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IBA guides and reports
As well as journals, committee publications, podcasts, books and other content, the IBA also publishes a wealth of information across all aspects of law to assist and support the international legal community.
Here you can find a library of freely accessible PDF documents, from ethical principles for the profession, to arbitration guidelines; task force reports on important issues and IBA statements and resolutions. Click on the tabs below to view relevant documents to that section.
If you can’t find what you’re looking for, check the committee publications and projects pages, or contact publications@int-bar.org
- Practice rules and guidelines
- Standards, principles and ethics
- Task forces and working groups
- Student resources
- Committee Projects
Practice rules and guidelines
Alternative Dispute Resolution
ARBITRATION
On 17 December 2020, the International Bar Association adopted the revised IBA Rules on the Taking of Evidence in International Arbitration, which supersede those of 1999 and 2010. In the absence of contrary indication, the revised rules will apply to all arbitrations in which the parties agree to apply the IBA Rules after 17 December 2020, whether as part of new arbitration agreements or in determining the rules of procedure in a pending or future arbitration.
Click below to select a language to download the Rules (2020):
Commentary on the Rules (2020): Click below to select a language to download
On 29 May 2010, the International Bar Association adopted the revised IBA Rules on the Taking of Evidence in International Arbitration, which superseded those of 1999. This version of the rules was superseded in 2020. These rules apply to all arbitrations in which the parties agree to apply the IBA Rules after 29 May 2010 and before 17 December 2020, whether as part of new arbitration agreements or in determining the rules of procedure in a pending or future arbitration.
Click below to select a language to download the Rules (2010):
The Guidelines on Conflicts of Interest represent the most comprehensive work to date defining the framework by which the impartiality of arbitration in the international arena can be most effectively assured. The publication sets out a series of seven general standards of independence and disclosure to govern the selection, appointment and continuing role of an arbitrator. The most recent version of the Guidelines was adopted by resolution of the IBA Council on Thursday 23 October 2014. This version updates and clarifies the original Guidelines, which were approved by the Council of the IBA on 22 May 2004. The Guidelines are intended for use around the world.
A clerical error was detected in paragraph 3.1.5 of the Orange List of the revised IBA Guidelines on Conflicts of Interest in International Arbitration. In paragraph 3.1.5, the expression “on a related issue” (which was part of that paragraph in the 2004 Guidelines and was mistakenly deleted during the review process) has been reestablished so that paragraph 3.1.5 now reads as follows:
“The arbitrator currently serves, or has served within the past three years, as arbitrator in another arbitration on a related issue involving one of the parties, or an affiliate of one of the parties”.
Select a language to download the Guidelines
The IBA Arbitration Committee and its Task Force on Counsel Conduct have produced guidelines for party representation and counsel conduct in international arbitration.
The IBA Guidelines on Party Representation in International Arbitration are inspired by the principle that party representatives should act with integrity and honesty and should not engage in activities designed to produce unnecessary delay or expense, including tactics aimed at obstructing the arbitration proceedings.
Select a language to download the Guidelines
The IBA Guidelines for Drafting International Arbitration Clauses were approved by the IBA Council in October 2010. The Guidelines were developed by a Task Force appointed by the Arbitration Committee and composed of Paul Friedland (chair), Doak Bishop, Karim Hafez, Adriano Jucà, Carole Malinvaud, Sundaresh Menon, Jean-Claude Najar, William (Rusty) Park, Anne-Véronique Schlaepfer, Eduardo Silva Romero, Stephen E Smith, Matthew Weiniger and Damien Nyer (Secretary).
Select a language to download the Guidelines
International arbitrators should be impartial, independent, competent, diligent and discreet. These rules seek to establish the manner in which these abstract qualities may be assessed in practice. Rather than rigid rules, they reflect internationally ·acceptable guidelines developed by practising lawyers from all continents. They will attain their objectives only if they are applied in good faith.
Mediation
The IBA Rules for Investor-State Mediation were adopted by a resolution of the IBA Council on 04 October 2012. The rules are designed for the mediation of investment-related disputes involving States or State entities, only applying when the mediating parties have both agreed that these rules shall apply. They govern the commencement and conduct of the mediation process, as well as the designation, resignation and role of mediators and co-mediators. Also included in the document are rules protecting the principles of independence and impartiality of mediators, privacy and confidentiality, and settlement or termination of the mediation process.
