Who’s Tripping up the Designs of the Global Corporatocracy?

by Don Quijones • November 2, 2014

Resistance comes not only from certain quarters of the largely disenfranchised public but also from the least likely national governments.

In Europe, opposition to the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Treaty is rising. The primary cause of concern, both among the general public and certain national governments, is the proposed inclusion of the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS).

As I previously reported, this rather innocuous-sounding provision is what gives the new generation of bilateral and multilateral trade agreements their sharpened claws and canine teeth, by allowing private companies and investors to sue entire nations if they feel that a law lost them money on an investment. As even The Economist now admits, while the original intention of ISDS was to encourage foreign investment by protecting them from discrimination or expropriation, their implementation has proven disastrous:

Multinationals have exploited woolly definitions of expropriation to claim compensation for changes in government policy that happen to have harmed their business…