OECD Multilateral Agreement on Investment

The OECD Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) represented the high point of post-cold war globalisation. The collapse of MAI negotiations in 1997 marked the beginning of the internet enabled anti-globalisation movement in the late -1990s.

The MAI aimed to create a global investment framework which opened national markets to international corporations and provided high levels of protections and rights to international investors. But the MAI was seen by developing country governments and civil society groups as promoting corporate rights over responsibilities, undermining national development policies and threatening environmental, cultural and social regulation.

Nick Mabey worked with Charles Arden-Clark to lead WWF-International’s work on making foreign direct investment a driver of sustainable development. WWF was one of the first civil society groups to see the danger of the - then secret - MAI negotiations and was at the heart of global civil society campaigning. The dynamics of the global campaign are outlined by Nick Mabey in this book chapter.

Nick produced influential analysis of the potential impact of the MAI on environmental regulation and international treaties, including the controversial role of Investor State Dispute Systems (ISDS) in allowing companies to claim damages for environmental regulation. The ISDS issue subsequently undermined the TTIP negotiations and recently caused EU countries to threaten to leave the Energy Charter Treaty.

Global protest caused the MAI negotiations to collapse in 1997 when governments withdrew their support as the conflicts between the draft MAI rules & national policies became clearer. Nick worked to increase awareness & scrutiny by legislators and the media on the potential consequences of poorly designed international investment treaties. Attempts to shift investment negotiations to the World Trade Organisation subsequently failed leaving investment mainly treated as a bilateral issue.

WWF continued to work on better FDI regulation including to strengthen the OECD Guidelines on Multi-National Enterprises which WWF’s research found were seldom effective. Nick Mabey later worked in the UK government delegation in the revision of the OECD Guidelines & led the UK negotiating team on corporate responsibility at the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development.