a ineficácia de
Paczy. English Court of Appeals. Apud Lloyd’s Law
Reports; IX ICCA Yearbook Com. Arb. 445, 1984.
38 Conferir Caso Sagatiba e outros v. Bonagura
Processamento de Dados. Apelação cível. Ação de
instituição de arbitragem. Contrato de prestação
de serviços. Cláusula vazia ou em branco para a
solução dos litígios decorrentes do presente pacto. Instituição forçada. Definição do conteúdo do
compromisso e nomeação de árbitros (TJSP, 30.ª
Câmara de Direito Privado, Rel. Penna Machado,
j. 14.09.2014. Disponível em: <https://esaj.tjsp.jus.
br/cjsg/getArquivo.do?cdAcordao=7839173&cdForo=0>. Acesso em: 8 nov. 2014).
37 MAXIMILIANO, Carlos. Hermenêutica e aplicação do direito. 9. ed. Rio de Janeiro: Forense, 1979.
p. 166-167.
Doutrina 55
uma convenção de arbitragem
por ausência de condições financeiras para arcar com as custas.
O Tribunal de Justiça do
Rio de Janeiro, em 2014, no caso Amebrasil Construções Ltda.,39 entendeu que não cabe ao
Judiciário sequer analisar eventual alegação de ineficácia da
Convenção de Arbitragem, em
virtude do princípio da kompetenzkompetenz. Eis a decisão:
Direito processual civil. Arbitragem. Eficácia de cláusula compromissória. Alegação,
pelo autor, de que a cláusula seria ineficaz por criar
obstáculo ao acesso à justiça em razão dos custos do
processo arbitral. Aplicação do princípio KompetenzKompetenz, por força do qual
incumbe ao árbitro ou ao tribunal arbitral examinar sua
própria competência e as
questões atinentes a existência, validade e eficácia da convenção de arbitragem. Correta
extinção do processo sem resolução do mérito. Apelação
desprovida. Honorários de sucumbência. Valor fixado pelo
juízo que se revela adequado
quando considerados os critérios estabelecidos nos §§ 3.º e
4.º do art. 20 do CPC. Apelo do
réu desprovido.
O caso versava sobre uma arbitragem ICC, em que, segundo
o voto do relator, os custos seriam da ordem de trinta e oito
mil dólares,40 para um benefício
de cento e quarenta e oito mil
dólares. O Tribunal, mesmo tecendo alguns comentários sobre
a capacidade das partes de arcar
com tais custos, preferiu por não
apreciar a matéria, por entender que esta deveria primeiro ser
submetida ao Tribunal Arbitral.
Embora
sejam
elogiáveis o caráter pró-arbitragem
e o respeito ao princípio do
kompetenz-kompetenz (cf. Capítulo 2, item 2.3), entendemos que
a solução final poderia ser outra,
caso as partes tivessem uma estratégia igualmente diferente.
Com efeito, entendemos ser
relevante resguardar a convenção de arbitragem em quaisquer situações (e o TJRJ assim
procedeu). Além disso, é importante que as partes se eduquem no tocante à arbitragem
e compreendam que é um mecanismo privado e que tem
seus custos.
Contudo, ao buscar no Judiciário o afastamento da Cláusula de Arbitragem, as partes, a
nosso ver, procuraram uma via
equivocada. Caso tivessem manejado a Ação de Instauração de
Arbitragem prevista no art. 7.o da
Lei 9.307/1996, solicitando a intervenção estatal para adequar a
cláusula arbitral para a situação
contenciosa apresentada, a solução talvez fosse distinta.
39 Caso Amebrasil Construções Ltda. (TJRJ, 2.ª Câmara Cível, Ap. Cível 0031966-20.2010.8.19.0209,
Rel. Des. Alexandre Freitas Câmara, j. 06.2014.
Disponível em: <http://www1.tjrj.jus.br/gedcacheweb/default.aspx?UZIP=1&GEDID=0004A2BBBEF6500EC33729E418B69118230E-
C50314621B4F>. Acesso em: 8 nov. 2014).
trônica 00329), o custo aproximado do processo
arbitral seria da ordem de trinta e oito mil dólares
(conforme se pode verificar pelo emprego do Cost
calculator que pode ser encontrado no website da
Câmara de Comércio Internacional”.
40 Trecho do voto do relator: “Considerando o
valor que a própria apelante indica como lhe sendo devido, equivalente a pouco mais de cento e
quarenta e oito mil dólares (fls. 317 – pasta ele-
D) O investimento de terceiros em arbitragem
O Sistema da Arbitragem, como sistema de solução de conflitos privado que é, traz também
outra solução para o problema da falta de recursos para
arcar com as custas do procedimento: o Third Party Funding,
ou investimento de terceiros no
processo arbitral.
Por meio deste fenômeno,
terceiros, externos ao procedimento arbitral, se envolvem com
este para financiar a solução do
conflito, adiantando custas de
Câmaras Arbitrais, honorários de
advogados e de árbitros e, enfim,
todas as despesas necessárias ao
desenrolar do procedimento. Em
troca, o terceiro recebe parte
substancial dos direitos eventualmente recebidos pela parte financiada, sendo, portanto, uma
operação de financiamento
de risco.
Por meio de negociação, define-se a parcela dos direitos
destinada a cada uma das partes (financiada e financiador).
O investimento pode ocorrer
