ABSTRACT
With ongoing globalization, transnational investment activities have become a major driving force of global economic development. The first sub-question relates to how the stakeholders, especially states, understand sustainable development within the specialized legal system of international investment law. The second sub-question essentially relates to how international investment agreements (IIA) provisions should be designed and reformed to better reflect and implement the multiple aspects of sustainable development, especially its social aspect. IIAs should feature a better balance between the protection of foreign investment and the preservation of state regulatory power. IIAs should be made a better norm supplier of the global investment governance regime. IIAs can only be effective in addressing sustainable development concerns if they are able to supply effective and enforceable sustainable development provisions. The third sub-question explores how the IIA-making and IIA-enforcing processes could be improved, so that sustainable development concerns associated with transnational investment activities can be adequately considered and properly addressed by IIA-makers and IIA-enforcers.
