Heavy Arbitration Week - HAW
"Arbitration is the future,” the retired judge (HMJ) declares. The future, apparently, involves a lot of expensive conferences in five-star hotels, and panelists who agree on everything. The actual practitioners are probably at home, actually arbitrating.
Published on: 6 October 2025, 05:24 am
THE COFFEE TASTES LIKE LIQUID CARDBOARD but it's free, so I take another sip. I'm sitting in the back row of yet another arbitration conference. The famous white man has taken the stage. Third conference this month. Same PowerPoint, same jokes about “navigating international waters” – a metaphor he loves to overuse. It always sounds funny in his accent though. I laugh.
He's promoting his new book. The one with the generic title about arbitration and global practice. Same one whose cover probably cost more to design than how much most of us make in a month.
I look around. Lots of lawyers in sharp suits. All of us pretending this is groundbreaking stuff. One half networking. The other half on their phones. After all, there’s a long time before India becomes the new global hub for arbitration.
The conference bag sits beside me. A cheap tote with the sponsor's logo - some arbitration institute I've never heard of but apparently desperately needed to exist. Inside: a thick dry pen that doesn't work, a notebook I'm using to write this piece on – with the Oberoi pencil, and a pamphlet for another conference – next month.
The arbitration industrial complex is alive and thriving.
The conference bag sits beside me. A cheap tote with the sponsor's logo - some arbitration institute I've never heard of but apparently desperately needed to exist.
"Arbitration is the future,” the retired judge (HMJ) declares. The future, apparently, involves a lot of expensive conferences in five-star hotels where we discuss how arbitration is more efficient than litigation.
The panellists are the usual suspects - the academic who's never practiced, the practitioner who's never written anything academic, and the arbitrator who's somehow both while being neither. They agree on everything while pretending to have different perspectives. It's like watching a very expensive, very boring kabuki in kimono. Go figure!
My notes from the morning session read: Efficiency. Innovation. Global reach. Paradigm shift. Best practices. Basic arbitration lingo. If someone mentions thinking “outside the box”, I’ll do a cartwheel right here! No I won’t.
Say what you will, there’s definitely a charm to arbitration. It feels exclusive and sophisticated. International. Even if domestic. There's a new arbitration centre opening every month. Every city wants its own arbitration institute. Every law firm wants an “arbitration practice”. Mine does too!
The woman next to me is taking notes furiously. She looks fresh out of law school, all earnest ambition and color-coded highlighting. I want to tell her that half these “thought leaders” on stage have never actually conducted an arbitration that wasn't a training exercise. But she'll figure that out in a few years. Or she'll become one of them. Either way, not my problem!
“The next speaker needs no introduction,” announces the moderator, who then proceeds to give a five-minute introduction anyway. It's always the speakers who most need introductions. The actual practitioners are probably at home, actually arbitrating. I wouldn’t know. I am no legend.
My phone buzzes. A WhatsApp from a colleague: “Stuck in another HAW session. Kill me now.” At least I'm not alone in my suffering – or my hypocrisy. No one forced us to be here BTW!