Biography
Mr. Rivkin is an independent arbitrator affiliated with Arbitration Chambers in New York, London and Hong Kong. For more than 40 years, Mr. Rivkin practiced private and public international law at Debevoise & Plimpton LLP, where he served as Co-Chair of its International Dispute Resolution Group for more than 20 years and was a founder of its Business Integrity/ESG Group. He now serves as a full-time arbitrator and mediator focusing on complex international commercial arbitrations and investor-state disputes.
Mr. Rivkin has long been recognized as a global leader in international arbitration. Chambers Global 2022 identified him as one of the top 10 arbitration practitioners worldwide.
Chambers publications have described him as “the best arbitration practitioner anywhere” and “a true giant in the field, whose depth of knowledge is incredible.”
In 2015-16, Mr. Rivkin served as President of the International Bar Association. whose membership includes more than 100,000 members and 200 bar associations. He was the first American to serve in that position in 25 years. As IBA President, he focused on issues such as judicial integrity, business and human rights, climate justice, human trafficking, corruption, and the independence of the legal profession. He previously served in the IBA as chair of the Legal Practice Division, which includes more than 50 substantive committees, and of the Committee on Arbitration and ADR. He currently serves as a Trustee of eyeWitness to Atrocities, which the IBA launched while he was President.
In addition, Mr. Rivkin has held prominent positions in arbitration institutions, government committees and other NGOs across the world. He worked on initial government efforts to encourage alternative dispute resolution under NAFTA and advised on negotiations to create a worldwide judgments convention, US sanctions policy and nuclear deterrence. He has served in leadership positions in arbitration institutions on virtually every continent. Currently, he is the Co-Chair of the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre and on the Council of the International Council for Arbitration in Sport and the Mumbai Centre for International Arbitration, and on the Court of the MCCI Mediation and Arbitration Centre in Mauritius.
He is a member of the Council of the American Law Institute, for which he is an advisor to the Restatement of the Law of International Arbitration, and a councillor to the Restatement of Foreign Relations Law. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and serves on the Advisory Board of the Commonwealth Climate Law Initiative. He also serves on the Boards of the Human Trafficking Legal Center and the James Beard Foundation.
For a more complete description of experience, see https://arbchambers.com/arbitrators/david-w-rivkin?lang=en.
