The Seraing case marks a significant development in the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) on the relationship between EU law and arbitration. The case addressed the constitutional limits imposed by EU law on the finality of awards rendered by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). The ruling extends the value-laden constitutional formula developed in Achmea in the context of investment arbitration to the context of compulsory sports arbitration, while substituting Achmea’s language of EU ‘autonomy’ with the concept of ‘EU public policy’. This note examines the divergence and convergence between Seraing and Achmea, the role of EU values and Article 267 TFEU, the distinction between compulsory and voluntary arbitration, and the ever-expanding definition of EU public policy. It shows how the ruling raises unresolved questions about the threshold for public policy infringements and the extent to which party consent can modulate the intensity of EU-mandated judicial review of arbitral awards.
European Investment Law and Arbitration Review