In proceedings for the challenge of an arbitral award, the applicable law is that in force at the time the arbitration agreement was concluded, regardless of when the arbitral proceedings were commenced or concluded.
An arbitration clause conferring on only one of the parties the right to decline arbitral jurisdiction and to bring the dispute before the ordinary courts is not invalid; unilateral derogability does not conflict with the limits of private autonomy or with any applicable rule of law, and constitutes an expression of a tendency consistent with the system that favours access to public justice as the primary form of dispute resolution; such a clause may be characterised as an option agreement within the meaning of art. 1331 cod. civ.
The assignment of a contract, effecting a particular-title succession in the contractual legal relationship, entails the transfer of the obligation arising from the arbitration clause, so that the assignee succeeds to the position of the assignor including the duty to submit disputes to arbitration; this principle is distinct from the different case of the assignment of a credit, where the assignee does not succeed to the separate and autonomous arbitration agreement.
Arbitral proceedings are governed by freedom of form, so that arbitrators are not bound to observe the rules of the cod. proc. civ. applicable to ordinary civil proceedings, unless the parties have made express reference to them when conferring the mandate; the proceedings must nonetheless be conducted in compliance with rules of public policy of constitutional rank, in particular the principle of adversarial proceedings.
In the challenge of an award on grounds of procedural irregularity, mere infringement of a rule is not sufficient; a concrete prejudice to the right to be heard must be alleged and demonstrated, and no such prejudice can be regarded as established where the party against whom the complaint is directed had a genuine opportunity to exercise its right of defence in the course of the arbitral proceedings.
A dispute concerning the performance stage of a concession relationship, and relating to the breach by the granting public authority of the obligations forming the paritary contractual relationship, may be submitted to arbitration, as it falls within the jurisdiction of the ordinary courts and does not require the resolution of questions involving the exercise of administrative powers.