About

The Centre for Inclusive Trade Policy (CITP) is built on the precept that trade policy should be inclusive in both policy formulation and outcome and comprises researchers and external partners across the UK.

Our aims

Formulating an effective trade policy that delivers something for all parts of society requires an evidence-based interdisciplinary approach, founded on consolidated and independent research expertise, which the Centre for Inclusive Trade Policy aims to provide.

Our aim is to equip the UK with the capability to formulate and implement a trade policy tailored to the needs of the whole of the UK by developing a community of scholars and practitioners with the knowledge, skills and mutual understanding to develop robust trade policy in a changing world.

The CITP seeks to guide the formulation of an effective inclusive trade policy that delivers something for all parts of society by:

  • Conducting innovative research into pressing practical international trade and policy issues
  • Developing a body of data and frontier empirical methods
  • Working extensively to inform public debate and understanding of trade policy issues
  • Engaging with a wide range of policymakers, businesses and civil society organisations
  • Working with international partners to analyse broader challenges to the world trading system
  • Creating a critical mass of expertise by integrating excellent scholars from several disciplines and all parts of the UK
  • Creating a permanent, widespread capacity to conduct first-rate research, analysis and policy-making in international trade within UK academia, officialdom and business.

Our Partners

We are the first Centre dedicated to trade policy to be funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and by contributions from its component universities. The Centre is led by the University of Sussex and brings together researchers from all four UK nations and several universities overseas. The team comprises scholars from economics, law, business management, politics and international relations and includes researchers from:

  • University of Sussex
  • University of Nottingham
  • University of Strathclyde
  • Queen’s University Belfast
  • Cardiff University
  • University of Cambridge
  • European University Institute
  • Georgetown University
  • Tel Aviv University
  • University of California, Berkeley

In addition to the universities, the Centre works with nine partners including:

  • Ernst & Young LLP (EY)
  • Fieldfisher LLP
  • The International Trade Group of the Professional and Business Services Council
  • The British Chambers of Commerce
  • The Trade Justice Movement and
  • Trade officials in all four UK administrations

Our People

Our research

People, Firms
and Places

Studies the differential impact of trade across locations, firms and individuals in the four nations of the UK, and how external factors such as Brexit, Covid-19 and the rise of China affect the UK economy.

Digitisation and
Technical Change

Considers how governments wrestle with huge platform-companies, and how digital trade affects labour markets, business models and value chains, and their regulation.

Negotiating a
Turbulent World

Explores how to formulate UK trade policy given the challenges to trading across the UK’s borders, differences in international regulatory regimes, the need for environmental sustainability and the interaction between trade and investment.

Read more on research themes