Regulating Arbitration Through Criminal Law: An Empirical Exploration of the Criminal Prosecution of Arbitrators in Mainland China

The arbitration community has traditionally argued that arbitrators should be shielded from criminal liability for actions performed in their professional capacity. However, a global trend has emerged wherein criminal law is increasingly used to regulate arbitrators’ behavior. Central to the debate on the extent of arbitrators’ immunity from criminal prosecution are questions of whether such immunity is necessary to ensure the fairness of arbitral proceedings and the degree to which arbitrators can be trusted to fulfil their professional responsibilities. Although this topic has been extensively debated in legal scholarship, there has been a notable lack of empirical research on the implementation and effectiveness of these criminal provisions. This study addresses this gap by examining Mainland China’s use of criminal law to regulate arbitration. China is a particularly relevant case study due to its adoption of a controversial provision titled “Perversion of Law in Arbitration” in 2006. Critics have argued that the broadly defined language of this provision could be susceptible to abuse, potentially undermining the integrity of arbitral proceedings. By analyzing twenty-seven cases of criminal prosecution against arbitrators in China, this research evaluates whether the critics’ concerns have materialized in practice. The findings suggest that this provision has not been used in Mainland China to improperly influence arbitral decision‑making.