The Ethyl Case demonstrates how vulnerable governments may be to corporate pressures, lacking the legal resources to confront a challenge from lawyers representing large corporations. Under the threat of lawsuits such as these, governments will inevitably become much more cautious about introducing and enforcing regulations that are intended to protect the environment. Chapter 11 and Technology Transfer Chapter II prevents governments from imposing or enforcing any requirement on foreign investors to transfer technology or knowledge in exchange for access to natural resources. In Suriname, a recent agreement with the pharmaceutical company Bristol-Myers Squibb is allowing the country to benefit from medicinal extracts derived from their forests, and enabling Suriname to refuse offers from foreign logging firms that would have eliminated between 25 and 40 percent of Suniname's forest cover, harming Suriname's environment while providing limited long term economic benefits. However, the international arbitral panels established under Chapter I I do not provide appropriate fora for resolving disputes in a way that balances the concerns of investors with the concerns of neighboring property owners and local communities.
Arbitrations take place in secret, without the participation of all stakeholders in a dispute.
Private individuals, and sub-national levels of government, are not allowed to present their views during the arbitration or even informed that a claim has been brought although they may be the parties with the most direct interests in the outcome of the controversy. Moreover, rather than setting up an intergovernmental dispute resolution system, Chapter II relies on private, for-profit arbitration institutions. The arbitration system lacks safeguards to ensure that arbitrators are trained to understand the risks to human health and the environment posed by inadequate regulation as well as the needs of business.