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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsQuestion about the TPP
I realize not a lot of information has been publicly debated about the fine details of this deal, so this is speculation.
As multi-nationals will be able to act independently of sovereign nation's environmental laws, would a US owned company also be able to use this standard and go to the closed tribunals for ruling, or if not, would they find it in their interest to move their companies over seas?
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)Question
Is it true that Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) would allow corporations to override laws, including environmental and public health regulations?
Answer
No. ISDS cannot change law in the United States or any other country. No government measure (federal, state, or local) can be blocked or reversed under the ISDS provisions or any other part of TPP. The United States would never negotiate away its right to regulate in the public interest, and we dont ask other countries to do so either. This is true with regard to public health and safety, the financial sector, the environment, and any other area where governments seek to regulate.
Put simply, ISDS is a mechanism to promote good governance and the rule of law. ISDS protects basic rights such as protection against discrimination and expropriation without compensation akin to those enshrined in U.S. law and the Constitution. We already provide these protections at home to foreign and domestic investors under U.S. law. Thats why although we are party to 51 agreements with ISDS the U.S. has never lost an ISDS case. Our trade agreements ensure the same kinds of protections to U.S. businesses and investors operating abroad, where they face a heightened risk of discrimination and bias.
TPP includes a number of enhancements that strengthen the transparency and integrity of the dispute settlement process under ISDS. These include making hearings open to the public, allowing the public and public interest groups to file amicus curiae submissions, ensuring that all ISDS awards are subject to review by domestic courts or international review panels, ensuring that governments have a way to dismiss claims that are without merit on an expedited basis, and more.
In addition, after consultations with Members of Congress, the United States pushed for and secured additional safeguards that will establish a code of conduct for ISDS arbitrators and facilitate the dismissal of frivolous claims, among other first-of-their-kind provisions.
ISDS ensures that a wide range of American businesses including small businesses are protected against unfair discrimination when investing abroad. This will benefit the millions of American workers employed by these companies, as outside analysis shows that about half of ISDS cases are initiated by small- and medium-sized businesses, or individual investors.
https://medium.com/the-trans-pacific-partnership/frequently-asked-questions-on-the-trans-pacific-partnership-eddc8d87ac73#.w3c4wzdlh
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)And in fact, it is not clear, but many groups whose main concern is global warming, that secret panels (I know, that sounds so Bilderberg, but what else to call them?) will be able to challenge carbon emission decisions by sovereign states.
So say, that is the hypothetical, and you've answered not x, so not y. But others are saying x - and my question was - then what about y? Would companies simply move abroad to be able to take advantage of the international review panels?
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)The "secret panels" notion came about because "TPP was negotiated in secret" - now you can read it yourself - no secret panels.
If there is no "x" there is no "y" in your scenario.
However - without trade agreements initiating environmental and labor standards in countries where there are no standards - where we try to level the playing field - does a corporation have a fiscal incentive to move there? Why, yes it does.
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)Even the article you quote above says "OR" independent panels. This wording needs to be finessed now that it has been revealed to the light of day.
As far as your suggestion I read the agreement - I simply don't have the time! I've perused it - but the footnotes are like a million billion tiny font all-the-meat-in-the-details pages and pages. I'm happy there are advocacy groups out there doing the fine combing.
Kudos to you for reading it all!
Recursion
(56,582 posts)Seriously, that's disturbing. Why do you want to take that away from our unions?
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)Recursion
(56,582 posts)labor standards? I still think that's seriously messed up.
Those are those "tribunals" people complain about. What part of American unions suing foreign governments when they violate the treaty standards are you against? It just seems kind of weird to me to oppose that.
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)I never said anything about American unions' right to sue. I want to see sovereign state rights strengthened, not eroded. Seriously don't know how you got to thinking I believed the opposite of what I meant. Proud Iron Workers of America member. Proud ASCAP member.
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)w4rma
(31,700 posts)floppyboo
(2,461 posts)floppyboo
(2,461 posts)in order to allay fears that the TPP could be disastrous for the planet. Just a few paragraphs. Not dissing the whole thing before you jump all over me for presenting more speculation
http://canadians.org/blog/barlow-calls-protection-isds-challenges-paris-climate-agreement
Yes, this is older, but the question is still in debate. And yes, it is from a Canadian source, but the deal includes Canada.
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)'Creative speculation' is not part of a serious conversation.
You want to argue against something that doesn't exist.
These safeguards are to protect corporations from being nationalized or governments creating unfair advantages for local investors after a corporation has invested in that country.
Do you think Mercedes Benz, Honda, Hyundai, many, many other foreign-owned corporations would invest in the US without an expectation of fairness?
If we pass environmental or labor standards that impact their profit margin - are they going to change our laws? No, they aren't. They deal with it exactly as we do. Including relocating to unregulated countries in pursuit of profit.
