Corporate Watch are recruiting for a temporary researcher to work on our 'Banking on Crisis' project.

Since 2007 the global economy has been plunged into severe crisis, causing widespread unemployment, social instability and an intensifying sovereign debt-crisis. Globally, politicians have attempt to resolve this crisis through a wholesale assault on the living standards of working people, slashing welfare provisions and increasing social repression whilst at the same time scrambling to preserve corporate profits and so called 'growth'. Resistance to these 'austerity' measures is fertile but there is a huge knowledge gap. By and large, people do not understand the crisis, nor the financial system which lies at the heart of it.

The 'Banking on Crisis' project aims to address this gap by producing a set of accessible and critical resources breaking down the main issues at stake in the current economic and political crisis. It is hoped that these resources, along with other similar projects, will help to generate a popular understanding of the financial sector and the current crisis and inform the current wave of struggles against austerity and social repression.

The project's main components are a series of printed booklets, a web resource (bankingoncrisis.org) and a series of workshops and outreach events. The researcher will be required to work on all three, producing one further booklet, keeping the website regularly updated and giving a series of workshops and presentations related to the project.

The role is part-time (15 hours a week) at £8.50 an hour for 3 months starting in April, with the potential of long term co-op membership if the project is successful and a good working relationship with the rest of the members established.

Person specification:

Crucially, the candidate will need a solid, critical understanding of the financial sector, knowing their 'treasuries' from their 'credit default swaps'. In addition they should be adept at presenting the complex concepts and jargon of the financial world in an accessible format that those with little background knowledge can grasp. These skills are important both in terms of the written materials and outreach aspects of the project, therefore demonstrable experience in both these area is desirable.

Good research skills are also a must. Finding the ins and outs of specific companies, investment projects, government policies and flows of capital throughout the economic food chain are all important elements of the project, although ultimately it is an overarching knowledge of the financial system that is key. Additionally, interrogating the way in which the complex and opaque aspects of finance impact upon people's everyday lives is of central concern. Familiarity, and ideally involvement with, social struggles should enable you to shape the project such that it will contribute to a general understanding of where and how people might resist capitalist power in crisis.

Web skills are also necessary. Ideally, experience of managing and updating a Wordpress blog, as this is the how the Banking on Crisis website is run.

Application information:

Applicants should send a c.v. along with two examples of relevant writing and outline any research and outreach experience to contact@corporatewatch.org

The role will require the researcher to work, at least some of the time, at our office in Whitechapel.

Applications deadline: 12th March 2012.