In my professional life as an administrative lawyer, I have dealt with shaping social issues through functioning and fair regulations with an appropriate balance of interests.
In 2012, I learned from the press that the secret negotiations on TTIP, the planned free trade agreement between the EU and the US, provided for private arbitration tribunals that could override national laws in favour of investors in the investor-state lawsuit (ISDS). The restriction of national sovereignty in legislation has led me to take part in the campaign against TTIP and CETA. The fact that such important agreements, which define the framework conditions for European and German society, are negotiated without democratic discussion in public, I felt as a scandal.
So-called free trade agreements only protect the rights of investors and often have an unfavorable effect on the economic development of the countries of the Global South. It is necessary that ‘free trade agreements’ are reviewed by experts for social, economic and environmental impacts before they are concluded, so that civil society and MEPs can assess the impact and act on it. This requires competent NGOs such as Powershift.
