Barry Finnegan
PhD Researcher
School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics
Through active membership of ATTAC (Ireland) - the Association for the Taxation of Financial Transaction for the Aid of Citizens - , the Irish Social Forum and now Comhlámh’s Trade Justice Group, Barry has spent over 20 years researching and campaigning against the anti-democratic and anti-environmental aspects of EU trade and investment policy. Over that time he has presented his research on European Union international trade policy to the Oireachtas Joint Committee on European Union Affairs, to the Irish government’s civil service TTIP negotiating committee, at academic conferences, in journals and at numerous presentations, meetings and public debates around island of Ireland.
Barry’s PhD, ‘Embedded Neoliberalism and EU Trade and Investment Policy in the Anthropocene: an Ecosocialist Critique’, will argue that the era of the Anthropocene requires that the European Union (EU) develops and implements a sustainable and ethical trade and investment policy. The research hypothesis is that an embedded neoliberal political economy approach drives EU trade and investment policy and that this approach challenges the EU’s democratic credentials and blocks its capacity to adequately develop policy responses to the planetary crisis. The work in particular will use the EU-Canada trade deal (CETA) and the EU-Mercosur FTA as case studies, critique Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) mechanisms, produce a working-draft text of ‘An Ecosocialist EU Trade and Investment Agreement’ and explore how a Citizens’ Assembly would dictate trade and investment policy.