A black hole for public money: How compensation in ISDS cases works and what makes it so dangerous
April 27, 2021 at 11:30am - 12:30pm
When investors sue states in arbitration tribunals, billions can be at stake. For some countries the compensation investors demand is higher than their entire health or education budget. And in many cases, the payouts investors receive are much higher than what they could win in national courts.
But the question of how such compensation payments are calculated and decided is being surprisingly little discussed.
In this webinar we want to take a closer look at compensation in ISDS cases and discuss:
- What methods are commonly used to calculate compensation and what are their flaws?
- Why is the size of awards in ISDS cases increasing?
- Has the EU done anything to address the issue of compensation in investment arbitration?
We are very happy to have two international experts as speakers, who jointly wrote the paper Compensation Under Investment Treaties for the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD):
Sarah Brewin advises developing country governments and regional bodies on laws, policies, contracts and treaties relating to investment in agriculture. At IISD, she is an international law advisor on agriculture and investment for the Economic Law and Policy program.
Jonathan Bonnitcha is a lecturer at the Law Faculty of the University of New South Wales and Associate with IISD’s Economic Law and Policy Program. He was a member of the legal team that successfully defended Australia’s tobacco plain packaging laws against a multi-billion dollar claim.
Please register here: https://tinyurl.com/ISDS-BlackHole
This webinar is hosted by: Both Ends, ClientEarth, Corporate Europe Observatory, PowerShift, Seattle to Brussels Network, SOMO, Transnational Institute.