Bar Associations and Law Societies
The 13-page document entitled IBA Anti-Corruption Guidance for Bar Associations: Creating, Developing and Promoting Anti-Corruption Initiatives for the Legal Profession was drafted by the IBA’s Legal Projects Team in conjunction with an expert consultation group comprised of members of the IBA Bar Issues Commission, and the IBA Anti-Corruption Committee.
Read more about the IBA LPRU Anti-Corruption Strategy for the Legal Profession
This handbook was written to help IBA Member Bars (and all bar associations) who may be approached by the trade negotiators from their own countries. It provides everything a bar would need to know about:
- the substantive provision of the GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services);
- how the GATS' substantive provisions apply in the context of legal services;
- what has happened since the adoption of the GATS and its relevance to legal services;
- where the debates have occurred with respect to legal services (and to give you a flavour of the disagreements); and
- the developments that IBA Member Bars might be asked to respond to.
The handbook has been prepared and compiled by Professor Laurel Terry, and the International Trade in Legal Services Committee of the IBA's Bar Issues Commission.
The BIC International Trade in Legal Services (ITILS) Committee sponsored, with funding from the PPID Activity Fund, the preparation of a toolkit of practical information for bars and other competent authorities for domestic lawyer regulation as it relates to international trade in legal services. This includes, for example, models of lawyer cooperation with foreign law firms and other types of legal business, case studies, frequently asked questions, common issues or concerns and transitional options, that bars can use in addressing regulatory issues affecting cross-border legal practice.
Access the toolkitGlobalisation has had a significant impact on the legal profession. Today, more lawyers than ever are crossing national borders, virtually and physically, to serve clients’ needs. These numbers will continue to increase. With this growth in cross-border legal practice, in the interests of, and to enhance client and public protection, lawyer accountability and cooperation between the regulatory authorities in each relevant jurisdiction has become even more important.
Access the GuidelinesGuidelines authored by a Working Group of the IBA Bar Issues Commission Policy Committee and by the IBA Legal Policy & Research Unit
Standards, principles and ethics
Task forces and working groups
IBA Covid-19 Legal Policy Task Force
The IBA Covid-19 Task Force examined the impact of the pandemic on international legal systems, recognised the successes and failings of those systems in dealing with the outbreak and made practical recommendations for reforming existing laws or promulgating new ones to improve the global response to pandemics.
The IBA Covid-19 Task Force examined the impact of the pandemic on international legal systems, recognised the successes and failings of those systems in dealing with the outbreak and made practical recommendations for reforming existing laws or promulgating new ones to improve the global response to pandemics.
IBA Presidential Task Force on Cybersecurity
This report forms part of the International Bar Association’s (IBA’s) ongoing work on cybersecurity. The IBA Presidential Task Force on Cybersecurity (the ‘Task Force’) has the objective of: producing a set of recommended best practices to help law firms: to protect themselves from breaches of data security; assisting their ability to keep operations running if a breach of data security or ransom attack does occur; giving their clients the best possible assurances that their data is protected; and helping protect the reputation of the profession.
Presidential Task Force on Climate Change Justice and Human Rights
Addressing global climate change requires many solutions. Recent citizen climate litigation has led to judges in some countries requiring governments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or take other steps to protect communities from climate impacts. Unfortunately, in many jurisdictions there are legal obstacles preventing citizens from even getting through the courthouse door. Judges are also experiencing difficulties adapting existing judicial procedures to remedy government climate inaction.
The new Model Statute would lower such hurdles. Building on recent successes and judicial reasoning, it highlights the role of litigation in setting requirements for governments to protect the public. With the advice of leading experts, the Model Statute provides detailed rationales, precedents and 23 specific Articles for reforms.
Global climate change is a defining challenge of our time. Dramatic alterations to the planet’s climate system are already affecting the world’s inhabitants and its natural environment.
This wide-ranging and comprehensive report from the IBA Presidential Task Force on Climate Change Justice and Human Rights identifies problems and gaps in existing legal, human rights, trade and other institutional arrangements. It contains a series of new ideas and recommendations to governments and world institutions, such as the World Trade Organization, human rights bodies, international development financing agencies, as well as specific law and corporate governance reforms to aid in the prevention and mitigation of climate change impacts and protect the human rights of vulnerable communities.
IBAHRI Task Force on Illicit Financial Flows, Poverty and Human Rights
This report addresses global taxation from the novel perspective of human rights law and policy. Based on extensive consultation from diverse perspectives, the expert Task Force offers unique insight into the links between tax abuses, poverty and human rights.
The report analyses the responsibilities and remedies to counter tax abuse and delivers recommendations for states, businesses and the legal profession.
