ABSTRACT
Introduction In 2013 US President Barack Obama, European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso announced discussions on a range of bilateral trade and investment issues. The subsequent negotiations between the two trade blocs developed the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). This sought to lower barriers to trade through removing obstacles to market access issues (including tariffs, investment protection and public procurement), and non-tariff barriers (including intellectual property rights, environment and labour market laws) to promote competitiveness across borders. Advocates of TTIP claimed that linking United States (US) and European Union (EU) markets would create the largest free trade zone in the world and help the EU to respond to the 2008 economic crisis through promoting growth 0.5 per cent growth in gross domestic product (GDP) (see Hugg and Wilkinson 2015). TTIP was soon criticised by a number of writers and emergent campaign groups, and, most notably the group Stop TTIP, as trade policy gained salience in Eurosceptic campaigns.1
