Based on an in-depth analysis of a few selected cases of commercial dispute and litigation, this chapter illuminates the functioning of the complex and competing legal systems and the mechanisms of dispute resolution among merchants in Surat in western India and Zanzibar in East Africa during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It explores the dynamics of this legal space, the endurance of legal plurality and qualitative changes in it over the period under review. It critically examines the perceived binary between the legal plurality of the pre-colonial period and the legal uniformity and centralization of the colonial period. The chapter argues that merchants usually sought to resolve their commercial disputes through informal negotiations, petitions, arbitration and legal proceedings in courts of law. The analysis of commercial disputes show that despite the emergence of the European (English) colonial legal system across the Indian Ocean arena in the nineteenth century and the colonial state’s push to make the law uniform and implement a single legal system, the normative and customary mechanisms of adjudicating commercial disputes endured in the colonial period.

The contemporary expansion of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) in Asia has been unparalleled in the world. While London and other traditional forums remain a vital jurisdiction for Asian parties, those constructing ADR regimes in Asian jurisdictions increasingly turn to their neighbors – other Asian jurisdictions. This chapter analyzes the interactions between the prominent ADR hubs in Asia and their neighboring jurisdictions. Topics include the race between Singapore and Hong Kong for the crown, Singapore’s impact on Vietnam, and the implications of Singaporean promotion of mediation on the practice of ADR in Asia. The chapter argues that ADR centers, viewed from the perspective of legal transplantation, provide successful models for secondary markets, although such transplantation is far from seamless. This chapter suggests that Singapore and Hong Kong, as established hubs, will remain influential and play a critical role in shaping ADR legal developments in Asia, although competition may result in disparate effects.