Resolving Disputes in China: New and Sometimes Unpredictable Developments

China has been continuously making progress to improve its arbitration environment over the past several years. In the context of the Belt and Road Initiative (the bri), the Chinese government expressly called for judicial support for alternative dispute resolution in China, including international arbitration. In response, the Supreme People’s Court of China (spc) issued several judicial documents by the end of 2017 in order to standardize and improve Chinese judiciaries’ review of arbitration-related matters. Furthermore, innovative measures were taken with respect to China’s Free Trade Zones (ftz) concerning redefinition of foreign-related factors, which had an impact on whether foreign-invested enterprises in China could submit their disputes to arbitration abroad, and under what circumstances to permit ad hoc arbitration in China. Various Chinese arbitration institutions have also updated their arbitration service. The establishment of the China International Commercial Court (the cicc) is also a notable development as it seeks to integrate and streamline the mechanisms of litigation, arbitration and mediation. It also features such innovations as an expert committee,