10. Sovereignty Modern

What is modernity in international trade and investment law when confronted with a never-ending inflation of norms and proliferation of dispute settlement mechanisms whose decisions are, if only known, sometimes incoherent and often inconsistent? Isn’t modern international economic law also driven by successive developments hence always on the move towards the integration (or not) of new protagonists and potential subjects, either public or private, which domains of action rest at the margin of its traditionally defined sphere of competence that is the regulation of trade and investment relations amongst nations. In this rather unstable environment, the rediscovery of sovereignty in the light of the emergence of a new State capitalism and the better voiced and framed expectations of an interrelated global civil society contributes to a form of stabilization, if not yet re-unification, of an international law now ritually denounced as fragmented. While it was not the purpose of this book to thoroughly assess the latest developments of sovereignty as a polymorphous, uncertain and so controversial concept in international trade and investment law, the question arose throughout all its contributions as in the statist perspective chosen to approach a variety of contemporary trade and investment disputes’ methods, actors and decisions. New challenges remain such as corporate nationality shopping aiming, as in the recent Phillip Morris case, to expand the scope of possible arbitration jurisdiction through better treaty protection. But here again, it is around the State that the question revolves. Hence, it is time for the State to reshape its approach of international trade and investment law-making so that it is eventually judged according to the standards he set on the basis of the very significance of sovereignty that is independence.