| China’s first generation of bilateral investment treaties(bits)refers to a series of bits documents formulated from 1982 to 1998 based on the European style investment treaties.After World War II,the world investment rules have experienced two main stages of development: European rules and American rules.Up to now,it is in the formation stage of the third generation of investment rules.Under its influence,China’s bilateral investment treaties also experienced three stages of development: the first generation of reference to the European style investment treaties,the second generation of transition from the European style investment treaties to the U.S.style investment treaties,and the third generation of comprehensive reference to the U.S.style investment treaties.The first generation of China’s bilateral investment treaties are characterized by their important system status,significant regional distribution differences and lagging institutional framework.From the microcosmic point of view of the specific system,China’s first generation of bilateral investment treaties have corresponding deficiencies in four major institutional parts.The prominent problems include: narrow and vague definition of part of the definition,confusion of investment treatment provisions,low compensation standards,lack of free investor state dispute settlement mechanism,etc.Through the analysis of the relevant international investment arbitration cases,it can be seen that the defects of the first generation of China’s bilateral investment treaties have led to many disputes in practice,hindering the further development of China’s foreign investment and the protection of overseas investment interests.Since 2000,some of China’s first generation bilateral investment treaties have been improved,providing useful experience but still insufficient in terms of coverage.In terms of the choice of improvement path,direct and indirect improvement methods have their own advantages.It is necessary to measure the willingness of contracting parties according to their national conditions and reality.In general,it is better to adopt the direct improvement method as the main way and the indirect improvement method as the auxiliary way.According to different national conditions,we should adopt the Abolishment and revision or partial modification method respectively.In terms of the choice of the perfect concrete system,we should start from the four main parts of the investment treaty,and focus on solving the problems such as vague definition,confusion of investment treatment,low applicability of collection compensation standard and lack of free investor state dispute settlement mechanism. |
