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ISDS at a Crossroads

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 March 2019

Charles N. Brower*
Affiliation:
Honorary Editor; Judge of the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal; Judge ad hoc of the International Court of Justice.

Extract

Let us understand what we are talking about. The standard investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) system: Claimant appoints an arbitrator, Respondent appoints an arbitrator, and through various means there is an agreement or appointment of someone to chair the proceedings. This has been going on for years.

Type
ISDS at a Crossroads: How the Settlement of Investor-State Disputes Is Being Transformed
Copyright
Copyright © by The American Society of International Law 2019 

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Footnotes

This panel was convened at 11:00 a.m., Friday, April 6, 2018 by its moderator Andrea Menaker of White & Case LLP, who introduced the panelists: Charles N. Brower of 20 Essex Street Chambers; Colin Brown of the European Commission; Kekeletso Mashigo of the South African Department of Trade & Industry; Natalie Morris-Sharma of the Singapore Ministry of Law; and Lisa Sachs of the Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment.

References

1 Joan E. Donoghue, International Adjudication: Peaks, Valleys, and Rolling Hills, 20th Annual Grotius Lecture held by the 112th American Society of International Law Annual Meeting (Apr. 4–7, 2018) (video recording accessible here: https://www.asil.org/resources/video/2018-annual-meeting) [hereinafter Donoghue].

2 Menon, Sundaresh, The Transnational Protection of Private Rights: Issues, Challenges, and Possible Solutions, Second Annual Charles N. Brower Lecture on International Dispute Resolution, 108 ASIL Proc. (2014)Google Scholar.

3 Esso Exploration and Production Nigeria Limited v. Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Ad Hoc Arbitration, Award (Oct. 24, 2011), available at http://globalarbitrationreview.com/cdn/files/gar/articles/Esso_and_Shell_v_NNPC_final_award_2011.pdf. See also Damien Charlotin, Analysis: $2.7 Billion Award by Fortier and Brower Surfaces as a Result of Shell and Exxon Entities Touched on Constitutional Questions, as Well as Tax Stabilization, IA Rep. (Feb. 15, 2019), at https://www.iareporter.com/articles/analysis-2-7-billion-award-by-fortier-and-brower-surfaces-as-a-result-of-nigerian-efforts-to-block-enforcement-ruling-in-favor-of-shell-and-exxon-entities-touched-on-constitutional-questions-as-we.

4 The Dow Chemical Company v. Petrochemical Industries Company of Kuwait, ICC, Award (May 24, 2012), discussion of award available at http://www.globalarbitrationreview.com/news/article/30567/dow-wins-us2-billion-cancelled-kuwaiti-venture.

5 Donoghue, supra note 1.

6 Phil Levy, Critique of NAFTA Provision Highlights Team Trump's Misconceptions on Investment Abroad, Forbes (Oct. 23, 2017), at https://www.forbes.com/sites/phillevy/2017/10/23/should-team-trump-encourage-investment-in-mexico/-3f1bf68670b4.

7 Donoghue, supra note 1.

8 Alison Ross, “Fake News” - Brower Blasts Investment Court Proposal, Glob. Arb. Rev. (Mar. 1, 2018), at https://globalarbitrationreview.com/article/1166223/-fake-news-brower-blasts-investment-court-proposal [hereinafter Ross]. See also, Keynote Address at the 3rd European Federation for Investment Law and Arbitration Annual Conference on Parallel States’ Obligations in Investment Arbitration, University of London (Feb. 5, 2018), available at https://efila.org/annual-conference-2018.

9 European Commission STATEMENT/14/85, Improving ISDS to Prevent Abuse - Statement by EU Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht on the Launch of a Public Consultation on Investment Protection in TTIP (Mar. 27, 2014), available at http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_STATEMENT-14-85_en.htm.

10 European Commission Press Release IP/15/3201, Report Presented Today: Consultation on Investment Protections in EU-US Trade Talks (Jan. 13, 2015), available at http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/press/index.cfm?id=1234.

11 Robin Emmott & Philip Blenkinsop, Online Protest Delays EU Plan to Resolve U.S. Trade Row, Reuters (Nov. 26, 2014), at https://www.reuters.com/article/us-eu-usa-trade/exclusive-online-protest-delays-eu-plan-toresolve-u-s-trade-row-idUSKCN0JA0YA20141126.

12 Chemtura Corporation v. Government of Canada, Award, (NAFTA Aug. 2, 2010), available at https://www.italaw.com/sites/default/files/case-documents/ita0149_0.pdf.

13 Council of the European Union, Negotiating Directives for a Convention Establishing a Multilateral Court for the Settlement of Investment Disputes, para. 4 (Mar. 20, 2018), available at http://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-12981-2017-ADD-1-DCL-1/en/pdf [hereinafter Negotiating Directives].

14 UN GAOR, Report of the UNCITRAL Commission Fiftieth Session (July 3–21, 2017), para. 264, UN Doc. A/72/17 (2017), available at http://www.uncitral.org/pdf/english/commissionsessions/unc-50/A-72-17-E.pdf.

15 Id.

16 Negotiating Directives, supra note 13.

17 Case C-284/16, Slovak Republic v. Achmea B.V., Judgment, ECLI:EU:C:2018:158 (Mar. 6, 2018).

18 See generally, Nikos Lavranos, The Outcome of the UNCITRAL Meeting: The First Steps Towards a Multilateral Investment Court (MIC), OGEMID (Aug. 7, 2017).

19 Keynote Address, supra note 8. See also Ross, supra note 8.

20 Negotiating Directives, supra note 13.

21 Charles N. Brower, Why The “Demolition Derby” That Seeks to Destroy Investor-State Arbitration?, Annual Justice Lester W. Roth Lecture, University of Southern California, Gould School of Law, Los Angeles (Oct. 12, 2017), published with Jawad Ahmad in 91 S. Cal. L. Rev. 1140 (2018).

22 Id.