The Use of Object and Purpose by Trade and Investment Adjudicators: Convergence Without Interaction

13 Pages Posted: 1 Jul 2018 Last revised: 23 May 2019

See all articles by Graham Cook

Graham Cook

Legal Affairs Division, World Trade Organization

Date Written: June 14, 2018

Abstract

This chapter compares the practice of trade and investment adjudicators in relation to the requirement to interpret a treaty 'in the light of its object and purpose'. It begins by identifying a range of issues and choices that adjudicators face in relation to applying this interpretative element, and the practical barriers to any significant degree of judicial interaction or cross-fertilization between trade and investment adjudicators with respect to those issues. It then shows that notwithstanding the absence of judicial interaction, there is a remarkable degree of convergence in the legal reasoning of trade and investment adjudicators on these diverse issues.

Keywords: Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, interpretation of treaties, object and purpose, consequentialist arguments, legal reasoning, WTO, investor-State dispute settlement

JEL Classification: K33

Suggested Citation

Cook, Graham, The Use of Object and Purpose by Trade and Investment Adjudicators: Convergence Without Interaction (June 14, 2018). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3195941 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3195941

Graham Cook (Contact Author)

Legal Affairs Division, World Trade Organization ( email )

Rue de Lausanne 154
Geneva 21, CH-1211
Switzerland

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