This document discusses research from the Pluricourts Investment Treaty Arbitration Database (PITAD) on trends in international investment law and arbitration. It finds that a small number of "powerbrokers", including arbitrators, legal counsel, and experts, dominate the field. Only the top 25 arbitrators account for 37% of appointments, and the same is true for legal counsel. It also examines the phenomenon of "double hatting", where arbitrators also work as counsel in other cases, which could pose conflicts of interest. The document closes by noting debates around potential reforms to address asymmetries and lack of diversity in the system.

1. PITAD
The Pluricourts Investment Treaty Arbitration Database
Malcolm Langford
Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Oslo
Affiliate Researcher , Pluricourts and Co-Coordinator, LEGINVEST
Co-Director, Centre for Law & Social Transformation
University of Bergen & CM

2. International Investment Treaties: 1980-2018
0
500
1000
1500
2000
2500
3000
3500
4000
0
50
100
150
200
250
BITs Treaties with Investment Provisions Cumulative

3. International Investment Arbitration Cases: 1987-2018
0
200
400
600
800
1000
1200
1400
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
1972
1974
1976
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
2010
2012
2014
2016
2018
Treaty-Based Contract/FDI Law ICISD Annulment Cumulative

4. Database 1.0 Law à UNCTAD
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5. 29.10.2018 6

6. 29.10.2018 7

7. 29.10.2018 8

8. Database 2.0 Empirical
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9. 1. Chart deeper trends in jurisprudence & treaties
29.10.2018 10
Tarald Berge and Wolfgang Alschner, Reforming Investment Treaties: Does treaty
design matter?, Investment Treaty News, 17 October 2018.

10. 29.10.2018 11

11. 2. Assess empirical claims (e.g. on legitimacy crisis)

12. Investor win rates by development
0,57
0,43
0,52
0,47
0,21
0
0,1
0,2
0,3
0,4
0,5
0,6
0,7
0,8
0,9
Lower
quintile
(n=60)
2
(n=63)
3
(n=69)
4
(n=71)
Upper
quintile
(n=65)
Predicetd probability of investor win
Respondent country GDP per capita (quintiles)
0,63
0,48 0,45
0,21
0
0,1
0,2
0,3
0,4
0,5
0,6
0,7
0,8
0,9
1
Low
income
(n=33)
Lower
middle
income
(n=99)
Upper
middle
income
(n=146)
High
income
(n=51)
Predicetdprobabilityofinvestorwin
Respondent country World Bank Income
Group
Daniel Behn, Tarald Berge and Malcolm Langford, ‘Poor States or Poor Governance: Explaining Outcomes in
Investment Treaty Arbitration’, Northwestern Journal for International Law and Business 38(3) (2018), 333-389.

13. 3. Social science: Understand actor behaviour
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14. 29.10.2018 15
Taylor St John, Daniel Behn, Runar Lie and Malcolm Langford, Glass Ceilings and Arbitral Dealings:
Gender and Investment Arbitration, ASIL Research Forum, 2018.

15. 4. Law: Modelling, prediction and legal technology
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Wolfgang Alschner and Dmitriy Skougarevskiy, ‘Towards an Automated Production of Legal Texts Using
Recurrent Neural Networks’, 16th International Conference Artificial Intelligence and Law, Conference
Proceedings, June 2017, pp. 229-332.

16. 29.10.2018 17

17. PITAD Database
Hosted by LEGINVEST Project
Pluriucourts Centre of Excellence
Associate Professor
Daniel Behn
Professor
Ole Kristian Fauchald
Research Fellow
Maksim Usynin
Research Fellow
Runar Lie
Research Fellow
Tarald Berge
Lecturer
Taylor St. John
St Andrews
Assistant Professor
Ottawa
Research Fellow
Tori Kirkebø

19. 110 variables
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Case25
Legal basis 3
Contested measures
6
Policy areas 1
Claimants 9
Legal counsel 6
Decisions 22
Merits 3
Claims discussed 1
Damages 7
Costs 7
Dissents/separate opinions 4
Other awards/orders 2
Arbitrator challenges 3
Annulments 7
Arbitrators 10
Tribunal secretary 2
Expert witness 4
Third parties 4
States 20
146 Variables
Cases

20. Treaties
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311 variables

23. Export Data

24. The Revolving Door in International
Investment Arbitration

25. 1. Arbitral asymmetry
• Top 25 Arbitrators account for 4% of total
arbitrators
• But 37% of all appointments
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• Malcolm Langford, Daniel Behn and Runar Lie, ‘The Revolving Door in International
Investment Arbitration’ Journal of International Economic Law 20 (2), 2017, pp. 301–332.

