With the crisis of 2008 the dangers of a deregulatory approach to economic governance became clearer to policy-makers. Yet despite this many states and institutions continue to put deregulation at the centre of their vision for global investment policy. Recent developments, such as the public debate over the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), have however given greater visibility to the opposition to corporate-focused globalisation.

A key concern within this shifting arena has been the unchecked nature of the power neoliberal/orthodox agreements have granted to corporations and major investors, particularly through the use of the Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) process in international arbitration, and the deregulatory implications of the focus on 'non-tariff barriers' to trade. Hitherto, however, alternative perspectives have remained too oppositional: conscious of what they are against but less clear what they are for.

This project will develop a new approach by bringing together a uniquely interdisciplinary research team comprising specialists and practitioners in the fields of Law and Political Science. It will develop an alternative model for global investment treaties based on democracy, human rights, and environmental protection. The project seeks to develop a framework for cooperation which sees global governance as a mechanism to ensure human security by undertaking actions on the world stage that states are unable to pursue on the national level alone.

To achieve these aims the project advances a methodology called ‘problem solving dialogues’, a synthesis drawn from Peter Reason’s (1994) concept of cooperative enquiry and Etienne Wenger’s (1998) notion of the community of practice. By establishing a workshop and other forms of knowledge exchange (‘problem solving dialogues’) between practitioners and scholars working towards a shared goal, the project endeavours to pioneer cutting edge solutions to fill the impasse created by the crisis of the corporate trade and investment agenda.