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)"If we pass environmental or labor standards that impact their profit margin - are they going to change our laws? No, they aren't. They deal with it exactly as we do. Including relocating to unregulated countries in pursuit of profit."
Which answers a question, not the question I asked.
I was curious about American/Canadian/Peruvian/Japnese/Malaysian - what have you - companies registered presently in their own countries. Will they be able to use the independent review boards? Or will they simply move?
We are obviously not concerned with the same issue.
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)It should be "Position on TPP."
I'm done arguing endlessly.
"A closed mind is a bar to any argument."
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)And it specifically relates to the guidelines of independent panels.
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)The "article" you reference that I provided the link to is a Federal government summary followed by the actual finalized text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
There are multiple references of ISDS panels - which exist in multiple agreements we have in place already, and which are mentioned in your Paris treaty "article" as being a concern to the "now finalized" Paris agreement on environment.
There are no "imaginary" panels in the finalized agreements. That's why you have to reference material prior to the actual agreements, when it was all "imaginary."
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)as an 'OR' and seriously - just because it is a gov't issued doc. that should be fact and end of discussion? Look what happened to bomb proof NAFTA. Those are the 'imaginary' panels I refer to. The ones whose problems have supposedly been fixed. They didn't get it right the first time. Doesn't look to me like its perfect/bomb proof this time.
But again, that wasn't my question or my issue in this thread. It is about national companies moving to other countries - even and especially countries who are part of the TPP in order to get the benefits of independent panels.
Response to yallerdawg (Reply #1)
Post removed
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)Brilliant.
What happened? The actual document ended the 'creative speculation'? Sure looks like it!
You can see TPP for yourself. It's not a secret!
https://ustr.gov/trade-agreements/free-trade-agreements/trans-pacific-partnership/TPP-Full-Text
brentspeak
(18,290 posts)Last edited Mon Jun 20, 2016, 12:00 PM - Edit history (1)
Not really.
Let's just ignore the official propaganda you cited, and find a better analysis of the TPP:
The leaked text would empower foreign firms to directly sue signatory governments in extrajudicial investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) tribunals over domestic policies that apply equally to domestic and foreign firms that foreign firms claim violate their new substantive investor rights. There they could demand taxpayer compensation for domestic financial, health, environmental, land use and other policies and government actions they claim undermine TPP foreign investor privileges, such as the right to a regulatory framework that conforms to their expectations.
The leaked text reveals the TPP would expand the parallel ISDS legal system by elevating tens of
thousands of foreign-owned firms to the same status as sovereign governments, empowering them to privately enforce a public treaty by skirting domestic courts and laws to directly challenge TPP governments in foreign tribunals.
Existing ISDS-enforced agreements of the United States, and of other developed TPP countries, have been almost exclusively with developing countries whose firms have few investments in the developed nations. However, the enactment of the leaked chapter would dramatically expand each TPP governments ISDS liability. The TPP would newly empower about 9,000 foreign-owned firms in the United States to launch ISDS cases against the U.S. government, while empowering more than 18,000 additional U.S.-owned firms to launch ISDS cases against other signatory governments. (These are firms not already covered by an ISDS-enforced pact between the United States and other TPP negotiating governments.)
snip
Contrary to claims from the Obama administration that the TPPs investment chapter would somehow limit the uses and abuses of the controversial ISDS regime, much of the leaked text would replicate, often word-for-word, the terms found in past U.S. ISDS-enforced agreements. However, some terms would widen the scope of domestic policies and government actions that could be challenged before extrajudicial tribunals, without offering meaningful new safeguards for those policies. For example, the leaked text could newly allow pharmaceutical firms to use TPP ISDS tribunals to demand cash compensation for claimed violations of the World Trade Organizations (WTO) rules regarding the creation, limitation or revocation of intellectual property rights. Currently, WTO rules are not privately enforceable by investors.
Got that? The ISDS terms within the TPP grant foreign investors (aka, very wealthy foreigners) with far more power than ever before to successfully sue the US government. I have to laugh at the specious reasoning of the propaganda piece you cited: "the U.S. has never lost an ISDS case", as though prior rulings would in any way affect the outcomes of future cases.
Classic avenue of legal lying: if it's possible to lie by not telling the whole truth, and if there's no way for the liar to ever suffer any personal consequences for the lying -- by all means, lie away. You can always get away with it!
Here's another doozy from your neo-Pravda apologetic: "No government measure (federal, state, or local) can be blocked or reversed under the ISDS provisions or any other part of TPP."
