Investment contracts and human rights

With regard to human rights, stabilisation clauses in investment contracts are of particular interest. They protect investors against changes in law in the host state during the life of the project. Hereby, they may hinder measures relevant for protecting or promoting human rights. Building on work undertaken in NCCR Phase I by IP 4 (Choudhury 2008, Choudhury 2007, 2009), IP 8 (Adlung and Molinuevo 2008) and IP 11 (Gugler and Chaisse 2008, Gugler and Tomsik 2007), the project attempts to define good practices for stabilisation clauses allowing for compliance with human rights law, while acknowledging the risk management function of investment contracts in the business context. With a view to linking up with the research undertaken in WP1 in the field of judicial trade governance, the project will at a later stage extend its research to identifying best practices for the judicial governance of investment disputes in this field.