AI and International Adjudication: Empirical Insights

This article examines empirically the actual use and perceptions regarding the use of artificial intelligence (AI) in international arbitration and adjudication. International judicial institutions have long been criticized for procedural inefficiency, excessive costs, limited accessibility, and allegations of bias. While AI is often framed as a tool to enhance efficiency, its potential significance is broader, as it may also help address legitimacy challenges that have undermined international tribunals. At the same time, AI raises concerns around accountability, fairness, and the risk of embedding bias in technological systems, which can weaken legitimacy. How AI is introduced into international adjudication, and how it is perceived by the professionals who sustain these institutions, will be central to whether it strengthens or erodes legitimacy. We surveyed practitioners of international arbitration and adjudication to investigate both the actual use of AI tools and attitudes towards their adoption across different functions that AI can fulfill in the work of international lawyers and tribunals. We looked into how perceptions of fairness, efficiency and accessibility, use of AI and participation in developing legal AI tools, as well as different demographic characteristics, predict the willingness to adopt AI and regard AI as being able to substitute for a human professional. Our findings show that AI is currently used primarily for technical tasks and enjoys broader acceptance in efficiency-oriented roles. Moreover, support for adoption of AI in both technical and substantive functions is driven primarily by perceptions of fairness, while efficiency and accessibility play only a minor role. Certain demographic characteristics such as gender and general use of AI were also influential. The future of AI in international adjudication therefore depends less on technical capacity and more on whether its integration reinforces fairness, accountability, and legitimacy.