소비자중재합의에서의 'VKI 법리'에 대한 고찰

The VKI Doctrine in Consumer Arbitration Agreements

This paper investigates on the legal doctrine of "voluntary, knowing, and intelligent" (VKI Doctrine). The main points that were discussed include the history of the VKI doctrine and the US courts' attitudes toward the doctrine. It was also discussed how the VKI doctrine influenced the protection of consumer who agreed to arbitrate with businesses. The US courts' attitudes have shown to be split in application of the VKI doctrine to disputes in the enforceability of arbitration agreement between the consumers and the businesses. In order for the arbitration agreement to be invalidated, the state legislature cannot enact law that are directly targeted toward the validity of arbitration agreement. Rather the contract law in each of the state should be applied to the evaluation of the validity of an arbitration agreement. As the more and more consumers become familiar with the arbitration, the need for the VKI doctrine to protect the individual consumers in arbitration is expected to be diminished in future disputes.