Presidential Task Force on the Financial Crisis
Following on from the work of the IBA Presidential Task Force on the Financial Crisis in 2009/10, the Second Phase of the Task Force has released Poverty, Justice and the Rule of Law, an in-depth report on the aftermath of the GFC and its effect on poverty, employment, welfare and good governance, featuring contributions from leading lawyers and academics including four Nobel laureates.
This report features an overview of the work of the Task Force from its Chair, Hendrik Haag, as well as updates on regulation from diverse jurisdictions: the US, the UK, Germany, Switzerland, France, Spain, Japan and Russia.
This interim report looks into causes and potential solutions to the problems confronting the world's financial markets and those who depend on the resumption of an efficient and appropriate global market system.
It conveys the preliminary views of the Task Force on legal responses to the crisis, pending the publication of the full Task Force report scheduled for October 2010.
Task Force on International Terrorism
The IBAHRI convened a Task Force, comprising world-famous jurists, in order to analyse the considerable developments in international law and practice.The events of 9/11 set governments and international law-making bodies a number of complex and novel legal challenges in terms of responding to global terrorism whilst protecting people’s fundamental rights and freedoms.
In 2003, a Terrorism Task Force was formed to analyse the challenges posed by international terrorism. The Task Force draw on the expertise of its high-profile members, the input from specialised IBAHRI working groups and information gained during meetings with high-level officials around the world. The report focuses on key areas including: civil liberties and human rights; the use of force as a response to terrorism; preventing the financing of terrorism and international cooperation in criminal justice; and the role of the ICC.
IBA Legal Practice Division Task Force on Extraterritorial Jurisdiction
The Task Force was formed to focus on two important questions:
- When should a state be able to regulate persons or conduct occurring outside its territory?
- How should overlaps or conflicts of jurisdiction between two or more states be resolved?
The report responds to these questions by laying out the principles governing extraterritoriality, and by providing recommendations for governments, courts, international organisations and businesses on methods for minimising costs and conflicts associated with extraterritorial exercises of jurisdiction. The report focuses in particular on competition and antitrust law, tort law, criminal law, securities law, insolvency law, bribery and corruption.
Working group: UNIDROIT Principles
Four IBA committees (International Commerce and Distribution, Arbitration, Litigation and Corporate M&A Law) and the European Regional Forum, created a working group of 51 specialised practitioners, advocates, arbitrators, professors, former judges, corporate counsel and transactional lawyers from 28 countries. Its aim was to give their views on the practice of the 2016 UNIDROIT Principles. What the Working Group’s members all have in common is their expertise and enthusiasm for facilitating the international practice of law.
This book, Perspectives in Practice of the UNIDROIT Principles 2016, represents the culmination of the Working Group’s efforts. The first half of the book comprises country perspective reports describing the application of the UNIDROIT Principles in their respective jurisdictions. The reader can use these reports in international cases, to get a sense of the background thinking of those involved.
The second half of the book contains compiled summaries of selected cases, consisting of a collection of over 250 summaries of court and arbitration cases where the UNIDROIT Principles were referred to or relied on either by the parties themselves or by the arbitrators or judges. The members of the IBA Working Group have compiled these summaries to illustrate the manner in which domestic courts and international tribunals apply the UNIDROIT Principles to the resolution of real disputes.
Given the wide scope of the book, readers may wish to download the distinct parts of the book separately instead, and for this purpose the book is also divided into separate PDFs, displayed below the full version.
FULL VERSION - Perspectives in Practice of the UNIDROIT Principles 2016
Download full version
Acknowledgements, Foreword and Members of the Working Group – pp 2-8
Download pp 2-8
Country Perspectives - pp 9-140
Download pp 9-140
Compiled Summaries of Selected Cases - pp 141-324
Download pp 141-324
Annex 1: UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts 2016 - pp 325-372
Download pp 325-372
Annex 2: Model Clauses for Use of UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts – pp 373-388
Download pp 373-388
Student resources
The IBA’s ICC Moot Court Manual
The IBA has developed a moot court manual containing five exercises to introduce students to the work of the International Criminal Court.
In these exercises, students are given an ICC judgment involving events that happened during a civil war in a fictional country. During the conflict, a large number of war crimes were committed that were so serious the ICC in The Hague wants to put people on trial for them. Student Members can gain access to these materials and guidance notes, allowing them to stage their own small scale moot court exercise.
