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Begin New Search Topic Foreign Direct Investment Political Geography United States Content Type Policy Brief Publishing Institution Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment

1. The China-United States BIT negotiations: A Chinese perspective

Author:
Sheng Zhang
Publication Date:
01-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
The China-US bilateral investment treaty (BIT) negotiations have attracted attention due to the relative size and weight of both economies. Despite broad consensus about the importance of such a treaty, there is considerable debate about its shape and content. The debate is reflected in two recent Columbia FDI Perspectives. Donnelly argued that a China-US BIT should be modeled on the US Model BIT without "splitting the difference between Chinese and US positions", and that the possibility of meaningful BIT negotiations are "really up to China at this point".
Topic:
Economics, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, Bilateral Relations, Foreign Direct Investment, and Governance
Political Geography:
United States, China, Europe, and Colombia

2. The Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership: A critical perspective

Author:
Rainer Geiger
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Launched in July 2013 by the European Union and the United States, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) represents an important effort to reach a comprehensive economic agreement between two major trading partners. As has been pointed out, the project offers great opportunities for liberalizing trade and investment and regulatory convergence. Its level of ambition implies high risks, but despite negotiators' initial optimism, its success is far from certain.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Treaties and Agreements, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

3. Three challenges for China's outward FDI policy

Author:
Karl P. Sauvant
Publication Date:
10-2013
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Since China adopted its "going out" policy in 2001, her outward foreign direct investment (OFDI) flows have grown rapidly, reaching US$84 billion in 2012 (although the stock remains small). That year, China was the world's third largest outward investor (after the US and Japan). This performance raises all sorts of issues, especially because state-owned enterprises (SOEs) control some three-quarters of the country's OFDI stock. Three challenges are addressed in this Perspective.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Emerging Markets, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States, Japan, and China

4. A new economic nationalism? Lessons from the PotashCorp decision in Canada

Author:
Sandy Walker
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
In its World Investment Report 2011, UNCTAD reported that liberalizing investment policy measures taken globally in 2010 outnumbered restrictive measures. Without the benefit of statistics, investors might have drawn the opposite conclusion, witnessing what appears to be a rising tide of national resistance to foreign takeovers: the Australian Foreign Investment Review Board's rejection of a takeover of the Australian Securities Exchange by the Singapore Exchange, Italian concern over a French company's takeover of dairy giant Parmalat and the US Government's requirement that Chinese company Huawei divest certain assets it had acquired from 3Leaf.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States, China, Canada, Australia, and Singapore

5. A China – US bilateral investment treaty: A template for a multilateral framework for investment?

Author:
Karl P. Sauvant and Huiping Chen
Publication Date:
12-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
China is the largest foreign direct investment (FDI) host and home country among emerging markets, the United States among developed countries. As host countries, both seek to maintain policy space to pursue their own legitimate public policy objectives; as home countries, both seek to protect their investors' outward FDI. The development of their bilateral investment treaties (BITs) over the past decade reflects this: Chinese BITs have become more protective of investors, US ones more respectful of host country interests. If agreement is reached between both, it would provide a template for future investment agreements.
Topic:
Economics, Emerging Markets, Treaties and Agreements, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States and China

6. State-controlled entities control nearly US$ 2 trillion in foreign assets

Author:
Karl P. Sauvant and Jonathan Strauss
Publication Date:
04-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Developing country sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) as players in the world foreign direct investment (FDI) market have received considerable attention. While outward FDI from emerging markets has indeed risen dramatically, that by SWFs has been negligible: their outward FDI stock is around US$ 100 billion (compared to a world FDI stock of US$ 20 trillion in 2010).
Topic:
Development, Economics, Emerging Markets, Government, International Law, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States

7. Economic patriotism: Dealing with Chinese direct investment in the United States

Author:
Sophie Meunier
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
China is investing throughout the world, in industries from automobiles to zinc. In the US, Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) accounted for only 0.25% of total FDI stock in 2010,but it is likely to increase as China diversifies its holdings and seeks to obtain technology, managerial know-how and easier access to US consumers. As these investments multiply, we expect a few cases to attract negative attention in the media and political arena. Chinese companies are predominately state-controlled, raising the specter that they act to fulfill strategic, rather than profit maximizing, goals. China is also an ideological rival, causing irrational concern that Chinese investment in the US may act as a Trojan Horse of Chinese values and politics --fueled by rational concerns about subsidies, piracy, and economic espionage.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States and China

8. The role of multinationals in sparking industrialization: From "infant industry protection" to "FDI-led industrial take-off"

