International Arbitration has been in the focus of public attention following the fierce debate on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA). A broad public has questioned whether arbitral tribunals should be entrusted with issues of public interest. Some of these issues are particularly controversial. These ‘hot-button’ issues include international sanctions, corruption, money laundering and, to a somewhat lesser extent, antitrust law. The authors wanted to know how arbitrators deal with these issues, should they come up in an arbitration. They set up a survey in the form of a short online questionnaire and invited more than 2,500 arbitrators, listed as members of different European arbitral institutions, to participate. The participants were asked whether they have already encountered hot-button issues in an arbitration, whether they felt prepared to deal with them and whether they have been approached by parties who wanted a hot-button issue to be disregarded in the arbitration. Further questions addressed possible proactive measures to prevent public policy violations, such as a cooperation with public authorities and state courts. The authors compare the results of their survey with recent developments in International Arbitration.