The PluriCourts Centre of Excellence at the University of Oslo will host a two day conference on international trade and investment disputes.
The conference will take place on Thursday and Friday, August 25-26 at the Faculty of Law, University of Oslo, Norway.
The webpage with the final programme and registration information is available here.
For more information, please contact: Daniel Behn, PluriCourts (d.f.behn@jus.uio.no)
The conference will focus on the relationship, interactions and comparisons between the international trade and investment regimes in the context of adjudication of disputes.
The conference will present research from the disciplines of law and political science relating to three themes:
1) the new mega-regionals
2) comparisons and practices
3) cross-fertilization and learning
Historically, the global regulation of international trade and investment relations have been closely interrelated; but in the post-war period, international trade law and international investment law developed on largely divergent paths. While international trade regulation has culminated in a multilateral regime with a permanent dispute settlement mechanism, the international regulation of foreign direct investment is primarily governed by 3500 essentially bilateral treaty relationships calling for ad hoc investor – state arbitration potentially to be hosted by a variety of international institutions. Despite these seemingly distinct structures, there is a recent trend that some say signal a move towards regime convergence: most clearly seen in the rise of mega-regional free trade agreements (FTAs) with investment chapters.
This potential convergence may be deceiving, however. The investment chapters of FTAs remain separate from the rest of the agreements and provide for distinct rules and procedures on dispute settlement. Moreover, issues of overlap between trade chapters and investment chapters have not been resolved, which means that the same case could possibly be raised simultaneously in two separate disputes under the same FTA. Legal disputes based on investment chapters in FTAs to date (ie under the NAFTA and DR-CAFTA) appear to interpret the investment protection chapters as standalone agreements with little or no reference to other sections of the FTAs.
Despite the limitations to integration that this new generation of trade and investment agreements may represent, there are other areas of interaction between the trade and investment regimes that could provide better evidence of a gradual move towards cohesion. This conference will look at the development of the new mega-regionals, but also the ways (or lack thereof) that the trade and investment regimes share practices and cross-fertilize. Below you will find the conference programme.
Conference program:
Adjudicating international trade and investment disputes: between interaction and isolation
Thursday, August 25
9:00 – 9:15
Welcome and introduction to the conference
Daniel Behn, Ole Kristian Fauchald, Geir Ulfstein and Michelle Zang, PluriCourts
9:15 – 10:30
The new mega-regionals
The mega-regionals: innovation versus imitation?
Manfred Elsig, World Trade Institute
Envisioning a model role for mega-regionals in international economic law
Tania Voon, University of Melbourne
10:45 – 12:30
The new mega-regionals – paper presentations
Chair and discussant: Jose Alvarez, New York University
International trade law in China: from paternalism to partnership
Greg Shaffer, University of California – Irvine
The scope of investment protection under newly negotiated FTAs: piecemeal reaction or serious reassessment?
Kate Parlett, 20 Essex Street
Participatory aspects of investor-state dispute settlement in the EU ‘new wave’ trade agreements
Joanna Jemielniak and Gunes Ünüvar, University of Copenhagen
The creeping multilateralization of investment dispute resolution under EU trade and investment agreements
Hannes Lenk, University of Gothenburg
1:15 – 3:00
The new investment court proposal – panel debate and discussion
Moderators: Daniel Behn and Malcolm Langford, PluriCourts
Completion of the legal analysis by the WTO appellate body – lessons for an appeal tribunal of an international investment court
Nicholas Lamp, Queens University
The Appellate Body of the WTO: obiter dicta, judicial economy, interpretation and the ban on adding obligations or diminishing rights
Lothar Ehring, DG Trade
Debate: Debating the pros and cons of the new EU investment court proposal
Julie Maupin, Max Planck Institute
Nikos Lavranos, EFILA
3:15 – 4:00
Cross-fertilization and learning
Converging divergences: a common law of international economic relations
Sunjoon Cho, Chicago-Kent College of Law
4:15 – 6:00
Cross-fertilization and learning – paper presentations
Chair and discussant: Laurence Boisson de Chazournes, University of Geneva
Cross-fertilization between the international trade and investment regimes
Markus Wagner, University of Warwick
Judicial interaction between trade and investment adjudication: theoretical foundation and empirical constraints
Michelle Zang, PluriCourts
Entry rights and investment in services: convergence between regimes?
Murilo Otavio Lubambo de Melo, University College London
The driving forces of the convergence of WTO dispute settlement mechanism and international investment arbitration
Fenghua Li, Renmin University of China
7:00
Dinner for speakers
Introduction: Geir Ulfstein, PluriCourts
The multiplicity of international courts and tribunals: factors of convergence and divergence
Georges Abi-Saab, Graduate Institute
Friday, August 26
9:15 – 10:30
Comparisons and practices
Comparative judicial practices: comparing dissent practices in the trade and investment regimes
Jeff Dunoff and Mark Pollack, Temple University
Comparing the East African and Caribbean Courts of Justice: explaining judicial behavior
Theresa Squatrito, PluriCourts
10:45 – 12:30
Comparisons and practices – paper presentations
Chair and discussant: J. Christopher Thomas, National University of Singapore
Do different treaty purposes matter for the interpretation of WTO agreements and investment agreements
Graham Cook, World Trade Organization
The use of public international law sources in WTO dispute settlement (with a side glance to the approach taken by investment tribunals)
Vitaliy Pogoretskyy, Advisory Centre on WTO law
Approaches to external precedent: invocation of international decisions in investment arbitration and WTO dispute settlement
Niccolo Ridi, King’s College London
Sharing interpretive functions between states and tribunals
Yuliya Chernykh, University of Oslo
1:30 – 2:45 Roundtable discussion – between isolation and interaction?
Moderator: Ole Kristian Fauchald, PluriCourts
Georges Abi-Saab, Graduate Institute
Jose Alvarez, New York University
Laurence Boisson de Chazournes, University of Geneva
Giorgio Sacerdoti, Bocconi University
- Christopher Thomas, National University of Singapore
3:00 – 4:45
Comparisons and practices – paper presentations
Chair and discussant: Giorgio Sacerdoti, Bocconi University
Regime shifting of IPR law-making and enforcement to international investment law
James Gathii and Cynthia Ho, Loyola University Chicago
On the interchangeability of trade and investment disputes: potential risks and opportunities
Andreas Ziegler, University of Lausanne
Adjudicating performance requirements disputes: blurring lines of trade and investment dispute settlement
Julien Chaisse, Chinese University of Hong Kong
Can a court’s function adequately explain the exercise of inherent powers: a comparison of the powers of the WTO Appellate Body and ICSID tribunals
Ridhi Kabra, University of Cambridge
Conference Organizers:
Daniel Behn, Postdoctoral Researcher, PluriCourts
Ole Kristian Fauchald, Professor of Law, PluriCourts
Geir Ulfstein, Professor of Law and Co-Director, PluriCourts
Michelle Zang, Postdoctoral Researcher, PluriCourts
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