Glocalization of Arbitration: Transnational Standards Struggling with Local Norms Through the Lens of Arbitration Transplantation in China

Summary

This article examines how commercial arbitration was introduced into China and reshaped through contact with Chinese legal traditions. It presents legal transplantation as a two-way process: domestic actors reinterpret imported concepts in light of local norms, while local practices can in turn spread internationally. Using the Chinese experience, it shows how arbitration acquired a distinctive character there, developing into a hybrid that blends adjudicative and mediatory elements. The article proposes “glocalization” as a framework for understanding legal globalisation — the combined influence of globally circulating legal models and local culture — and concludes that transplanting law involves selection, resistance and integration shaped by legal, social, cultural, economic and political factors.