Fair And Equitable Treatment And Climate Legislation: A Comparative Review Of Reform Proposals In Multilateral Investment Court
- IJLLR Journal
- Aug 6
- 1 min read
Tanmayee Mohapatra, University of Bristol
ABSTRACT
This paper examines critically the standards in international Investment Law through Fair and Equitable Treatment (FET), focusing on the importance of the implications towards climate change. Fair and equitable treatment was introduced with the purpose of protecting international investors from unfair and discriminatory treatment, which has now evolved into an unfair and inconsistent standard that gives the tribunal excessive discretion. This ambiguity has created issues related to the interest of international investors and has resulted in the phenomenon of regulatory chill, in which countries fear implementing regulations and losing related to the environment and climate change, which results in a lack of societal regulation due to the fear of being sued by investors.
This paper also explores various important cases related to the conflict between the state and international investors like Eiser v. Spain, Vattenfall v. Germany and Eco Oro v. Colombia. This paper also highlights the theoretical criticisms from TWAIL, GAL, which emphasises the structural bias and the fragmentation of the investment treaty framework.
While the proposed multilateral Investment Court (MIC) has a potential ground to create an impact with regards to consistency, fairness, and judicial independence, however, it has yet to address the deeper substantive imbalance happening in the existing treaties.