Author:
Terutomo Ozawa
Publication Date:
06-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Although not yet fully conceptualized as a new catch-up model in mainstream development economics, the infant industry argument (protectionism designed to replace imports with domestic substitutes) is giving way to a foreign direct investment (FDI)-led model of industrialization.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Industrial Policy, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States, Japan, and China

9. The coming harmonization of climate change policy and international investment law

Author:
Daniel M. Firger
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Developments in climate change policy and international investment law may be ushering in a new era characterized by profound harmonization between the two regimes. Although policy instruments such as the Kyoto Protocol's “Clean Development Mechanism” (CDM) have been in existence for years, it is only relatively recently that the international community has turned to low-carbon foreign direct investment (FDI) and away from command-and-control regulation as the preferred means by which to achieve future greenhouse gas emissions reductions. Meanwhile, states have begun to renegotiate international investment agreements (IIAs) or sign new treaties to take into account policy goals, including climate change mitigation, that extend beyond the regime's traditional preoccupation with investor protection. Though still somewhat tentative, emerging trends in both arenas are thus showing unmistakable signs of convergence.
Topic:
Climate Change, Economics, Industrial Policy, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States and China

10. Is the party-appointed arbitrator a "pernicious institution"? A reply to Professor Hans Smit

Author:
Giorgio Sacerdoti
Publication Date:
04-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Some readers of the Columbia FDI Perspective No. 33 of December 14, 2010 may have been surprised to read Hans Smit's contribution against party-appointed arbitrators. The opening of his Perspective could not be expressed in more sweeping terms: "In my judgment, party-appointed arbitrators should be banned unless their role as advocates for the party that appointed them is fully disclosed and accepted. Until this is done, arbitration can never meet its aspiration of providing dispassionate adjudication..."
Topic:
Economics, Human Rights, Foreign Direct Investment, and Law
Political Geography:
United States

11. From the FDI Triad to multiple FDI poles?

Author:
Karl P. Sauvant and Persephone Economou
Publication Date:
07-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Twenty years ago, in the inaugural issue of the World Investment Report, the United Nations highlighted a shift in the global pattern of foreign direct investment (FDI) from bipolar, dominated by the United States and the European Community, to tri-polar (the FDI Triad), dominated by the European Community, the United States and Japan.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, United Nations, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States, Japan, and Europe

12. Shaping global business conduct: The 2011 update of the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises

Author:
Manfred Schekulin
Publication Date:
09-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
On May 25, 2011, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton joined ministers from members of the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and developing economies to celebrate the Organisation\'s 50th anniversary and agree on an update of the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, the fifth revision since their adoption in 1976. This marked the culmination of an intense one-year negotiating process involving a large number of stakeholders, international organizations and emerging economies.
Topic:
Development, Economics, International Cooperation, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States

13. Beyond treasuries: A foreign direct investment program for U.S. infrastructure

Author:
Geraldine McAllister and Joel H. Moser
Publication Date:
09-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
In his jobs address to a joint session of Congress last week, President Obama returned to a familiar theme: a call for nontraditional infrastructure investment as a generator of economic growth and, ultimately, jobs. The President's frequent references to “private investment” and “fully paid” infrastructure are encouraging, yet there is no assurance that domestic private capital investment alone is sufficient to reverse the degradation of the nation's infrastructure. As host to the largest flows of inward foreign direct investment (FDI), it is time that the United States employs this critical source of capital in tackling the nation's infrastructure deficit.
Topic:
Economics, Labor Issues, Infrastructure, Foreign Direct Investment, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States

14. Investment incentives and the global competition for capital

Author:
Kenneth P. Thomas
Publication Date:
12-2011
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Investment incentives (subsidies designed to affect the location of investment) are a pervasive feature of global competition for foreign direct investment (FDI). They are used by the vast majority of countries, at multiple levels of government, in a broad range of industries. They take a variety of forms, including tax holidays, grants and free land. Politicians, at least in the United States, may have good electoral incentives to use them.
Topic:
Development, Environment, Globalization, International Trade and Finance, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

15. FDI incentives pay — politically

Author:
Nathan M. Jensen and Edmund J. Malesky
Publication Date:
06-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Despite broad skepticism about the benefits of globalization, the majority of U.S. states have offered lucrative tax incentives to attract investment. The size of these incentives is generally considered too large to be welfare enhancing, and many economists are skeptical of the effectiveness of these policies. Yet despite the mounting evidence to the contrary, the incentives offered by U.S. states (and foreign countries) continue and have actually increased in their generosity over time.
Topic:
Economics, Political Economy, Politics, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States

16. Foreign direct investment and U.S. national security: CFIUS under the Obama Administration

Author:
Mark E. Plotkin and David N. Fagan
Publication Date:
06-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
There was considerable public scrutiny of the Obama Administration's performance in its inaugural year, but comparatively little focus on one of the Administration's key processes governing the flow of investment into the United States — namely, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). Yet, this is a frequent question we receive from foreign investors -- has the change in the administration affected CFIUS?
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Monetary Policy, Foreign Direct Investment, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States

