On Oct 30, Singapore Management University (SMU) — Fudan University Webinar Series: "New Developments in Advanced Legal Education", the second in a series, was successfully held, with the theme on dispute resolution.

This webinar was co-moderated by Zhang Wei, Associate Dean of SMU, and Chen Li, Associate Dean of Fudan University Law School, which consisted of four presentations made by Dr. Darius Chan, Associate Professor of SMU, Dr. Cai Congyan, Professor of Fudan Law School, Dr. Dorcas Quek Anderson, Assistant Professor of SMU, and Dr. Xiong Hao, Associate Professor of Fudan Law School respectively.

The first presentation was made by Dr. Darius Chan on Ascertaining the Governing Law of the Arbitration Agreement: A Comparison of Three Recent Decisions from the English, Singapore and Chinese courts. Based on cases analysis, Dr. Chan illustrated different approaches of a national court ascertaining the governing law of an arbitration agreement, and further analysis the rational of different courts in different jurisdictions in this regard.

Professor Cai Congyan was the second presenter. His topic is Transnational Judicial Dialogue in the Rise of China: How Chinese Judiciary Enhances the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Based on the theory of transnational judicial dialogue contributed by Anne-Marie Slaughter, Professor Cai explained the Chinese judiciary effort to the implementation of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), and argued that when China engaged the globalization and achieved the ambition of rising as a leading power, transnational judicial dialogue is an important means of Chinese judiciary to enhance the BRI.

The third speaker was Dr. Dorcas Quek Anderson. Her topic was the Enforcement of Cross-Border Mediation Settlement Agreements in the context of Singapore Convention. This presentation provided an overview of the Singapore Convention and its future role in the development of international dispute resolution. It also discussed the implications of the convention on mediation standards, and on domestic courts' enforcement of cross-border mediation settlement agreements. 

The final topic was contributed by Dr. Xiong Hao, Religiosity and Conflict Handling Styles in China. Based on the data collected from the internet, the research evaluated the conflict-handling styles of five officially admitted religions in PRC. By comparing the five religion-affiliated people’s data, it was found that that they were very similar in terms of the conflict-handling styles. In this case, a structural explanation is presented from both cultural and political perspectives to construct an understanding of this phenomenon.

After each presentation, the speakers from both universities conducted a meaning dialogue and idea exchange, which embodied and enhanced the cooperation between two law schools.