Fair Trade Advocacy Office is looking for a Strategic Action Research Doctoral Student

Newcastle Business School and the Fair Trade Advocacy Office in Brussels are delighted to offer a Collaborative Doctoral Research Studentship which will conceptualize and support the strategic planning of a new future for the Fair Tarde movement. The project will produce both world leading scholarship and meaningful policy that will support the movement in maintaining its transformative ambitions in a global economy that is increasingly dominated by large corporate actors and turbulent political priorities.

The Fair Trade Advocacy Office works in a unique institutional space that straddles three distinct, but interdependent, spheres. First, we work with political stakeholders by engaging with EU institutions through structured advocacy, policy dialogue and evidence based lobbying. Second, we influence business, by working with the established Fair Trade movement to embed ethical standards into commercial supply chains, and finally, with NGO’s and with producers in the global south to ensure they have a voice in decision making. This hybrid position allows the translation of goals surrounding issues of fairness, justice and sustainability, to be integrated into both market practices and regulatory frameworks.

The Fair Trade movement emerged in the late 20th century as an alternative trading system intended to correct structural inequalities in global markets by ensuring fair prices, decent labour standards, and long-term trading relationships for producers in the Global South. Since the establishment of the first certification systems in the late 1980s, Fair Trade has expanded rapidly, becoming embedded in mainstream retail markets.

However, challenges persist for the movement. Critics argue that mainstreaming, for example through the aforementioned changes, has diluted the radical ambitions of the movement and the integrity of the products. Large corporations have increasingly adopted Fair Trade certification or ethical branding strategies without fundamentally altering underlying supply chain structures.

By examining the historical trajectory and current challenges of the movement, the research will identify how Fair Trade organisations might reassert their role as pioneers of ethical and socially just trading systems. This research will contribute to scholarship on ethical markets, social movements, and alternative economic systems. Empirically, it will provide new evidence on the internal dynamics of the European Fair Trade movement both quantitatively and qualitatively. Theoretically, it will contribute to debates about market mainstreaming, regulatory capture, and the sustainability transition. The project will examine if Fair Trade reached a point of “peak influence,” where its core principles risk being absorbed or displaced by competing market logics.

The research will be undertaken in close liaison with FTAO and the candidate will integrate with the FTAO team in supporting its key strategic objectives, where compatible with the research programme. Therefore, it is envisaged that successful candidate will have knowledge of EU institutions and policy. They will also be supported by an experienced supervisory team as well experts in EU policy and the Fair Trade movement at the FTAO in Brussels.

Enquiries: This project is supervised by Dr Michael Price & Dr Helen Kopnina. For informal inquiries, please contact the principal supervisor: michael.j.price@northumbria.ac.uk

Application details can be found at: https://www.findaphd.com/phds/project/peak-fair-trade-reimagining-the-future-of-the-fair-trade-movement-ref-rdfc26-sc-nbs-price/?p196712

Eligibility Requirements:

• Academic excellence i.e. 2:1 (or equivalent GPA from non-UK universities with preference for 1st class honours); or a Masters (preference for Merit or above); or APEL evidence of substantial practitioner achievement.
• Appropriate IELTS score, if required.
• Applicants cannot apply if they are already a PhD holder or if currently engaged in Doctoral study at Northumbria or elsewhere.

Timing and timescale

Commencing October 2026, duration 3 years

Student support

A minimum annual, tax-free stipend of £21,805 for full-time PhD students, with annual increases determined by UKRI.

Language

The working language of the FTAO is English but knowledge of French and/or German, though not essential, would be helpful

Location

The student can be based either in the UK or in Brussels or possibly elsewhere. If a non-EU citizen, residency in Belgium is likely to be granted through a long term student research visa. A work base will be provided in the FTAO office in Brussels and the student will informally be welcomed as part of the FTAO team and as such be encouraged to synergise research, analysis and policy work with agreed areas of the FTAO’s work priorities, where compatible with the PhD programme.

Supervision

Supervision will take place in person and online in both Brussels and Newcastle upon Tyne.

Deadline

Applications by 30th June 2026

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