The "Competence-Competence" Doctrine
It is a general principle of international commercial arbitration that a tribunal is empowered to make a determination as to its own jurisdiction to deal with the substantive claims in dispute. This is known as the "competence-competence" doctrine. However, the fact that a tribunal can determine its own jurisdiction does not give it exclusive power to do so and certainly does not prevent an enforcing court that is not at the seat of the arbitration from re-examining the tribunal's jurisdiction. As a leading textbook on international arbitration states: