The regime for international investment is extraordinary in public international law and controversial in many regions of the world. This article explores two aspects of this set of rules: its decentralization and the unusual powers it gives to private actors to invoke dispute settlement. Decentralization has contributed to a competitive environment for ratification of bilateral investment treaties (bit s) and has elevated the importance of dyadic bargaining power in the formation of the regime. Governments of developing countries are more likely to enter into bit s and tie their hands more tightly when they are in a weak bargaining position, which in turn is associated with economic downturns of the domestic economy. Once committed, investors have sued governments with surprising regularity, arguably contributing disproportionately to legal awards that favor the private corporate actors who have the power to convene the dispute settlement system. States have begun to push back, revising their obligations and attempting to annul arbitral awards. One of the conclusions is that it is important not only to consider whether bit s attract capital—which has been the focus of nearly all the empirical research on bit effects—but also to investigate the governance consequences of the international investment regime generally.

https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0043887113000312

Bargaining over BITs, Arbitrating Awards: The Regime for Protection and Promotion of International Investment

Introduction Part I. Historical Evolution of Foreign Investment Protection Law: 1. Origins of international investment law 2. 'The dynamic of a politically oriented law': foreign investment protection in a changing political environment Part II. Contemporary Interaction: Foreign Investment, Imperialism and Environmental Protection: 3. Polarisation of positions 4. Hints at synergy Part III. Foreign Investment Law, Practices and Policy: Future Trends: 5. Transformation in international law: applying developments to foreign investment 6. Paths towards a reconceptualised international law on foreign investment 7. Conclusion: patterns of power in international investment law.

The Origins of International Investment Law: Empire, Environment and the Safeguarding of Capital

Investment treaties are some of the most controversial but least understood instruments of global economic governance. Public interest in international investment arbitration is growing and some developed and developing countries are beginning to revisit their investment treaty policies. The Political Economy of the Investment Treaty Regime synthesises and advances the growing literature on this subject by integrating legal, economic, and political perspectives. Based on an analysis of the substantive and procedural rights conferred by investment treaties, it asks four basic questions. What are the costs and benefits of investment treaties for investors, states, and other stakeholders? Why did developed and developing countries sign the treaties? Why should private arbitrators be allowed to review public regulations passed by states? And what is the relationship between the investment treaty regime and the broader regime complex that governs international investment? Through a concise, but comprehensive, analysis, this book fills in some of the many "blind spots" of academics from different disciplines, and is the first port of call for lawyers, investors, policy-makers, and stakeholders trying to make sense of these critical instruments governing investor-state relations.

The Political Economy of the Investment Treaty Regime

Introductory observations Part I. Setting the Framework: 1. The increasing interactions between foreign investment law and international environmental law 2. Conceptualising interactions 3. Synergies 4. Conflicts I - soft-control mechanisms 5. Conflicts II - adjudication mechanisms Part II. Normative Conflicts: 6. Normative priority in international law 7. Foreign investment and the international regulation of freshwater 8. Foreign investment and the protection of biological and cultural diversity 9. Foreign investment and the international regulation of dangerous substances and activities 10. Foreign investment and the climate change regime Part III. Legitimacy Conflicts: 11. Normative priority between different legal systems 12. Environmental measures and expropriation clauses 13. Environmental measures and non-discrimination standards 14. Environmental measures, stability and due process 15. Defence arguments based on environmental considerations Concluding observations.

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Foreign investment and the environment in international law

Conceptualising Transnational Corporate Groups for International Criminal Law

1. Overview 2. Legal Basis of Investment Arbitrations 3. Parallel Proceedings 4. Nationality 5. Definition of Investment 6. Investors' Rights 7. Expropriation 8. Compensation APPENDICES NAFTA Chapter 11 ECT Investment Provisions Agreement on the ASEAN Investment Area UK Model BIT US 1994 and 2004 Model BITs Germany Model BIT Netherlands Model BIT Sri Lanka Model BIT France Model BIT Chapter II of the ICSID Convention World Bank Investment Guidelines

Matthew Weiniger

Papers

International Investment Arbitration: Substantive Principles

International Investment Arbitration