Committee projects
This report, published by the Art, Cultural Institutions and Heritage Law Committee, provides an overview of the restrictions on the export of cultural property and artwork in 14 jurisdictions. The report covers each jurisdiction’s respective restrictions, the protections provided to cultural property, the consequences in case of violation of export restrictions and restitution and repatriation of illegally exported cultural property.
The Corporate and M&A Law Committee has produced a guide covering the highly relevant topic of foreign investment control across 29 countries. This guide is intended to offer practitioners easy access to the relevant applicable rules, answering, in a consistent fashion across jurisdictions, the most frequently raised questions in relation to foreign direct investment rules relevant to M&A transactions.
This report was commissioned by the IBA Rule of Law Forum to provide a handy overview to assist lawyers in understanding how courts in various countries adapted during Covid-19. The report is organised as a survey that covers how courts in each country covered generally managed filings/document intake, discovery, and hearings – including the use of social distancing, hygiene and virtual hearings – during the pandemic.
The Corporate and M&A Law Committee has updated its negotiated M&A guides with chapters from more than 40 countries. The negotiated M&A guides deal with negotiated acquisitions of private companies and are aimed at providing a general overview of acquisition structure options and the essential provisions contained in a standard acquisition agreement in each jurisdiction.
This report analyses the data from a study on Latin American law firms and Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) issues. ESG issues have taken the corporate world by storm ever since the UN adopted the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015. The newest generation of investors is pressing for sustainable growth, and it is obvious that ESG is not merely a fashionable trend but instead a permanent issue to be addressed by lawmakers.
This report of the IBA Investment Arbitration Subcommittee examines the mechanisms and strategies available to the parties to calibrate the time, effort, and financial resources mobilised and invested to arbitrate small value investment claims in a manner that is commensurate with the sums at stake.
This collection of articles from the Criminal Law Section reflects how, more and more over recent years, criminal law is becoming not only a matter of judicial defence of a case but also, especially in the corporate world, a matter of preventing misconducts and, in the case of those that have been committed, a matter of prompt and effective collection of items of evidence for their ascertainment.
The Taxes Committee published its annual update on tax developments by jurisdiction for 2022, featuring over 30 jurisdictions.
The Corporate and M&A Law Committee has prepared a minority shareholder rights guide with chapters for over 20 countries around the world. This guide is intended as a high-level, practical guide for practitioners who are looking for an introduction to the laws of each relevant jurisdiction relating to the rights of, and protections for, minority shareholders.
The IBA has launched the Women Lawyers' Committee: Mentorship Toolkit (the Toolkit) with the aim of empowering female legal professionals and addressing the gender representation gap at senior levels. With global organisations revealing the business case to address gender disparity, the Toolkit is launched into an environment where there has been an increased focus and shift in perspective on gender equality.
Through this compendium, the IBA Arb40 Subcommittee offers its own contribution to tackling concerns around costs and efficiency. Although there may be many different reasons why inefficiency has crept into the arbitration process, due process concerns are often cited. That is to say that tribunals are concerned that if they take a robust procedural approach, their orders and awards will ultimately be challenged.
This report focuses on the way that the insurance sector has dealt with insurance claims arising from damage caused by Covid-19. Members from 19 different jurisdictions analysed a questionnaire to provide a summary of the rules applicable in their jurisdiction as well as their interpretation on the different items affected.
The Directors’ Duties Checklist is a joint project of the Corporate and M&A Law Committee and the Corporate Counsel Forum. The checklist provides a practical perspective on the duties of directors imposed by jurisdictions around the world and includes an overview of the applicable statutory and regulatory regime in each jurisdiction.
Issues connected to the ‘new normal’ way of working following the global Covid-19 outbreak present fresh challenges for human resources law, according to the tenth annual report by the IBA Global Employment Institute. Remote working arrangements, the right to disconnect from work and data privacy challenges related to requirements to be tested or vaccinated are identified as three key issues facing the HR sector in the aftermath of the pandemic.
The purpose of this paper, prepared by the BIC Regulation Committee, is to set out the main findings from the production of a directory of anti-discrimination rules (the Directory) which currently exist from around the world. The purpose of the Directory is to list which jurisdictions have express anti-discrimination provisions in their relevant regulations, codes of conduct and ethics or professional principles for legal practitioners, as opposed to provisions that are more generally applicable..
The Corporate and M&A Law Committee has updated its financial assistance guide with chapters for more than 35 countries around the world. This guide is intended as a high-level, practical guide for practitioners who are looking for an introduction to the laws of each relevant jurisdiction relating to financial assistance when purchasing shares.