ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the investment protection project and its relation to state regulation and human rights. Thus, international development cooperation in practice focuses primarily on facilitating investment. Developed states assert that international law governs investment. The investment system is regarded as an efficient market enhancing mechanism vastly superior to domestic courts. The International Center for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) framework is seen by its Executive Directors as an inducement for foreign investment as, ‘an instrument of international policy for the promotion and protection of economic development. Investment treaties interpret expropriation – including indirect expropriation – to require full compensation. Investment may have consequences that conflict with norms set out in other multilateral treaties. The rapid evolution of investment law conflicts with other areas of international law. Applicable law is defined both in the ICSID Convention and the relevant investment treaties. Conflicts over government regulation of privatized public services may arise frequently in the future.
