INTRODUCTION 

This module introduces students International Investment Law. The course aims to provide students with a theoretical and practical understanding of international investment law, particularly the regime governing protection and implementation of foreign investments. The course explains various frameworks established by national laws and rules of international law governing cross-border or international investments and how they operate in practice. The major focus of the course is to examine whether the rules of international investment law reconcile the protection of foreign investment with the host State’s right to regulate.

OBJECTIVES

The objectives of the module are:

• To give adequate exposure to leaners about the core principles of the international law of foreign investment.
• To enable learners, familiarize with the foreign investment disputes between investors and sovereign States;
• To develop their critical faculties by evaluating the policy arguments behind the formation of BITs.
• To make learners understand the importance of regulating foreign investment;
• To develop their analytical faculties by identifying and resolving legal arguments and policy debates surrounding international investment law and the regulatory discretion of the sovereign states.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

At the end of this module you should be able to:

• Know the importance of international investment law a regulatory tool in international economic law;
• Know the elements of BITs and the policy considerations underlying the formation of such treaties.
• Demonstrate knowledge of various aspects of investment treaties and their linkage with investor protection and the regulatory discretion of the sovereign countries
• Know the conflicts between formation of BITs and policy-making ability of sovereign countries.
• Know the specific terms and sources of the global investment law.
• Demonstrate knowledge of the practical abilities to research on international investment law, national laws and regulations governing international investment.

UNIT 1 – INTRODUCTION TO INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT LAW: VARIOUS AREAS AND VARIOUS REGIMES

UNIT 2 – APPLICATION OF GENERAL INTERNATIONAL LAW TO FOREIGN  INVESTMENT

UNIT 3 – THE CONDUCT OF HOSTILITIES

UNIT 4 – PROTECTION OF FOREIGN INVESTMENT: SCOPE OF APPLICABLE  TREATIES

UNIT 5 – EXPROPRIATION

UNIT 6 – STANDARDS OF TREATMENT (II): NATIONAL TREATEMENT & MOST  FAVOURED NATIONAL TREATEMENT

UNIT 7 – SETLEMENT OF INVESTMENT DISPUTES (I): FORA

UNIT 8 – SETTLEMENT OF INVESTMENT DISPUTES (I): PROCEDURE

 

RECOMMENDED READING

Douglas Z. (2003). The Hybrid Foundations of Investment Treaty Arbitration. British Yearbook of International Law, Volume 74, Issue 1.

Elimination of TRIMS: The Experience of Selected Developing Countries, UNCTAD, 2007

Paparinskis M. (2013) The International Minimum Standard and Fair and Equitable Treatment. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Paulsson J. (1995) Arbitration Without Privity // ICSID Review – Foreign Investment Law Journal, Volume 10, Issue 2.

Kaufmann-Kohler G., Potesta M. (2016). Can the Mauritius Convention Serve as a Model of Investor-State Arbitration in Connection with the Introduction of a Permanent Investment Tribunal or an Appeal Mechanism, available at http://www.uncitral.org/pdf/english/CIDS_Research_Paper_Mauritius.pdf.