Procedural issues in international commercial arbitration

International commercial arbitration is based on party autonomy, which is also the guiding principle for the conduct of the arbitral proceedings. Due to the judicial function exercised by arbitral tribunals, which is almost equivalent to that of state courts, there are certain minimum requirements of due process which have to be maintained throughout the arbitral process. These include, in particular, the right to be heard, the right to a neutral decision-maker and the right to be treated equally. While the existence and the limiting function of these principles of procedural due process are recognized worldwide, their interplay with party autonomy, the wide discretion of the arbitral tribunal in shaping the arbitral procedure and the need to guarantee an effective procedure differs from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. How the conflicting principles are balanced is dependent in part on the procedural tradition of each particular jurisdiction.