Research On The EU Investment Court System

Investor-State Dispute Settlement(ISDS)is accepted by most countries.With the increasing investment agreements,the number of investment disputes has surged.And the problems of ISDS are also increasingly exposed,such as ignorance of public interest of the host country,the doubtful independence and impartiality of international arbitrators,low transparency in the process and inconsistency of the award,etc.The ISDS thus facing a legitimate crisis and is in trouble in the EU.In order to overcome the defects of the ISDS,the EU actively promotes the reform of the ISDS mechanism.In the investment section of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership Agreement(TTIP)negotiations,the EU proposed the establishment of the Investment Court System(ICS)to replace the current temporary investment arbitration mechanism.ICS is a new international investment dispute settlement by setting up the appeal mechanism,setting higher standards of transparency,making a right to regulation in the host country clear,etc.It alleviate the legitimacy crisis of the existing ISDS mechanism.At present,the EU has established the ICS in the comprehensive trade and economic agreement(CETA)signed with Canada and in the European Union and Vietnam free trade agreement(EUVFTA)signed with Vietnam.EU will use this framework to make trade and investment negotiations with other countries as a template.First,this paper introduces the reasons for establishing the ICS and points out the problems existing in the theory and practice of the ISDS.Second,it introduces the international contracting practice of ICS and demonstrates the main content of the ICS through TTIP,CETA,EUVFTA text,comparing the appellate mechanism and transparency requirements of the ICS with the related provisions of ICSID,WTO and so on.Third,it analyzes the merits and defects of the ICS,analyzing the feasibility of the ICS in theory and in practice.Then it discusses whether the ICS can solve the existing problems of the ISDS and whether it can be used for reference in China.Finally,it makes some suggestions on how to deal with the ICS in the China-EU BIT negotiation.