Challenge and Disqualification of Arbitrators in International Investment Arbitration: An Overview

2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Federica Cristani

A significantly small spectrum of arbitrators – i.e. 15 – have sat on the panels making up 55 percent of the 518 investment treaty disputes known today. This has produced considerable, real or perceived, conflicts of interests, whether personal, professional or case- or issue-related. This article addresses the requirements of independence and impartiality of arbitrators under the institutional rules and the relevant ethical codes, together with a survey of the most significant case law on the matter.

2020 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 557-570
Author(s):  
Riddhi Dhananjay Joshi ◽  
Shashikala Gurpur

Abstract As a niché body of jurisprudence, International Investment Arbitration has paradoxically remained aloof from developments in other related spheres of law. Increasingly, however, Tribunals have been compelled to reflect on matters arising out of a human rights narrative. This article studies the perspectives of certain stakeholders in choosing to employ human rights to further social, economic or environmental interests in an investment arbitration. These stakeholders are: Claimant, Respondent, Third Party Interveners, Tribunal, and Enforcing Jurisdiction. Reliance is placed on awards spanning 28 years from 1989 to 2017 under the ICSID regime as well as in ad hoc arbitrations under the UNCITRAL Rules. An analysis of trends in case law sheds light on the nature of a jurisprudence constante developing in this regard. The article also explores limitations to, and recommendations for, the engagement of human rights within the realms of Investment Arbitration.


2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 942-973
Author(s):  
Romesh Weeramantry

Abstract Cambodia has undertaken several initiatives to attract foreign direct investment (FDI), which has been growing rapidly in recent years, particularly through participating in Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) investment agreements and free trade agreements (FTAs). This article first outlines Cambodia’s arbitration law and practice, its Law on Investment, the court system, problems relating to corruption, and foreign direct investment (FDI) patterns. It then surveys trends in Cambodia’s comparatively belated signing of investment treaties, and their main contents (including recent treaties with India and Hungary, adopting very different models). The article then discusses the only investment arbitration instituted against Cambodia, which was successfully defended, followed by a comment on the future prospects for Cambodia’s investment treaty program.


Author(s):  
Clodfelter Mark A ◽  
Tsutieva Diana

The last decade has seen an increase in the efforts of respondent States to have their own claims against investor-claimants heard in investor-State proceedings commenced against them. The investment arbitration case law has revealed a host of legal and practical difficulties in admitting counterclaims. Most of these stem from the core requirement that parties must consent to submit their differences to investment arbitration. The applicable arbitration rules have also been cited as a bar to counterclaims. This chapter explores the functionality of applicable procedural rules as bases for an investment tribunal’s authority to hear counterclaims under the two main investment law regimes: the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Dispute (ICSID) Convention and Arbitration Rules and the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law Arbitration Rules. A review of the milestone cases under these two regimes reveals the major problems that have arisen.


Author(s):  
McLachlan Campbell ◽  
Shore Laurence ◽  
Weiniger Matthew

This is the long-awaited second edition of this widely-referenced work on the substantive law principles of investment treaty arbitration. It forms a detailed critical review of the substantive principles of international law applied by investment arbitration tribunals, and a clear and comprehensive description of the present state of the law. The first edition met with immediate success as a result of the authors’ achievement in describing and analysing the volume of law created, applied and analysed by tribunals. The second edition is fully updated to take account of the arbitration awards rendered in the period since 2007. Written by an internationally recognised author team, it is now the most comprehensive and up to date work in its field and no practitioner or academic can afford to be without it.


2007 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frederic Gilles Sourgens

AbstractThis article explores the problems of public accountability in current investment law practice. These problems arise from the private interpretation of international investment treaty and customary law in arbitration. It analyses these problems through the historical lens of Roman law and the Roman law tradition in international law. It suggests a Praetorian system of international accountability and explores the remarkable similarities between current investment arbitration and classical Roman civil procedure.