26. 29.10.2018 27

27. Arbitrator Network (update)
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Rank Arbitrator Nationality HITS
hub
Page
rank
Rank
Cases
Rank
(Puig)
1 Gabrielle Kaufmann-Kohler Switzerland 1.0000 0.0130 2 5
2 Brigitte Stern France 0.9034 0.0210 1 1
3 V.V. Veeder UK 0.7109 0.0099 9 11
4 L. Yves Fortier Canada 0.6308 0.0153 3 8
5 Charles Brower USA 0.6183 0.0123 4 6
6 Francisco Orrego Vicuña Chile 0.5716 0.01281 NI* 2
7 Albert Jan van den Berg Netherlands 0.5176 0.0123 6 9
8 Bernard Hanotiau Belgium 0.4851 0.0103 8 13
9 Karl-Heinz Böckstiegel Germany 0.4469 0.0114 8 16
10 Vaughan Lowe UK 0.4334 0.0075 19 22

28. Revolving Door
• Sequential
• Simultaneous
– ‘Double hatting’
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29. Legal counsel asymmetry
• Only 1% of legal counsel have acted in more
than 10 cases.
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30. 2. Legal Counsel
Rank Counsel Nationality Law firm(s) For
claimant
For resp. Total cases*
1 Stanimir Alexandrov Bulgaria Sidley Austin 13 18 31
2 Nigel Blackaby UK Freshfields 26 4 30
3 Osvaldo Guglielmino Argentina Argentina Ministry 0 25 25
4 Emmanuel Gaillard France Shearman & Sterling 14 7 21
5 Todd Weiler Canada Todd Weiler 20 0 20
6 Angelina Abbona Argentina Argentina Ministry 0 19 19
6 Ronald Goodman US Foley Hoag 3 16 19
7 Stephen Jagusch NZ Quinn Emanuel 12 6 18
7 Gabriela Álvarez-Avila Mexico Curtis Mallet 0 18 18
7 Jan Paulsson France Freshfields 7 11 18
7 Hamid Gharavi France Derains & Gharavi 11 7 18
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31. 3. Expert witnesses
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Rank Expert Nationality Role For claimant For resp. Total cases
1 Brent Kaczmarek US Quantum/Industry Expert 17 11 28
2 Rudolf Dolzer Germany International Law Expert 13 4 17
3 W. Michael Reisman US International Law Expert 9 7 16
4 Christoph Schreuer Austria International Law Expert 11 2 13
5 Manuel Abdala US Quantum/Industry Expert 5 1 6
6 Anne-Marie Slaughter US International Law Expert 0 5 5
6 Ismael Mata Argentina National Law Expert 0 5 5
6 James Crawford Australia International Law Expert 1 4 5
6 James Dow US Quantum/Industry Expert 0 5 5
6 Joseph Kalt US Quantum/Industry Expert 4 1 5
6 Nico Schrijver Netherlands International Law Expert 2 3 5
6 Pablo Spiller US Quantum/Industry Expert 4 1 5

32. 4. Tribunal secretaries
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Rank Secretary name Nationality Institution Total cases
1 Gonzalo Flores Chile ICSID 38
2 Martina Polasek Czech ICSID 30
3 Eloïse Obadia France ICSID 28
4 Aurélia Antonietti France ICSID 25
5 Ucheora Onwuamaegbu Nigeria ICSID 24
6 Natalí Sequeira Costa Rica ICSID 21
7 Claudia Frutos-Peterson Mexico ICSID 20
8 Gabriela Alvarez-Avila Mexico ICSID 19
9 Mercedes Cordido-Freytes de
Kurowski
Venezuela ICSID 16
10 Aïssatou Diop Senegal ICSID 15
10 Anneliese Fleckenstein Venezuela ICSID 15

33. Entire Network: The Powerbrokers
Rank Name Nationality Arbitrations Counsel
Expert
witness
HITS Hub
1 G. Kaufmann-Kohler Switzerland 56 0 0 1.00000
2 L. Y. Fortier Canada 53 0 0 0.87664
3 B. Stern France 88 0 0 0.87278
4 V. V. Veeder UK 37 2 0 0.55004
5 F. Orrego Vicuña Chile 49 0 0 0.54280
6 S. Alexandrov Bulgaria 32 31 0 0.52113
7 C. Brower US 52 0 0 0.48111
8 J. Crawford Australia 27 14 5 0.48067
9 D. Price US 18 13 0 0.48031
10 E. Gaillard France 23 21 0 0.47015
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34. 29.10.2018 35

35. Implications for arbitral appointments
• Role of symbolic and network capital in obtainining
appointments
• Structural barriers to new entrants
– Role of insiders in arbitration appointments
– Lack of transparency around process
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36. Double Hatting
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37. Case Study: Telekom Malaysia v Ghana
38

38. Critics
• “it is possible to recognise the difficulty that may arise if
a lawyer spends a morning drafting an arbitral award
that addresses a contentious legal issue, and then in
the afternoon as counsel in a different case drafts a
pleading making arguments on the same legal issue.
Can that lawyer, while acting as arbitrator, cut herself
off entirely from her simultaneous role as counsel?”
• Philippe Sands
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39. Top 10 Double hatters
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0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Zachary Douglas
Eric Schwartz
Stanimir Alexandrov
Stephen Schwebel
Florentino Feliciano
Robert Volterra
Daniel Price
James Crawford
Jan Paulsson
Emmanuel Gaillard

40. Double Hatting Across Time
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41. Reforms?
• Internal debate
• EU’s Investment Court
• UNICTRAL reform process
• Proposals for transitional rules
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