AIIB Yearbook of International Law


The AIIB Yearbook of International Law (AYIL) is an annual legal publication in furtherance of the development mandate of the Bank. AIIB’s Office of the General Counsel, responsible for the yearbook, looks outward and embraces the larger responsibilities that befall a modern organization owned primarily by states, substantially supported by public funds and with the potential to impact on the lives of many. Those responsibilities include the obligation to share what we learn, the successes we celebrate and the failures we suffer, so that others may benefit from that experience.

Because it is not only experience that informs knowledge, AIIB will also wish to offer, for the critical consideration of others, new ways of thinking about difficult issues with which international organizations and the wider legal community must contend. Some of those issues will be recurrent, sometimes being seemingly intractable. Assuredly, as yet unknown challenges also lie ahead, about what role law does, can and ought to play in empowering and constraining international organizations and others in the pursuit of societal objectives.

The search for answers, in the international legal sphere as elsewhere, will always draw us forwards together. Through this yearbook, the AIIB strives to make some modest contribution to legal knowledge and understanding, not only by drawing on its own experiences and insights, but by offering a platform for others to develop and rigorously test ideas on matters of common interest and for the AIIB to disseminate them. In this endeavor, we all stand to gain with the enlargement of public goods.


Funding International Development Organizations: Innovations of Law and Practice

AIIB Stone AIIB Yearbook of International Law 2021
Volume 4
Editors: Christopher Smith and Xuan Gao
Publication Date: To be published in 2021
Publisher: Brill Nijhoff

The fourth volume of the AIIB Yearbook of International Law, to be published in 2021, will examine the law and practice in the funding of international development organizations. Specifically, it will look into the role of international organizations in the development of local capital markets in which they operate, examine the effect of their international legal status on their funding operations in different jurisdictions, and explore the innovations they have undertaken in resource mobilization, funding structure and development.

The 2020 AIIB Law Lecture, delivered by Xue Hanqin, Vice President of the International Court of Justice, on the subject of “The Juridical Role of the International Court of Justice in the Development of International Law” will also be included in this volume, together with the 2020 AIIB Legal Conference Report.


The Role of International Administrative Law at International Organizations

AIIB Stone AIIB Yearbook of International Law 2020
Volume 3
Editor: Peter Quayle
Publication Date: Nov. 4, 2020
Publisher: Brill Nijhoff
ISBN: 978-90-04-44103-3

The Role of International Administrative Law at International Organizations, edited by Peter Quayle, is centred on the law of employment relations at international organizations, and divided into four parts. It examines the interplay between international administrative law and the jurisdictional immunities of international organizations. It explores the principles and practice of resolving employment related disputes at intergovernmental institutions. It considers the dynamic development of international administrative tribunals. It examines international administrative law as the basis for the effectiveness and integrity of international organizations. Together academics, jurists and practitioners portray the employment law that governs the international civil service and the resulting accountability of the United Nations, UN Specialized Agencies, and international financial institutions, like the World Bank and IMF.

This volume concludes with the text of the 2019 Law Lecture, delivered by Nico Schrijver, Member and President (2017-2019) of the Institut de Droit International, State Councillor of the Council of State of the Netherlands and professor of international law at Leiden University, on the subject of “The Rise of Sustainable Development in International Investment Law”, and the 2019 AIIB Legal Conference Report.


International Organizations and the Promotion of Effective Dispute Resolution

AIIB Stone AIIB Yearbook of International Law 2019
Volume 2
Editors: Peter Quayle and Xuan Gao
Publication Date: June 26, 2019
Publisher: Brill Nijhoff
ISBN: 978-90-04-40741-1

This second volume of the AIIB Yearbook of International Law examines the role of international organizations in promoting effective dispute resolution. It is divided into five parts to reflect a series of overarching themes and relationships. Firstly, international arbitration’s effectiveness and affinity with multilateral institutions. Second, international organizations as proponents of the norms of dispute resolution. Third, the dispute resolution mandates of international organizations. Fourth, the role of dispute resolution and economic development. Together, this diversity of perspectives offers convincing evidence that effective dispute resolution is a precondition to successful economic development—and that international organizations have an essential role to play in promoting both.

The fifth part presents the 2018 AIIB Law Lecture given by Georg Nolte, Chair of the International Law Commission, on the subject of “International Organizations in the Recent Work of the International Law Commission” and the 2018 AIIB Legal Conference Report.


Good Governance and Modern International Financial Institutions

AIIB Stone AIIB Yearbook of International Law 2018
Volume 1
Editors: Peter Quayle and Xuan Gao
Publication Date: July 18, 2019
Publisher: Brill Nijhoff
ISBN: 978-90-04-40832-6

This first volume of the AIIB Yearbook of International Law (AYIL), edited by Peter Quayle and Xuan Gao, is based upon the inaugural 2017 AIIB Legal Conference, both titled, Good Governance and Modern International Financial Institutions (IFIs). Following a Preface by the General Counsel of the AIIB and General Editor of AYIL, Gerard Sanders, and an Introduction by the Editors, this volume of AYIL draws upon expertise from other IFIs, international law and governance practitioners, and eminent academics. It is divided into three parts to reflect a series of dimensions to the good governance of IFIs. Firstly, the role of the membership of IFIs as expressed through their executive governance organs. Second, the legal basis of governance of IFIs. And third, the interaction around governance between IFIs and external stakeholders.

This volume concludes with the text of the 2017 AIIB Law Lecture, delivered by the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and Legal Counsel, Miguel de Serpa Soares on the subject of “The Necessity of Cooperation between International Organizations” and a summary report on the proceedings of the 2017 AIIB Legal Conference.

The first volume of AYIL was launched at the Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of the AIIB in Mumbai, India, June 2018.

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