The European Commission has posted a document in which it defends investor state dispute settlement. In the document, the Commission puts forward what it considers to be “incorrect claims” about investor state, and then rebuts each one. In his blog Simon Lester addresses a couple of these.
The First examines the claim that: Investor-state dispute settlement subverts democracy by allowing companies to go outside national legal systems.
The Second: Investor state dispute settlement gives too many rights to companies
The Third: Investor-state dispute settlement undermines public choices (e.g. Vattenfall challenging the German moratorium on nuclear power, Philip Morris challenging Australia’s plain packaging regime for cigarettes)
The Fourth: Investors should not be allowed to challenge governments directly in international law. Only governments should be able to act against each other, via state-to-state dispute settlement.
Go to the International Economic Law and Policy Blog for the full arguments.