Public order as a source of limitation for the award of an arbitration agreement:An Investigation into Iran's Judicial Process

Concluding of the arbitration agreement is based on the principle of party autonomy but this principle is restricted by public order. In other words, although the arbitration agreement is mainly based on the private agreement of both parties, it is not correct that the common will of both parties have an absolute authority to refer any disputes to arbitration. Sometimes the law forbid or restrict the reference of some disputes to arbitration, and the reason for these are based on the basic concept of public order and interest; thus, the settlement of some disputes are merely on the authority of the courts and if the arbitrators proceed to issue an award about such disputes, that award will not be applicable. This article will outline the opinions of Iranian scholars with regard to the effect of public policy on the arbitration agreements as it could help to understand the floating essence of public policy. In addition, this article set forth to analyses the most important cases in relation to arbitrability which are the Art. 139 of the constitution, bankruptcy claims, family disputes, intellectual property claims, securities claims and also labor and employment contracts.