2021 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 105-136
Author(s):  
Jadranka Osrečak

International investment arbitration as an alternative dispute resolution mechanism for resolving disputes between foreign investors and host states is also a favourite dispute resolution for investors. It consist of three parts, all of which can be resolved separately. These are jurisdiction, merits and damages. Consequently, it is possible for a tribunal to render one, two or even three arbitral awards, depending on the tribunal decision to bifurcate/trifurcate the proceedings or not. This shows the complexity of each of the stages of the arbitration proceeding. The paper deals with the issue of reparation, specifically compensation for damage caused as the main form of reparation for damage. It gives an overview of the legal issues affecting the amount of awarded damages, the main methods for calculating damages, as well as the applicable case-law and statistics in relation to the legal issues and calculating methods. The paper argues that only a proactive and inclusive approach in respect to determining damages including a detailed fact analysis for legal qualification of the dispute and determination of the best damages assessment methods, can give satisfactory results.


Author(s):  
Thomas Dietz

This chapter suggests a vision of investment treaty arbitration filtered through the lens of political systems theory. Political systems theory was developed in the 1950s and 1960s by David Easton, an eminent political scientist. The core idea of Easton’s theory is that political systems can be understood as consisting of inputs from various actors that are aggregated and transformed into outputs, where outputs consist of the authoritative allocation of values. As such, the political systems approach encourages people to move beyond overly reductionist visions of international investment law as a quasi-inevitable product of state and investor interactions, or as the quasi-autonomous and teleological identification and imposition by tribunals of necessarily sensible or correct rules of state behaviour. Indeed, the chapter argues that seeing investment arbitration as political system allows people to bring out elements of its workings with greater clarity. Altogether, this helps people get a better sense of some of the key dynamics of investment arbitration.


Author(s):  
Nathalie Bernasconi ◽  
Martin Dietrich Brauch ◽  
Howard Mann

This chapter discusses the role of civil society in international investment arbitration. Much of the civil society focus on international arbitration has been on the investor–state dispute settlement (ISDS) process included in many international investment agreements. However, the historical role of commercial arbitration as the progenitor of investment treaty arbitration and the procedural and structural links between ISDS and commercial arbitration are important for the discussions on civil society engagement. Civil society recognized early on the problems of using a commercial arbitration model for investment arbitration, which involves public law matters, and concluded that this created a misappropriation of a tool that up to that time had only been used for private commercial purposes or very well-defined state-to-state purposes. The crossing of these purposes and actors to create public law arbitration between investors and states is what created this sense of misappropriation and led to a spotlight being shone on the regime by civil society. The chapter then looks back at the beginnings of civil society engagement with international arbitration through the experience with investment treaties, including the advancement of transparency and the ability to submit amicus curiae briefs.


2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 1001-1024
Author(s):  
Romesh Weeramantry ◽  
Mahdev Mohan

Abstract Laos is no stranger to international investment arbitration. Despite its status as one of Southeast Asia’s least developed countries, it has had an Investment Law for more than two decades and is also a party to several bilateral and Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN)-related investment agreements. More recently, two investment treaty claims have been made against it, one of which has given rise to an award challenge that went all the way to Singapore’s highest court. This article will examine the history, evolution and current iteration of Laos’ relationship with international investment law and focus on the two investment treaty claims instituted against Laos. The article concludes with an appraisal of Laos’ need to maintain its investment treaty programme, despite the difficulties that may have arisen as a result of it being a respondent in investment treaty arbitrations.


2014 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 199-222
Author(s):  
Sondra Faccio

In the last few years, the principle of proportionality has appeared with a certain frequency in international investment case law: arbitrators have employed it to determine whether the State’s regulatory measure under scrutiny represents a form of indirect expropriation, to assess violations of the fair and equitable treatment (‘fet’) standard, to counterbalance competing obligations drawn from international investment law and international human rights law, and to assess compensation. This article will focus on the so-called “quantum phase” – the part of the award devoted to the assessment of the monetary compensation due to the foreign investor for the breach of the investment treaty provision – and will discuss whether the principle of proportionality can effectively play a role in the assessment of compensation. The work will start from the analysis of the case of Joseph Charles Lemire v. Ukraine, where arbitrators expressly resorted to proportionality to verify whether the indemnity awarded to the claimant for the breach of the fet standard was adequate in light of the specific characteristics of the investment lato sensu and the investor, to then approach the issue of proportionality more in detail.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document