International Trade Law and Sustainable Development: post-2015 trends

The goal of the research thesis consists of scrutiny of the concept of sustainable development in international law, as well as its interplay with international trade law. Additionally, the goal of this project consists of formulating the trends for further development of that kind of interplay in the light of contemporary perception of sustainable development and international trade. Achievement of the goal set necessitates indicating and solution of the following tasks: • Providing a definition for “sustainable development” in international law and the content of this concept; • Identification the concept’s legal nature within international law and international trade law in particular; • Analysis of changes that sustainable development underwent in the last five years; • Identification of the role of international trade for the achievement of sustainable development; • Targeting the post-2015 trends for future interplay between international trade law and sustainable development; The present thesis involves the research and analysis of scientific literature both in Russian and foreign languages, international documents of various international bodies, decisions of various international courts and tribunals, as well as international treaties. Thesis consists of three chapters and each include multiple sections. The first chapter concerns the content of sustainable development in international law. Second chapter analyses the role of sustainable development in international trade law. Third chapter touches upon the contemporary trends in international trade law from the perspective of current state of the concept of sustainable development. The present thesis reveals the contradictions between the current system of international trade and sustainable development that have become as the consequence of the lack of normative character of sustainable development. Such lack follows from both the ambiguity of sustainable development, as well as the reluctance of international community to make effective steps to solve this issue. This and other factors explain the inferior character of possible changes in the post-2015 interplay between international trade law and sustainable development