The in Dubio Pro Development Principle : A Right to Development in Trade and Investment Regimes

The Right to Development (“RTD”) is indeed an enforceable obligation in International Economic Law (“IEL”), both in its trade and investment disciplines. IEL provides for mechanisms to ensure the Right to Development will be enforced, particularly through the application of the in dubio pro development principle and the Right to Development, both seen as obligations in trade and investment agreements. Recognition of the RTD and the in dubio pro development principle by international economic dispute settlement bodies will help clarify IEL norms that support the adoption of public policies by emerging nations that foster development. It will likewise help accomplish the fair and sustainable trade and investment goals agreed upon by developed and emerging nations in treaty negotiations, which were clearly promised in order to initiate trade and investment negotiations and which consequently resulted in binding instruments. Therefore, the Right to Development is an implicit value of the International Economic Law system, which was teleologically formulated using a language infused with commonly shared ideals. As such, the in dubio pro development principle as a formal source of international economic law is implicit in trade and investment law and has emerged from the systemic integration of treaty preambles, Special and Differential Treatment rules, and negotiation purposes, which, like any legal principle, are at the origins and foundation of the legal system