The Lisbon treaty: The final instalment of the Unions creeping competence or a source of legal uncertainty?

Abstract

With the coming into force of the Lisbon Treaty, the European Union has tactfully shifted the vertical alignment of competence to regulate foreign direct investment away from EU Member States, thereby reserving all prerogatives in this field for itself. The new Treaty purports to dislove the existing bilateral treaty regime that has been regulating the field of foreign investment for the past fifty years and replace it with a common European investment policy. The central question is: whether or not the legal mechanisms enshrined in the Lisbon Treaty are suitable and sufficient for facilitating and upholding the EUs bold objectives and whether or not the EU will have enough political leverage to lead Member States down a new European investment path.