“Free trade” agreements contribute to financial and other crises

Myriam Vander Stichele
February 2009

While the financial crisis and its consequences are spreading around the world and even the most erstwhile ‘free market’ governments are discussing how to re-regulate the financial sector, bilateral and regional ‘free trade’ agreements continue extreme deregulation of the financial industry.
While the financial crisis and its consequences are spreading around the world and even the most erstwhile ‘free market’ governments are discussing how to re-regulate the financial sector, bilateral and regional ‘free trade’ agreements continue extreme deregulation of the financial industry. The terms of these agreements prohibit countries from reforming their financial sector so as to remedy the financial, economic, environmental, food and social crises now growing, and from ensuring that finance is directed towards the transformation to sustainable societies.

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Senior Researcher, Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO)

Myriam Vander Stichele  has been monitoring international trade negotiations and agreements since 1990, both at a regional and global level. She is an advisor to many NGOs whose indepth research on investment agreements and policies, and private investor strategies has sparked many international campaigns.

With an M.Phil in International Relations from Cambridge, Myriam's research is particularly focussed on the financial, food and supermarkets sectors, and the corporate strategies and services liberalisation related to these.