James Clanchy, FCIArb, is a full-time arbitrator in independent practice and a former Honorary Secretary of the London Maritime Arbitrators Association (LMAA). He is an associate member of Six Pump Court chambers in London.
As an arbitrator, he has taken appointments in ad hoc and institutional arbitrations, seated in London, Dubai, Singapore and Copenhagen, as a sole arbitrator and as a member of two and three member tribunals. His cases largely concern charterparties, ship sale and purchase, container leases, and commodities trading. He has written more than 30 awards. He is a solicitor in England & Wales (admitted 1990, non-practising since 2019) and was an avocat at the Paris bar from 1994 to 2008. He spent 20 years as a commercial disputes lawyer in London and Paris, with Withers, Holman Fenwick Willan, and Stephenson Harwood, specialising in shipping, oil and gas, and international trade.
He was Registrar and Deputy Director General of the London Court of International Arbitration (LCIA) for four years (2008 to 2012). He spent two years as a case assessor for third-party funders and After The Event (ATE) insurers. He is a co-author of A Commentary on the LCIA Arbitration Rules 2014 (Sweet & Maxwell, 2015). He has given lectures and spoken at conferences about the LCIA, the LMAA, third-party funding, and professional ethics. He has been a contributor to Lexis PSL Arbitration and New Law Journal. His International Congress of Maritime Arbitrators 2020 paper, “Ad hoc arbitration and its enemies”, was published in Arbitration 86, no 4 (2020). Since July 2022 he has been co-editor (arbitration) of Lloyd’s Maritime Law Newsletter.
