Paper's abstract

David Chekroun, The Arbitral Imperium
It is taught that judges exercise the power of jurisdictio, to decide on a point of law, as well as the power of imperium, the power to enforce the decision. On the contrary, it is said that arbitrators, do not have the power of imperium, because they are unable to grant orders enforcing their awards binding the parties.
However, the principle whereby arbitrators do not have the power of imperium must be qualified due to the fact that imperium may be divided into imperium mixtum, imperium merum and imperium summum. The imperium summum is the concrete application of the principle territorial sovereignty of the State. The imperium merum is the absolute power of judges to give orders to litigants and to national authorities such as notaries and officials bailiff. On the other hand, the imperium mixtum is a form of intellectual exhortation that does not imply any kind of concrete constraint. It is the latter manifestation of imperium that might be attributed to the arbitrators if certain conditions are met.
In fact, arbitrators do possess a part of the imperium mixtum if there is an implicit authorization of the parties and an explicit recognition by States.



Key Words : imperium, arbitration, jurisdictio
t. 52, 2009 : p. 135-180

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