International arbitration and third-party funding in international arbitration

International arbitration is the most popular dispute settlement mechanism for international disputes. Nearly all international contracts include "Arbitration Clause" as an essential part of their contracts, which enables parties to arbitrate before private and non-governmental arbitrators without going to national courts. This means parties can settle their disputes in a way where they have much more control than they have in national courts. While international arbitration is getting more popular and common, problems and some uncertainties regarding the arbitration process are also arising. Some of its problems diminish however new problems and institutions also emerge. "Third-party funding" –can be translated to Turkish as "Üçüncü Kişi Fonlaması"- is one of these new institutions, which is the most famous topic and recently causing heated debates. Basically, when the parties have insufficient balance to be able to arbitrate, arbitration costs are met by a third party funder. This means third-party funding and it enables parties to access to justice while causes so many legal problems. This thesis consists of three chapters. The first chapter covers international arbitration as a dispute settlement mechanism and mentions its general principles and the sources of international arbitration. To make the topic and evolution of arbitration clearer there will be a short summary of the history of international arbitration as well. In the second chapter, recent developments of third-party funding in the world are observed. The court and arbitral awards in the UK and other major arbitration centres are assessed to present the positions of countries and their courts regarding third-party funding in international arbitration. In the third and last chapter, the major players in the market, most important third-party funders and their positions will be mentioned. These funders, whose headquarters are generally in London, assess funding requests via their legal departments and accept or decline those requests based on the possibility of winning or losing the case of the party who they might fund.