How can business and human rights be reconciled in investor-State dispute settlement? This controversial issue is examined in two recent contributions by Anil Yilmaz Vastardis, a lecturer at the University of Essex law school.

The first  is a submission made jointly with Tara Van Ho and Luis Felipe Yanes (PhD Candidate) to the UN Working Group on Business and Human Rights. This was submitted to the Working Group’s Crowd-Drafting session for designing a human-rights compatible international investment agreement which took place on 27 November 2018 at the UN Forum on Business and Human Rights.  The proposal includes 10 clauses that States can adopt into their investment treaties to ensure compatibility with international human rights law.

Secondly a paper recently published in the London Review of International Law concerns EU proposals for investor-State dispute settlement.  Entitled “Justice bubbles for the privileged: a critique of the investor-state dispute settlement proposals for the EU’s investment agreements”, the article criticises the judicialisation of investor state dispute settlement in the direction envisaged by the EU’s Investment Court System because it prioritises institutions of justice for foreign investors over the improvement of local institutions that could provide justice for members across society, including foreign investors.

photo credit: Human Rights Council of Australia