Rethinking international development: To what extent can the practical interaction of sustainable development and the field of international investment law be considered mutually beneficial in the light of modern advances?

The concept of sustainable development has been given a mounting presence within the international legal ether. This presence has culminated in the proclamation of the United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals in 2015. Even with these increasing and further defining proclamations, the legal status of the concept remains unclear. With an equal degree of contemporary context, the regulation of the field of international investment law, and particularly that of the regulation of foreign direct investment, has been described both as continuous in regulation formation and as having a strong link to wider international developmental policy. Considering these features, the investigation into the translation of the concept of sustainable development within this field is deemed significant. Essentially therefore, this research comprehensively analyses the most modern understanding afforded to the concept alongside the regulatory parameters adopted by international investment law and importantly explores this meeting, continually assessing the question to what extent is the concept effectively translated.

To answer this question, a doctrinal methodology is employed. The manner in which the research is approached provides two substantial implications. Firstly, an extremely detailed review of both the concept of sustainable development and international investment law in their entirety, including theoretical analysis and sources. Secondly, current academics place most of their efforts upon individual translations of the concept within the field of law, this research confronts these traditional approaches and views the regulatory system employed by international investment law as an entire arena working together. The results of the research will highlight the extremely fragmented and varied translations of the concept of sustainable development. Although in general there is much scope for the encouraging view the concept has within the regulation of foreign direct investment, this view must be approached with a degree of caution.