Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-skm99 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-27T12:52:28.769Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - Foreign investors vs sovereign states: towards a global framework, BIT by BIT

from PART IV - Transformations in international economic law

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 January 2011

Susy Frankel
By
Ko-Yung Tung
Edited by
Meredith Kolsky Lewis
Susy Frankel
Affiliation:
Victoria University of Wellington
Meredith Kolsky Lewis
Affiliation:
Victoria University of Wellington
Get access

Summary

Introduction

In his letter to Queen Victoria of Great Britain in 1838, Commissioner Lin Tse-Hsu, the Chinese Imperial Customs Commissioner in Canton, wrote:

Magnificently our great Emperor soothes and pacifies [the Middle Kingdom] and the foreign countries, regarding all with the same kindness. If there is profit, then he shares it with the peoples of the world; if there is harm, then he removes it on behalf of the world …

We have read your successive tributary memorials saying ‘In general our countrymen who go to trade in China have always received His Majesty the Emperor's gracious treatment and equal justice.’ … The profit from trade from afar has been enjoyed by them for two hundred years …

But … there are those who smuggle opium to seduce the Chinese people and so cause the spread of the poison to all provinces. Such persons who only care to profit themselves, and disregard their harm to others, are not tolerated by the laws of heaven and are unanimously hated by human beings. His Majesty the Emperor [is enraged].

… By what right do they then in return use the poisonous drug to injure the Chinese people? … Let us ask, where is your conscience? I have heard that the smoking of opium is very strictly forbidden by your country; that is because the harm caused by opium is clearly understood. Since it is not permitted to do harm to your own country, then even less should you let it be passed on to the harm of other countries – how much less to China! … […]

Type
Chapter
Information
International Economic Law and National Autonomy , pp. 243 - 268
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Teng, S. and Fairbank, J., China's Response to the West: A Documentary Survey 1839–1923 (Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1954)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Friedman, T., The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century (New York, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2005)Google Scholar
McLachlan, C., Shore, L. and Weiniger, M., International Investment Arbitration: Substantive Principles (Oxford University Press, 2007)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stiglitz, J. E., Globalization and Its Discontents (New York, W. W. Norton, 2002)Google Scholar
Stiglitz, J. E., Making Globalization Work (London, Allen Lane, 2006)Google Scholar
Guzman, A. T., ‘Why LDCs Sign Treaties That Hurt Them: Explaining the Popularity of Bilateral Investment Treaties’, Virginia Journal of International Law, 38 (1998) 639Google Scholar
Schreuer, H., The ICSID Convention: A Commentary (New York, Cambridge University Press, 2001)Google Scholar
Bishop, R. D., Crawford, J. and Reisman, W. M. (eds.), Foreign Investment Disputes: Cases, Materials and Commentary (The Hague, Kluwer Law International, 2005)
Coe, J. J., Jr, ‘Taking Stock of NAFTA Chapter 11 in Its Tenth Year: An Interim Sketch of Selected Themes, Issues, and Methods’, Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law, 36 (2003) 1384, p. 1391Google Scholar
Tung, K.-Y. and Cox-Alomar, R., ‘The New Generation of China BITs in light of Tza Yap Shum v. Republic of Peru’, American Review of International Arbitration, 17 (2006) 461Google Scholar
Ganguly, S., ‘The Investor-State Dispute Mechanism (ISDM) and a Sovereign's Power To Protect Public Health’, Columbia Journal of Transnational Law, 38 (1999) 113Google Scholar
Geiger, R., ‘Towards a Multilateral Agreement on Investment’, Cornell International Law Journal, 31 (1998) 467Google Scholar
Franck, S. D., ‘The Legitimacy Crisis in Investment Treaty Arbitration: Privatizing Public International Law Through Inconsistent Decisions’, Fordham Law Review, 73 (2005) 1521Google Scholar
Paulsson, J., Denial of Justice in International Law (Cambridge University Press, 2005)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bjorklund, A. K., ‘Reconciling State Sovereignty and Investor Protection in Denial of Justice Claims’, Virginia Journal of International Law, 45 (2005) 809Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×