Against a background of worldwide competition among jurisdictions to host arbitral proceedings in the wake of globalization, the very special advantages of Macau are rising inexorably. A European settlement since the sixteenth century, this Portuguese-speaking city on China's south coast has been positioning itself as an exemplary East-West trade centre since China's famous 'opening' to the West in the 1970s. Now, diversifying its role as a service platform, Macau is poised to become a preeminent locus for commercial arbitration between China and the major developed and emerging trade nations of the West - of particular interest to its major Lusophone counterparts Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, and Portugal, but, because of its traditional and highly developed 'Europeanness, ' to other major trading jurisdictions as well