Arbitration, also known as composition, refers to a dispute resolution mechanism in which, before or after a dispute arises, the parties to the dispute reach an agreement, pursuant to which they voluntarily submit the dispute to a third party for adjudication.

  In the early days, arbitration was generally conducted in the private sector and was purely folk, and the parties to arbitration were highly autonomous. As a legal system, arbitration began in the Middle Ages. It was not until the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century that arbitration was popularized in the whole world, forming arbitration in the modern sense, with the development of commodity economy and international economics and trade.

  As one of the first arbitration institutions in seven pilot cities, China’s Guangzhou Arbitration Commission came into being after the promulgation of the Arbitration Law of the People’s Republic of China in 1995. In the first few years after its establishment, Guangzhou Arbitration Commission accepted only 100 cases with amount of subject matter of only several hundred million yuan every year in average. Later, Guangzhou Arbitration Commission has achieved leapfrog development with the continuous improvement of its credibility. According to the data published by the Legislative Affairs Office of the State Council, Guangzhou Arbitration Commission has been ranked among the top three in the country for many consecutive years in terms of the number of cases and the amount of subject matter, and has ranked first in the country for eight consecutive years in terms of the number of cases involving foreign, Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan matter/party.

  As a kind of public legal service, arbitration has the characteristics such as agreed jurisdiction, no territoriality, full respect for the parties’ autonomy, expert adjudication, final award and extensive extraterritorial enforceability, and has unique advantages in resolving international commercial disputes. Arbitral awards can be recognized and enforced in 159 countries in the world according to the New York Convention, which means that arbitration is the best mechanism for resolving commercial disputes in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and under the “Belt and Road Initiative”. With the optimization of service quality and the improvement of credibility, arbitration will play a more prominent role in diversified dispute resolution mechanisms.