From trade deal to corporate takeover: threats of lawsuit abuse in RCEP
IBON International | 7 October 2025
From trade deal to corporate takeover: threats of lawsuit abuse in RCEP
🎙️ POWER FROM THE GROUND | EPISODE 4 - FROM TRADE DEAL TO CORPORATE TAKEOVER: THREATS OF LAWSUIT ABUSE IN RCEP 🎙️
This episode unpacks the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), world’s largest free trade agreement, and the dangerous push to insert the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) mechanism into its investment chapter.
ISDS gives corporations the power to sue governments for enacting policies that protect workers, Indigenous peoples, the environment, and communities. If included, it will further entrench corporate power, deepen inequalities, and erode democratic space in the Asia-Pacific and the wider Global South, especially in the context of the global “green” transition and the global rush for critical minerals.
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Power From the Ground is a podcast produced by IBON International, in collaboration with the Association pour le Développement et de la Promotion des Droits Humains (ADPDH), Badabon Sangho, Bantay Kita, CSDevNet, and The SHINE Collab.
Episode 4 is produced in partnership with Asia Pacific Forum on Law, Women, and Development and Gabriela Philippines.
