Epilogue: The Early and Long End of the Mixed Arbitral Tribunals, 1920–1939

This chapter sheds light on the often-neglected question of how the Mixed Arbitral Tribunals, after entering the international stage as a result of the post-World War I peace treaties, disappeared into near oblivion. It first notes that the main Central Power, Germany, often tried to avoid the establishment of MATs in the first place or to impose deadlines limiting the number of claims submitted to those MATs which it had not been able to thwart. After examining the efforts already made by governments during the 1920s to phase out various MATs, it addresses the attempts made by some actors within the MAT-system to establish permanent MATs (partly reminiscent of present- day investor-state arbitration) between a number of Western countries and describe how government officials from these countries eventually derailed these attempts. It then moves on to the liquidation of the last remaining MATs, which was mostly completed on the eve of the Second World War, although three MATs actually continued to operate – albeit in a way that could hardly be considered judicial – until 1943. The chapter concludes by an account of the constitution, wartime preservation and peacetime destruction of the MATs’ archival records.