Events

View Video here.

One common critique of investor-state dispute settlement (or “ISDS”) under investment treaties is that the process allows disputes with important public policy implications to be resolved behind closed doors. But, with recent actions by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) to increase transparency in ISDS, there is an opportunity to minimize this concern. In July 2013,UNCITRAL adopted a set of rules – the Rules on Transparency in Treaty-Based Investor-State Arbitration (“Transparency Rules”) — to provide a template for opening up these proceedings to public view, and to give amicus curiae and the investors’ home state greater clarity regarding their ability to participate in the disputes. More recently, in July 2014, UNCITRAL adopted a treaty (the “Mauritius Convention on Transparency”) that governments can ratify in order to ensure wide application of the Transparency Rules. The Mauritius Convention will be open for signature in March 2015.

This free CLE session took place at Columbia Law School, and was led by Lee Caplan, Partner, Arent Fox LLP. The session provided governments, investors, and other interested stakeholders with an overview of the Transparency Rules, the Mauritius Convention on Transparency, and what these instruments mean for them.

Readings:

UNCITRAL, Rules on Transparency in Treaty-Based Investor-State Arbitration

Lise Johnson and Nathalie Bernasconi-Osterwalder, New UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules on Transparency: Application, content and next steps (CCSI, CIEL & IISD 2013)

Lise Johnson, The Mauritius Convention on Transparency: Comments on the treaty and its role in increasing transparency of investor-State arbitration (CCSI 2014)

Dan Barstow Magraw Jr. and Niranjali Manel Amerasinghe, Transparency Norms in International Commercial Arbitration: Part I: An Introduction to the Issues: Transparency and Public Participation in Investor-State Arbitration, 15 ILSA J. Int’l & Comp. L. 337 (2009)

Howard Mann and Fiona Marshall, Good Governance and the Rule of Law: Express rules for investor-State arbitrations required (IISD 2006)

Columbia Law School has been certified by the New York State Continuing Legal Education (CLE) Board as an Accredited Provider of CLE programs. Under New York State CLE regulations, each live non-transitional CLE panel will provide one credit hour that can be applied toward the Areas of Professional Practice requirement. CLE credit is awarded only for full attendance of a panel in its entirety. Attorneys attending only part of a Program are not eligible for partial credit for it, although they are most welcome to attend it. Attendance is determined by an attorney’s sign-in and sign-out, as shown in the Conference registers. Please note that there will be separate registers for each CLE panel, with sign-out and sign-in required for each one. On sign-out, attorneys should also submit their completed Evaluation Form, provided at the Conference. Please note the NYS Certificates of Attendance will be sent to the email address as it appears in the register unless otherwise noted there.