Risking the Rule of Law? The Relationship between Substantive Investment Protection Standards, Human Rights, and Sustainable Development

This contribution investigates whether international investment law and its substantive protection standards could entail potential risks in relation to the rule of law’s normative foundations informed by human rights and sustainable development. Answering this in the affirmative, it identifies such risks and finds that risks could be mitigated through treaty interpretation and the principle of systemic integration of relevant international commitments. An empirical study of selected decisions where human rights of others than investors, or sustainable development concerns, were at stake gives on the one hand indications of an increasing awareness and application of such systemic integration. On the other hand, however, it reveals ambiguities and unevenness in the decisions of investment tribunals when addressing human rights and sustainable development issues. The concluding discussion also addresses whether the more recent trend towards specific mentions of human rights and sustainable developments concerns in international investment agreements, or current attempts to settle investor-State disputes in a multilateral framework will solve the issue.