Research On Investment Clauses Of Regional Trade Agreements

Bilateral Investment Treaties build a system of international investment law,that greatly promoting the development of world economy.But now,this system is gradually facing the plight of lack of stability and unity.Recently,more and more countries include investment issues in the Regional Trade Agreements negotiation.Then,Regional Trade Agreements is favored by more and more countries as an emerging investment legal system,because of its widely member states and widely jurisdiction.To some extent,the RTAs remedy the defects of the BITs.Compared with BITs,RTAs increase in terms of stability and unity of the law.However,because of RTAs' larger goal and the more interests,the member states based on the considerations of "interests negotiations",tend to make concessions on non-key negotiation.The reality caused the RTAs' investment section have more general provisions than the BITs,its language and the architecture of the basic section also presents similar.At present,the research of the BITs and single rules thorough,while the comparative study on investment section of RTAs and its developing trend has little attention.From the point of practice,our research of RTAs-IC has begun to change gradually from theory macroscopic level to practice microcosmic level.The guiding strategy of "regionalization",put forward by the central government,has great improve research on the application layer.Based on the above,comparing the similarities and differences between RTAs investment clause,analyzing the international tribunal decisions on the same terms in the context of different expressions,to guide the practice of China's participation in China's regional economic integration is very necessary.And,that also is the purpose of this study.To strengthen the research,can enrich the theory of regional system,also can provides feasible suggestions for China's participation in RTAs negotiation process.Therefore,this research has strong theoretical and practical value.In this article,we used research methods such as the comparative analysis,empirical analysis and normative analysis,to research RTAs' representative investment terms carefully and analyze the different understanding drawed by the international tribunal on the same terms based on the different reason,and summarize the general rules.The subject of this article is strive to put forward reasonable suggestions for China participation in RTA investment section talks in the future.Besides the preface and conclusion,this article is made up of six chapters.The first chapter discusses the origin and the development of RTAs investment norms.Firstly,we pointed out that this manner involving investment terms into the international agreement has a very long history;Secondly,we analyzed the legal source of the international investment legal system,the multilateral investment norms,RTAs investment norms,and the bilateral investment norms;Finally,on the basis of the analysis of the above,we summarized the advantages of RTAs investment system and its developing trend.The second chapter compared the "scope" clause in the RTAs investment chapter.The key terms are the definitions of "invest" and "investors.Basing on the thinking of the treaty provisions context,the purpose and so on,the arbitration tribunal defined the connotation of "invest" and "investors" in two different method,the one is "broad interpretation" and the other is "limit interpretation ".The different decision of the arbitration tribunal,in turn,promote the development of the system of regional investment.The third chapter compared "investment treatment" clause in the RTAs investment chapter.This part compared three terms: the national treatment clause,the most-favored-nation treatment clause,and the fairness and justice treatment clause.The research on the national treatment clause has focused on the evaluation elements;The research emphasis on most-favored-nation treatment clause on the definition of allicable object;On fairness and justice treatment clause reseach focused on the nature and its contents.The fourth chapter compared the clause of “expropriation”.Expropriation clause is mainly focused on the legitimacy of the behavior,and the standard of compensation.The fifth chapter focus on ISDS.This chapter don't involve dispute settlement between countries,neither the governing law.The research objection of this section shall be limited to clauses oriented investment disputes between investors and the host country,mainly compares the applicable scope clauses,the procedures clauses,and the appeal mechanism of ISDS.At the same time,based on the negotiating of ISDS provisions in TTIP are controversial,we specially expounds the TTIP's ISDS negotiating text.According to current situation of Chinese RTAs signed,chapter 6 focus on the design of Chinese RTAs-IC.Firstly,The author compare the investment section language in China's RTAs;Secondly,discuss whether the negative list mode can draw lessons for an RTAs.Finally,puts forward several suggestion for the RTAs-IC.