17. How much do U.S. corporations know (and care) about bilateral investment treaties? Some hints from new survey evidence

Author:
Jason Webb Yackee
Publication Date:
11-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
A remarkable number of countries have recently entered into bilateral investment treaties (BITs) as a means of protecting and promoting inward foreign direct investment (FDI). But do the treaties “work?” In exchange for giving up some mea sure of regulatory autonomy, host countries hope to receive increased flows of investment. Scholars have devoted substantial energy to examining whether this so-called “grand bargain” has in fact been realized. Most studies follow a common research design. The number of BITs that a state has signed are counted up, with the resulting independent variable regressed against country-level FDI flow data. Unfortunately, the results of these various and increasingly complex statistical exercises are inconsistent. 1 Some studies show that BITs can have massive positive impacts on foreign investment; others show modest positive impacts; others show no impact at all, or even a negative impact.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance, Bilateral Relations, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States

18. State-controlled entities as claimants in international investment arbitration: an early assessment

Author:
Michael D. Nolan and Frédéric Sourgens
Publication Date:
12-2010
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
State-controlled entities (SCEs) are increasingly important participants in international investment flows and international trade. Cumulative FDI by sovereign wealth funds (SWFs) has reportedly reached US$100 billion. SWFs are significant equity investors in, and provide significant debt financing to, every kind of company, from professional sports franchises to container ports. In addition to the role of these funds, national oil companies are growing in regional and international importance. In many countries, other industries are also increasingly government-owned.
Topic:
Development, Government, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, Political Economy, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States

19. Can the U.S. Remain an Attractive Host for FDI in the Auto Industry? New Labor Policy and Flexible Production

Author:
Terutomo Ozawa
Publication Date:
10-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
President Obama has been supporting a new bill, the Employee Free Choice Act, designed to promote the labor unions' drive for unionization. This bill, if enacted, will surely be a big boon for unions as it helps enlarge their membership, enhance their bargaining power vis-à-vis businesses, and enrich their coffers to wield political clout. An important issue here, however, is how such reinforced unionism contributes to the U.S.'s much needed industrial competitiveness and employment—and, more specifically, how this new policy will affect the U.S. as a host to FDI in the auto industry.
Topic:
Economics, Industrial Policy, International Trade and Finance, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States

20. The global economic crisis and FDI flows to emerging markets: for the first time ever, emerging markets are this year set to attract more than half of global FDI flows

Author:
Laza Kekic
Publication Date:
10-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
The global economic and financial crisis has had a major impact on foreign direct investment (FDI) flows. After declining in 2008 by 17% to US$1.73trn from US$2.09trn in 2007—the high point of a four- year long boom in cross-border mergers and acquisitions (M) and FDI—global FDI inflows are forecast to plunge by 44% to less than US$1trn in 2009. The big drop in 2009 is occurring despite the improvements in the global economy in recent months. A notable feature of trends in 2009 is that, for the first time ever, emerging markets are set to attract more FDI inflows than the developed world.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Foreign Direct Investment, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States

21. International Investment Arbitration: Winning, Losing and Why

Author:
Susan D. Franck
Publication Date:
06-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
We know several things about foreign investment. First, foreign investment matters, reaching US$1.7 trillion in 2008. Second, we know that foreign investors have new international law rights to protect their economic interests. Third, we know that those rights are now being used.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States

22. The global financial crisis: will state emergency measures trigger international investment disputes?

Author:
Anne Van Aaken and Jürgen Kurtz
Publication Date:
03-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
Several developed countries have introduced emergency measures to mitigate the effects of the Global Financial Crisis, including Australia, Germany, Ireland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Although the measures taken are still undergoing changes by the executive branch and are thus a “moving target”, our survey reveals early evidence of differentiation between foreign and domestic actors in the emergency plans adopted by this sample grouping. It is this differentiation that may give rise to liability as breaching guarantees against discrimination of foreign investors under international investment law.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, Markets, International Affairs, Foreign Direct Investment, and Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, and Ireland

23. The revised national security review process for FDI in the US

Author:
Mark E. Plotkin and David N. Fagan
Publication Date:
01-2009
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment
Abstract:
On December 22, 2008, new regulations setting forth the U.S. government's national security review process for foreign mergers and acquisitions of U.S. businesses became effective. They are the ultimate step in a lengthy effort to revise and strengthen the reviews undertaken by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (“CFIUS”).
Topic:
Economics, National Security, and Foreign Direct Investment
Political Geography:
United States