Professor Christopher Dent

Profile

Biography

I am an international political economist working on key global challenges facing humanity in the 21st century. My main research expertise and interests are in:

• Trade – free trade agreements (FTAs) in particular as well as the global trading system.

• Energy – especially renewable energy in all its forms with an emphasis on government policy and business/industry practices on renewables 

• Climate action – with a focus climate policy, climate global governance, business climate strategies and local government climate strategies

• East Asia region (China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Southeast Asia) – its regional economic integration and impacts on the global system

I mostly work on combining these themes together, such as: the links between trade, energy and climate action; free trade agreements in the Asia-Pacific region. As an international political economist I am also by nature inter-disciplinary in my research approach. In addition, my work looks increasingly at local – global/international linkages, for example how local government is dealing with global-level climate change.

I am also the founder and leader of SustainNET, a network community seeking to advance the sustainability agenda (https://sites.edgehill.ac.uk/sustainnet) based at where I work at Edge Hill University. SustainNET’s work involves augmenting through research and other activities our local region’s efforts on climate, environment and a range of sustainability priorities. 

I have been a consultant advisor to the British, Australian, Chilean, German, Swedish, Japanese, South Korean, Lao PDR and United States governments, as well as the Asian Development Bank, European Commission, ASEAN Secretariat, APEC Secretariat, Secretariat for Central American Economic Integration and Nike Inc. He has been an invited speaker at conferences and other events in Asia, Europe, North America, Latin America, Africa, Middle East and Oceania. From April 2021 to September 2022, I served as a Specialist Adviser to the House of Commons International Trade Select Committee, advising Members of Parliament on the UK’s trade policy and free trade agreements.

I am the author of 14 books and over 100 academic articles and other papers. My latest book, East Asian Regionalism, 2^nd Edition (Routledge 2016) was awarded the Masayoshi Ohira Memorial Foundation ‘Special Prize’. Other books include Renewable Energy in East Asia: Towards a New Developmentalism (Routledge 2014), The Great Diversity: Trajectories of Asian Development (co-editor, Wageningen Press, 2013), The Asia-Pacific, Regionalism and the Global System (co-editor, Edward Elgar, 2012), China and Africa Development Relations (editor, London: Routledge, 2010); China, Japan and Regional Leadership in East Asia (editor, Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2008); New Free Trade Agreements in the Asia-Pacific (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), Asia-Pacific Economic and Security Co-operation (editor, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003); The Foreign Economic Policies of Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2002); Northeast Asian Regionalism: Learning from the European Experience (co-editor, London: RoutledgeCurzon, 2002); The European Union and East Asia: An Economic Relationship (London: Routledge, 1999); The European Economy: The Global Context (London: Routledge, 1997); Core Economics (co-editor, London: Heinemann, 1995). I am also a sailor, builder of adventure playgrounds in back gardens and somewhat discerning (some would say fussy) about what coffee I drink.