What Obama and the corporate lawyers and lobbyists around him aren't exactly going out of their way to make abundantly clear to the public is that much of the TPP ISDS provisions' purpose is to act as a deterrent to future Congress' and administrations' willingness to enact or even enforce important regulations that might stifle some billionaire investors' profits. A new safety regulation that might prevent people from turning green and dying after taking some new pharmaceutical? Won't get off the ground because Congress and the Executive branch don't want to run afoul of the TPP provisions. Some strengthened provision of Dodd-Frank so that the American public won't yet again be fleeced by Wall Street? Forget about it: Congress will take one look at the TPP's provisions, know that government can be sued, and now have a brand-new excuse not pass such legislation.
That's your TPP "safeguards", for you.
As a variation from what I pointed out earlier: there are those who learn early on in life that if it's possible to lie and not to suffer personal consequences for it, they'll always lie. Depressing to know that we have to deal with such people.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)Just seems an odd question to ask...
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)Chapter 11 is 55 pages alone! I choose to get my synapses from experts. I choose my experts. You choose yours. Place your bets. I like environmental justice lawyers with good credibility.
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)and too many footnotes."
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)SoP: "Discuss conspiracy theories and other highly-speculative topics. Free-thinkers and skeptics are both welcome. When posting, please be mindful of the DU Terms of Service."
Isn't this where "OMG, the sky is falling" speculation and innuendo goes?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1135
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)or would she just be 'speculating' too?
yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)She added: "I don't believe it's going to meet the high bar I have set."
http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/07/politics/hillary-clinton-opposes-tpp/index.html
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)yallerdawg
(16,104 posts)As you suggest, the anti-TPP candidate was rejected by Democratic primary voters.
The president I voted for is still in office for 6 more months - with an agenda!
Hillary doesn't take over until January!
I guess I just like Democrats!
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)so please don't make this into a Hillary/Bernie thing. It will be a Hillary/Obama thing though. If she asks her SD's to vote against it in the lame duck session.
But it may all be moot, as the TTP is somewhat reliant on the TTIP, and looks like more than enough signatures and countries have been gathered to stop that - not to mention the Brexit vote. Hold onto your seats for that! One poll +2 for leaving, another -2.
swhisper1
(851 posts)Hoyt
(54,770 posts)agreements among Scandinavian countries. Read the darn agreement, and read about how the dispute mechanism works under UN guidelines.
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)30 chapters and more than 2,000 pages!!!
Well done!
Eric J in MN
(35,619 posts)In 1997, the Ethyl Corporation, a U.S. chemical company, sued Canada under NAFTA over a Canadian "ban on the import of MMT, a gasoline additive that is a suspected neurotoxin."
The Ethyl Corporation won. Canada can't ban MMT.
swhisper1
(851 posts)Hoyt
(54,770 posts)swhisper1
(851 posts)Hoyt
(54,770 posts)tried banning the importation of MMT. Ethyl Corporation sued, the ruling was basically that a company could produce MMT if it had plants in the various Provinces. Canada ended up paying $13 million out of the $250 Million suit. But, even with that, today 95% of Canadian gasoline is MMT free. In the USA, MMT is still used today, although at low rates because it helps control emissions. Even today in Canada, they could ban the use of MMT for environmental reasons, but have not done so.
But under trade agreements, they can't allow say a Canadian company to produce MMT, but not an American company. That was the dispute. I think if you are going to have open trade between countries (which is what trade agreements promote for numerous reasons beyond just financial), you can't allow production in the domestic country, but not the importation of goods.
Interestingly, this case was in 1997. Canada has not only continued as part of NAFTA, which included the tribunals, but has entered other agreements which also include similar tribunals and Canada begged to become part of the TPP which includes tribunals (operated under UN rules, btw).
swhisper1
(851 posts)Hoyt
(54,770 posts)at least some, of not all, those governments know what's better for their people long-term. Certainly better than those who have never taken the time to read the agreements, negotiations, history, purposes, etc., and can't look 20 years down the road.
floppyboo
(2,461 posts)He also loosening regs around mining companies, which is why something like 78% of all mining companies globally are listed in Vancouver. He's also responsible for the General Dynamic sale of armoured vehicles to Saudi - Michigan based company - but - hey, what's a bit a graft and avoidance of looking like you're not the guilty party.
Harper was a great big dink and disco still sucks!!!
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)now. That will work, whereas telling American companies they can't do something that Canadian companies can do is a blatant violation of hundreds of trade agreements, that the USA is not even part of.
If you don't want to abide by a trade agreement, rescind it rather than begging to be part of more and bigger agreements.
Eric J in MN
(35,619 posts)Canadian legislators wanted to ban the use of MMT in order to protect the Canadian public. Because they could not do so under Canadian Environmental Protection Act (CEPA) provisions, they did the next best thing: banning MMT's import and transport.
http://www.citizen.org/trade/article_redirect.cfm?ID=6221