Date: Wednesday and Thursday, 20-21 September 2023
Location: Grossman Hall, on the Terrace Level of the Warren Building, at the American University Washington College of Law, Washington, D.C.
REGISTER HERE
Organizing Institutions: Universidad Externado de Colombia; TRICI-Law (University of Groningen); Eberhard Karls University Tübingen; Center on International Commercial Arbitration - American University Washington College of Law; Nicolaus Copernicus University.
Sponsoring entities: GST LLP (Washington, D.C. and Miami), and Alvarez Zarate y Asociados (Bogota, Colombia)
The Organizing Committee invites to the Conference “Interpreting the Unwritten Word - Custom and its Interpretation in International Investment Law”, which will hold various thematic panels, an expert roundtable and several keynote speakers, featuring renowned scholars and practitioners as well as new voices. Also, during the Conference, the newly published book “Custom and its Interpretation in International Law” will be presented, which contains contributions by several of the panelists as well as other experts in public international law and international investment law and arbitration, including new emerging voices in these fields.
Conference Program
CONFERENCE DAY 1 (20 September 2023):
09:30-10:00 Arrival & Registration
10:00-10:15 Welcome by Host & Organizers
10:15-10:30 Remarks on the Book Custom and its Interpretation in International Investment Law (CUP 2023) - Horacio A. Grigera Naon, Director of the Center on International Commercial Arbitration, American University Washington College of Law
10:30-10:45 Introduction / Presentation of the TRICI-Law Project - Panos Merkouris (Professor of International Law & Principal Investigator of the TRICI-Law project, University of Groningen)
10:45-11:15 Keynote Speech (tbc)
11:15-11:30 Coffee Break
11:30-13:00 Panel 1: Identifying Custom in International Investment Law
Chair: Michelle Grando (Counsel, White & Case)
- Patrick Dumberry [ONLINE] (Full Professor, University of Ottawa) The ‘Minimum Standard of Treatment’ in International Investment Law: The Fascinating Story of the Emergence, the Decline and the Recent Resurrection of a Concept
- Diego Mejía-Lemos [ONLINE] (Research Associate Professor, Xi'an Jiaotong University School of Law, PRC) The Identification of Customary International Law and International Investment Law and Arbitration: State Practice in Connection with Investor-State Proceedings
- Jose Manuel Alvarez Zarate (Professor, Universidad Externado de Colombia) Damages in International Investment Law: The Chorzow’s Tale
- Nigel Blackaby [ONLINE] (Partner, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer) The Alabama Case and Customary Assessment of Damages
13:00-14:30 Lunch Break
14:30-16:00 Panel 2: Interpretation of Treaties and Custom in International Investment Law
Chair: Bjorn Arp (Fellow, Center on International Commercial Arbitration, AUWCL)
- Eric de Brabandere (Professor, Leiden University) Claims Commissions and the Full Protection and Security Standard (FPS)
- Yannick Radi (Professor, Université Catholique de Louvain) Comparative Reasoning in Investor-State arbitration
- Nina Mileva (Assistant Professor, University of Groningen) A TWAIL Engagement with Customary International Investment Law: Some Strategies for Interpretation
- Anastasios Gourgourinis (Associate Professor, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens) Subsequent Agreements and Subsequent Practice in the Interpretation of International Investment Law
16:00-16:30 Coffee/Tea Break 16:30-18:00 Roundtable Discussion on Custom & its Interpretation in International Investment Law
Chair: Maciej Zenkiewicz (Assistant Professor, Nicolaus Copernicus University)
- Andreas Kulick (Senior Research Fellow, University of Tübingen)
- Michelle Grando (Counsel, White & Case)
- Margarita R. Sánchez (Partner, Miller & Chevalier)
- Diego Gosis (Partner, GST LLP)
- Jose Manuel Alvarez Zarate (Professor, Universidad Externado de Colombia)
CONFERENCE DAY 2 (21 September 2023):
9:00-10:30 Panel 3: The Interpretation of Secondary Rules in International Investment Law
Chair: Diego Gosis (Partner, GST LLP Washington DC)
- Marina Fortuna [ONLINE](Assistant Professor, University of Groningen) Interpretation of Secondary Rules in International Investment Law
