Abstract

In an age of legitimacy crisis, the issue of how investment tribunals enjoin domestic criminal proceedings is critical because states rarely comply with those binding recommendations. Nonetheless, a missing gap exists in the current literature on the interplay between interim measures and the legitimacy crisis. This article reviews the five general elements of issuing interim measures and examines their applications in enjoining criminal proceedings to fill this gap. As a recent controversy, Munshi v. Mongolia captures the common struggle in balancing sovereign deference with investor protection. A historical and comparative analysis of how interim decisions are enforced in cases of persons’ custody suggests that states’ non-compliance with those decisions frustrates the object of interim measures. Against this background, this article submits that investment tribunals should consider the compliance of their binding recommendations in an age where non-compliance with these binding recommendations harms the legitimacy of investment arbitration.