em qualquer parte do procedimento (antes, durante ou mesmo após a entrega da sentença
arbitral, especialmente em arbitragens internacionais em que é
56 Doutrina
arbitral são altos e é importante
que as Partes estejam cientes disso. Contudo, a eficácia do instituto da arbitragem, tão útil para as
empresas e para o próprio Judiciário está em xeque. Surgem decisões em países que são referência
no mundo da arbitragem que entendem que a falta de condições
financeiras45 para suportar os
custos de um procedimento arbitral são motivo suficiente para
privar de efeitos a convenção de
arbitragem. Boa parte dessas decisões se fundamentam na ideia
de Acesso à Justiça, valor fundamental no sistema judicial de solução de conflitos.
Entendemos que tal solução
é perigosa e atécnica. As partes
precisam arcar com os custos e
consequências de suas escolhas.
Em situações extremas, em que
as partes claramente se equivocaram relativamente à escolha do
procedimento arbitral, elegendo, por exemplo, um tribunal com
três ou mais árbitros e uma Câmara de renome e com elevados
custos, entendemos que a falta de
recursos pode ser caracterizada
com uma causa superveniente de
esvaziamento da cláusula arbitral.
No Brasil, tal situação atrairia a jurisdição estatal não paE) Conclusão
ra julgar o conflito, mas sim para
Os custos de um procedimento suprir a vontade das partes, com-
necessário executar a sentença
em outra jurisdição).
Yves Derains41 assim definiu o
fenômeno:
It’s a scheme where a party unconnected to a claim
finances all or part of one
parties’ arbitration costs, in
most cases the claimant. The
funder is remunerated by
an agreed porcentage of the
proceeds of the award, a success fee, a combination of the
two or through more sophisticated devices. In the case of
an unfavourable award, the
funder’s investment is lost.42
Evidentemente, diversos problemas podem advir da entrada
de um terceiro no procedimento
arbitral. Tanto a confidencialidade, quanto a imparcialidade dos
árbitros podem ser impactadas.
Contudo, a experiência internacional43 e até mesmo nacional44
tem se mostrado bastante eficaz
na utilização desse mecanismo
para superar a falta de recursos
de uma das partes em custear o
litígio. Também, em nossa tese
de doutorado, tivemos oportunidade de expor com mais detalhes
os problemas de tal solução e sua
adequação do direito brasileiro.
41 Prefácio do Livro ICC Dossier: Third-party
funding in International Arbitration. In: CREMADES, Bernardo; DIMOLITSA, Antonias. Dossiers –
ICC. Paris, 2013. p. 5.
42 Tradução livre: “É um esquema em que uma
parte desconectada a uma ação financia toda ou
parte dos custos de arbitragem de uma parte, na
maioria dos casos o requerente. O financiador é
plementando a cláusula, de forma a viabilizá-la. Caberia, então,
às partes recorrer à ação prevista no art. 7.o da Lei de Arbitragem para requerer ao juiz estatal
que alterasse a cláusula extremamente onerosa, determinando
métodos mais compatíveis com
o litígio ou com a situação financeira das partes, como a adoção
de árbitro único e a indicação de
instituição com regulamento de
custas mais compatível com a situação financeira das partes.
Poderiam, ainda, as partes,
recorrer aos investidores em arbitragem (Third Party Funders).
Tal possibilidade é plenamente
compatível com o Direito brasileiro e precisa ser utilizada como
ferramenta primeira no momento de dificuldade financeira.
* Napoleão Casado Filho
Doutor em Direito Internacional
pela PUC/SP. Pesquisador
visitante na Société de Législation
Comparée (Université Paris II).
Fellow do Chartered Institute of
Arbitrators de Londres. Coach do
time da PUC/SP em competições
internacionais de arbitragem
desde 2007. Árbitro indicado nas
listas da Hong Kong International
Arbitration Center, Eurocâmaras e
CAM/FIEP. Advogado em São Paulo,
sócio de Clasen, Caribe & Casado
Filho Sociedade de Advogados.
remunerado por uma percentagem dos resultados da sentença arbitral, uma taxa de sucesso,
uma combinação desses dois métodos ou por um
meio mais sofisticado. Em caso de sentença desfavorável, o investimento do investidor é perdido”.
nacionais.
43 Alguns fundos de investimento internacionais
como Burford Capital e Calunius Capital têm se
especializado em financiar litígios arbitrais inter-
45 “Impecuniosité” em francês ou “impecuniosity”
em inglês.
44 No Brasil, temos notícia de que a Sociedade
São Paulo de Investimentos tem financiado procedimentos arbitrais.
Acesse nosso site e confira
datas de eventos, publicações
e muito mais.
www.ibdce.com
Doutrina 57
comercialista.ibdce.com
facebook.com/revistacomercialista

Gary Born

Transcrição

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