- Sotirios-Ioannis Lekkas (Assistant Professor, University of Sheffield) The Uses of the Work of the International Law Commission on State Responsibility in International Investment Arbitration
- Anna Ventouratou (Assistant Professor, University of Sheffield) Revisiting the Availability of Countermeasures in Investment Arbitration
- Emmanuel Giakoumakis (Associate, Steptoe & Johnson LLP) A Riddle Wrapped in a Mystery Inside an Enigma: Equitable Considerations in the Assessment of Damages by Investment Tribunal
10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
11:00-12:30 Panel 4: Custom and its Interpretation in International Investment Law – Current Challenges
Chair: Claudia Frutos
- Filip Balcerzak (Assistant Professor, Adam Mickiewicz University) The Role of Custom in International Investment Law Remedies: the Curious Case of Natural Resources
- Enrique Prieto-Ríos (Professor, Universidad de Rosario) A Third World Perspective on the Hull Formula as the Accepted Standard of Compensation
- Oliver Hailes [ONLINE] (Assistant Professor, London School of Economics and Political Science) Rebutting the Presumption of Reasonable Regulation: A Comment on Certain Iranian Assets and Recent Investment Awards
- Madhav Mallya [ONLINE] (Associate Professor; Jindal Global Law School) The Precautionary Principle and the International Investment Regime: The Gradual Inclusion of Emerging Customary International Environmental Law in International Investment Agreements
12:30-12:45 Concluding Remarks & Closing of Conference
General Context
The Conference and book analyze and discuss the connection between customary international law (CIL) and International Investment Law. While custom is a familiar companion to international investment law and arbitration, including treaty interpretation, state responsibility or the minimum standard of treatment, among many others, several areas and topics that highlight and investigate this inter-connection remain woefully under-analyzed and consistently overlooked. The present Conference and book aim at addressing this lacuna. It asks the question: how are custom’s relevant rules and principles being interpreted and applied by investor-state arbitral tribunals and how should they be interpreted and applied? The particular challenge lies, of course, in the object of interpretation: custom does not feature a written text. Hence, the interpretation of the unwritten word of custom, first, requires conceptual distinction from its identification and then, second, begs the questions how such interpretation of customary rules is conducted. This is further exacerbated in international investment arbitration, by the myriad of ad hoc investor-state arbitral tribunals whose approach to very same subject matter at issue may vary significantly. The contributions in the book and the Conference panels explore these and other related questions with a focus on custom identification, the interpretation of secondary rules and current challenges, such as the Covid-19 pandemic, natural resources and the precautionary principle.
No registration fee will be charged for the Conference. The program and registration link will be published soon. For any questions and/or clarifications, please contact: custom.investment.conference@gmail.com. We also invite potential sponsors, if interested, to contact the Organizers of the Conference at the above email.
Organizers, Venue & Date
The Conference is co-organized by the Universidad Externado de Colombia, the TRICI-Law project of the University of Groningen, the Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen, Nicolaus Copernicus University and the Center on International Commercial Arbitration - American University Washington College of Law. It will be held in Washington DC on 20-21 September 2023 at the premises of the Washington College of Law.
Organizing Committee
Horacio Grigera Naón (Center on International Commercial Arbitration - American University Washington College of Law), Jose Manuel Alvarez Zarate (Universidad de Externado, Bogotá), Panos Merkouris (University of Groningen), Andreas Kulick (Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen) & Maciej Zenkiewicz (Nicolaus Copernicus University, Torun) & Konrad Turnbull (University of Groningen).
For inquiries, please email arbitration@wcl.american.edu.
