During its 2010 and 2011 terms, the U.S. Supreme Court decided three high-profile arbitration law cases, each focusing on what the court described in the third case, AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion, as the Federal Arbitration Act’s (FAA) overarching purpose “to ensure the enforcement of arbitration agreements according to their terms so as to facilitate informal, streamlined proceedings.” 1
Concepcion was preceded by Stolt-Nielsen v. Animal Feeds International 2 and Rent-A-Center, West v. Jackson . 3 In Stolt-Nielsen , the Supreme Court held that a party to an arbitration agreement cannot be compelled to submit to class arbitration absent a “contractual basis for concluding that the party agreed to do so.” 4 Thus, where an agreement to arbitrate is silent on the subject, and a meeting of the minds cannot otherwise be inferred, a court or arbitrator may not compel a party to engage in a class arbitration. 5
