Definition
The investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) mechanism included in free trade agreements extends into domestic policy spaces and disciplines governments into maintaining the most favorable conditions for capitalist accumulation. Serving as a form of continuity between past imperial relations and present articulations of subjugation and control, ISDS is both linked to, and dependent upon, imperial domination in earlier epochs. The uneven development of capitalism that resulted from imperialism has provided the incentives for the geographic dispersal of both production processes and financial flows in the neoliberal era. ISDS thus serves to protect the processes associated with the transnationalization of capital through internalized, universalized interventions.
Introduction
Bilateral and multilateral free-trade agreements have proliferated in recent decades, becoming increasingly qualitatively...
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Nichols, S. (2019). Investor-State Dispute Settlement Mechanisms and Imperialism. In: Ness, I., Cope, Z. (eds) The Palgrave Encyclopedia of Imperialism and Anti-Imperialism. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-91206-6_143-1
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