The Potential Implementation of Collective Arbitration in Europe

This article analyses the feasibility and the potential implementation of collective arbitration in Europe. Although arbitration has reached a significant success in Europe, up to this date this mechanism has not been used to settle collective disputes yet, as there are many barriers hindering its implementation. But class arbitration is being successful in other parts of the world (especially in the United States) and, therefore, its feasibility should not be rejected. In fact, the EU bodies recommend the Member States to consider the possibility to settle collective disputes by out-of-court proceedings. This article considers both the obstacles and the benefits of this kind of arbitration, and includes some proposals. This work concludes with the only two sorts of collective arbitration systems implemented in Europe: the Spanish Consumer Collective Arbitration System and the German Corporate Arbitration System ruled by the German Arbitration Institution (DIS).