ABOUT ICMA

The International Congress of Maritime Arbitrators (ICMA) was established in 1973 to provide a forum for maritime arbitrators and lawyers from around the world to exchange views and news of professional interest.

Last Congress: Singapore 2007

The Congress is generally held biennially. It has met over the past three decades in such exciting cities as Athens, Santa Margherita, London, New York, Monaco, Casablanca, Madrid, Hamburg, Vancouver, Hong Kong, Paris, Auckland, New York and London.

The origins of ICMA are intriguing. The first conference was conceived in a Moscow subway (underground) station in 1972. Michael van Gelder, then president of the Society of Maritime Arbitrators, Cedric Barclay and Clifford Clark, two future presidents of the London Maritime Arbitrators Association, and Roger Jambu-Merlin, then president of the Chambre Arbitrale Maritime de Paris were all attendees of an International Congress of Commercial Arbitrators which was being held in Moscow. They decided there and then (actually, in the subway station) to stage their own impromptu Congress, the first International Congress of Maritime Arbitrators (ICMA). Professors Sergei Lebedev and George Maslov of Moscow provided the place and a large audience.

In Memory of Cedric Barclay

Cedric Barclay, a vibrant and talented multi-linguist with a great sense of humor and a true "hands-on" arbitrator, decided that this sort of exchange of ideas should be expanded to include maritime arbitrators and lawyers from all over the world. Building on the Moscow Congress as the "original" ICMA, Cedric Barclay pursued the idea and organized the second ICMA Congress in 1974 at a beach hotel, a few miles outside of Athens. It was the first organized, exclusively maritime-focused arbitration Congress with papers prepared in advance, and was attended by maritime arbitrators and lawyers from twenty countries.

In tribute to Cedric Barclay’s vision in organizing ICMA and since his death in 1989, every Congress has held the Cedric Barclay Memorial Lecture, in his memory. His widow, Mrs. Cora Barclay has been an honoured guest. Past speakers all have been highly respected as masters in dispute resolution.

ICMA has grown to host delegates from, on average, 26 countries presenting approximately 50 papers. The international maritime conferences are generally composed of arbitrators, lawyers, owners, charterers, other industry professionals and their guests. A black tie dinner dance is a tradition, as are one or two cocktail parties.

Aside from providing a forum for discussion and serious, scholarly papers, the Congress always includes a social program for accompanying persons and delegates.

Unlike other organizations, which may have an executive directorate, ICMA is an ad-hoc event which is arranged by the host organization. The ICMA Permanent Steering Committee, whose primary duty is to select the next venue for ICMA and to appoint the chairman of the ICMA Topics Committee, is traditionally composed of a delegate each from New York and London and a representative from the organizing committee of the previous and current ICMA locales.

The ICMA Topics Committee has the important task of proposing topics, collecting the delegates’ papers and organizing the working sessions of the Congress. All papers are normally published in the Proceedings of the Congress."

An excerpt from an article written by Lucienne Bulow, former President of the Society of Maritime Arbitrators