International law of foreign investment is a field of public international law that has attracted considerable attention from practitioners, academics, and policy-makers in the last two decades. Its key characteristic is the extent of substantive and procedural decentralisation: while often sharing certain structural elements, both substantive obligations and mechanisms of international dispute settlement are mostly opposable only between the particular parties, even when expressed in multilateral form. This makes a clear and comprehensive overview of the topic particularly important. The second edition adopts a new structure that better reflects the concurrence of various reform proposals with the fairly stable stratum of instruments that inform the current practice. With this systemic dynamic in mind, the selected documents are divided into three parts: Past, Present, and Future. The Past sets out the legal background to modern investment protection law. The Present provides generalist international law materials (sources and responsibility), a selection of the more important instruments with substantive investment rules, and rules of international dispute settlement regarding investment protection. The Future (new for the second edition) lists a number of possible directions of future development, including a variety of approaches that maintain the traditional procedural kernel of investor-State arbitration as well as proposals for more significant change, with non-State actor involvement in dispute settlement either rejected or moulded into a judicial mechanism. This highly regarded book is aimed at teachers, students, practitioners, and policymakers in the area. It can be used both as a practitioners' handbook and as a classroom companion for courses on international dispute settlement and investment protection law.

This book outlines the protection standards typically contained in international investment agreements as they are actually applied and interpreted by investment tribunals. It thus provides a basis for analysis, criticism, and stocktaking of the existing system of investment arbitration. It covers all main protection standards, such as expropriation, fair and equitable treatment, full protection and security, the non-discrimination standards of national treatment and MFN, the prohibition of unreasonable and discriminatory measures, umbrella clauses and transfer guarantees. These standards are covered in separate chapters providing an overview of textual variations, explaining the origin of the standards and analysing the main conceptual issues as developed by investment tribunals. Relevant cases with quotations that illustrate how tribunals have relied upon the standards are presented in depth. An extensive bibliography guides the reader to more specific aspects of each investment standard permitting the book's use as a commentary of the main investment protection standards.

"In recent years, the concept of fair and equitable treatment has assumed prominence in investment relations between States. While the earliest proposals that made reference to this standard of treatment for investment are contained in various multilateral efforts in the period immediately following World War II, the bulk of the State practice incorporating the standard is to be found in bilateral investment treaties which have become a central feature in international investment relations. In essence, the fair and equitable standard provides a yardstick by which relations between foreign direct investors and Governments of capital-importing countries may be assessed. It also acts as a signal from capital-importing countries, for it indicates, at the very least, a State's willingness to accommodate foreign capital on terms that take into account the interests of the investor in fairness and equity."--Provided by publisher.

This comprehensive book provides a complete overview of the international legal system of foreign investment protection, synthesising material from treaties, general international law, contracts and case law to demonstrate a coherent system of investment protection. Through this systematic approach, the book considers all aspects of the discipline, providing a thorough and accessible analysis.

This book outlines the principles behind the international law of foreign investment. The main focus is on the law governed by bilateral and multilateral investment treaties. It traces the purpose, context, and evolution of the clauses and provisions characteristic of contemporary investment treaties, and analyses the case law, interpreting the issues raised by standard clauses. Particular consideration is given to broad treaty-rules whose understanding in practice has mainly been shaped by their interpretation and application by international tribunals. In addition, the book introduces the dispute settlement mechanisms for enforcing investment law, outlining the operation of Investor-State arbitration. Combining a systematic analytical study of the texts and principles underlying investment law with a jurisprudential analysis of the case law arising in international tribunals, this book offers an ideal introduction to the principles of international investment law and arbitration, for students, scholars, and practitioners alike.

Bringing together all the most important treaties and materials in international trade law, investment law, and financial law, this book will be an invaluable resource to both students and practitioners of international economic law.

An examination of the origins of international investment law and their continued resonance in the twenty-first century.