Artikel
How to Incorporate Human Rights Obligations in Bilateral Investment Treaties?
This short essay examines...[the] promising option...to impose human rights and other non-investment obligations directly upon corporations in BITs [bilateral investment treaties]...A...promising avenue is for human rights obligations to be expressly referred to in the main text of the BIT...It is...paramount that a treaty provision creates mandatory legal obligations that would force corporations to adopt a certain behavior...[and] establish a mechanism whereby non-compliance is efficiently sanctioned by an arbitral tribunal...At the moment, the prospect of a new generation of BITs balancing the rights and obligations of corporations is uncertain...Yet, there is a growing concern about the negative impact that corporate activities may have on local populations with respect to human rights and related issues. In our view, one simple way for capital-exporting States to respond to these grievances from segments of civil society would be to adopt BITs imposing human rights obligations upon corporations.