I think you're right in noting that.... The original treaty, the very first one that's always mentioned, between Germany and Pakistan certainly was designed to protect German investments in Pakistan. There weren't very many in the fifties, sixties and seventies. Things gradually took off, particularly with NAFTA, in fact.
NAFTA was a bit of a wake-up call for Canada. Everybody said that we were going to buy into investor-state arbitration under chapter 11 because we may have to deal with these Mexicans who are a bit unruly. Lo and behold, who got sued first? Canada. Who got sued second? Canada. Then somebody had the good sense to sue the USA and one thing led to another.
In fact, in many ways, in terms of the thinking that went into the lawyership and into the decision-making by arbitrators, NAFTA was certainly an important moment in the development. There was certainly a phenomenon where more developed countries were being sued, but I think over the last 15 to 20 years, we have seen something of a rebalancing. People wondered whether China would ever get into it. Finally they've accepted to be sued and now they're suing other countries themselves. India has been reticent, but Indian investors are out there suing both developing and developed countries.
I think the idea that it is simply some sort of conspiracy to pull down the developing world is no longer true. You have developing country investors, as between each other, and people like Tata in Europe and in Great Britain who have taken cases against European governments.
I think things have rebalanced quite a bit. We have over 700 cases now, and those who are suing really constitute quite a remarkable mix of countries. As Barry Appleton noted, it's not just big corporations, but a great many smaller corporations are using the system as well.