Shotaro Hamamoto

Comment to “International Energy Trade and Investor-State Arbitration”

This comment discusses the relationship between human rights concerns and investment treaties.

Aikaterini Titi, The Right to Regulate in International Investment Law

States conclude investment treaties to promote and protect foreign investment by accepting international obligations that restrict their rights or powers that they have under international law as well as respective domestic law. But have they not gone too far? If existing investment treaties lay down excessive restrictions on the host State’s right to regulate or the ‘right to pursue specific public policy goals’, how to rectify the situation? These questions attract an increasing number of academics, practicing lawyers, governments, international organizations and, last but not least, civil society, as testified by the rich bibliography of the book. Titi tries to answer them in her doctoral thesis submitted to the University of Siegen through an analysis of investment treaties, relevant rules of general international law and investment arbitral jurisprudence.

Recent Anti-ISDS Discourse in the Japanese Diet: A Dressed-Up But Glaring Hypocrisy

As in many parts of the world, an anti-investor-State dispute settlement (ISDS) discourse has been propagated also in Japan. In the Japanese Diet (Japan’s parliament), ISDS is criticized as infringing State sovereignty; as being incompatible with the Japanese Constitution; as unduly restricting regulatory space and government procurement; as being biased in favor of the United States; and as being acceptable only in relation to developing States. These criticisms are difficult to sustain and in fact ineffective as investment treaties continue to be approved by the Diet by unanimity or by a large majority. An analysis of the rhetoric of these criticisms and of actual voting records suggest that investor-State arbitration itself is not an independent political issue in Japan, but used as a pretext to manifest an anti-American sentiment or to criticize the incumbent government.

L’être situé, Effectiveness and Purposes of International Law

The present collection of essays gathers contributions written in honour of Professor Ryuichi Ida by his colleagues and former students, covering a variety of fields of international law with particular emphasis upon the context, effectiveness and purposes of international law.

Compensation Standards and Permanent Sovereignty over Natural Resources

In case of direct expropriation, the host State is required to pay compensation. The form and amount of such compensation used to be the subject of a heated debate. An ‘appropriate’ compensation needs to be paid, but does it mean that the compensation should cover the entire market price of the expropriated assets? This question is today considered moot, given the proliferation of investment treaties, which almost unanimously adopt the Hull formula. The present study argues, however, that the permanent sovereignty over natural resources or peoples’ right of economic self-determination may come into play in cases of expropriations of a general and impersonal character so that the strict application of the Hull formula is to be limited to cases of individual expropriations.