§ 9-17-10.Application of federal Model Law

International commercial disputes bring a different set of expectations to mediation, and this section channels those disputes to a different framework. Subsection (a) names that framework: the Model Law on International Commercial Mediation and International Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation, a text the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law approved in 2018 for states and countries to adopt. Subsection (b) then makes it the default — if a mediation qualifies as international commercial mediation under the Model Law’s own definition, the Model Law governs it, not this chapter, unless subsections (c) or (d) say otherwise.

Subsection (c) keeps Georgia’s own privilege rules in the mix even when the Model Law applies. Unless the parties have agreed, under Code Section 9-17-2(c), that all or part of the mediation will not be privileged, Georgia’s privilege in Code Sections 9-17-3, 9-17-4, and 9-17-5 — along with the relevant definitions in Code Section 9-17-1 — applies to the international mediation right alongside the Model Law. The statute is explicit that nothing in Article 11 of the Model Law cuts back on that Georgia privilege, so the two regimes are meant to coexist rather than one displacing the other on confidentiality.

Subsection (d) hands the parties an exit from the Model Law entirely. If the parties to an international commercial mediation agree that the Model Law will not apply, this chapter governs the mediation instead, the same as it would for a purely domestic dispute.