Research On A Limited Return Of The Principle Of Exhaustion Of Local Remedies In The Context Of The Revival Of Calvo Doctrine

In the field of international investment dispute settlement,the international investment arbitration mechanism has exposed many birth defects in practice,overemphasizing the high standard of protection for the investors,which poses a serious threat to the regulatory rights of the host countries,thus triggering a legitimate crisis of the ISDS mechanism.To solve the current issues in the international investment arbitration procedure,some countries and regions have implemented a series of reform measures,which obviously contain the color of the Calvo Doctrine,such as terminating the current effective BITs and withdrawing from the ICSID Convention.So that the Calvo Doctrine has been declared to be "revived" after a period of silence.Because of the above background,as a a principle of international customary law closely related to the Calvo Doctrine,the principle of exhaustion of local remedies has once again become the hot focus of the international community in ISDS reform.Neither developed nor developing countries invariably appeal to reconsidering the principle of exhaustion of local remedies.To indirectly strengthen the regulatory rights of the host country,they advocated that the local remedies should be taken as a preconditioning procedure to restrict the investors’ right to international litigation.Therefore,improving the design of the principle of exhaustion of local remedies is not only related to the survival of the international investment arbitration but also the key to correct the imbalance in the Investor-State Dispute Settlement.Because of this,to what extent has the principle of exhaustion of local remedies returned in the context of the revival of Calvo doctrine? What kind of value orientation is reflected behind its regression trend? What future does the principle of exhaustion of local remedies have in ISDS reform? In the redesign of the IIAs,what choice must we make as for the application of this principle with the transition of China’s role? These are all issues that need to be solved urgently in ISDS.This article first expounds and summarizes the theoretical concepts such as“exhaustion of local remedies” and“Calvo Doctrine”,and then clarifies the close relationship between them,which lays a theoretical foundation for the following discussion.Secondly,based on the recent legal practice,Calvo Doctrine’s revival is divided into radical,moderates,and hypocrisies under the recent legal practice;on this basis,the paths of regression in different countries and regions are analyzed synthetically.Thirdly,it discusses the internal and external reasons for the changes in the attitude of this principle and discusses the value orientation and development trend reflected behind the new changes of exhausting local remedies.Finally,combining with the status quo of dual investment roles as both the capital exporting and importing country,and focusing on the imbalance of interests between investors and host countries,this paper puts forward the selection based on the basic position and improvement path of the principle of exhaustion of local remedies in China.