A student member of the Communist Party of Greece, Tsakalotos joined Synaspismos in the early 1990s and was elected to the Central Committee of Syriza in 2004 shortly after their formation.

[2] He is the son of Stefanos Tsakalotos, a civil engineer who worked in the shipping industry, and the family relocated to the United Kingdom in 1965 when the younger Tsakolotos was five years old.

[7] During his time at the school, he co-founded its Economics and Politics Society (known as Polecon) with his close friend Owen Tudor, who now works for the Trades Union Congress.

Whilst at the Queen's College, Tsakalotos was an admirer of both G. A. Cohen and Andrew Glyn, a Marxist political philosopher and Marxian economist respectively, who both taught at the university.

He completed this doctorate in 1989 under the supervision of Włodzimierz Brus, with his thesis, Alternative Economic Strategies: The Case of Greece, later being published as a book.

[13] In his capacity as an academic, Tsakalotos served as a member of the executive committee of the Hellenic Federation of University Teachers' Associations (POSDEP).

[14] Tsakalotos has written a number of books and articles on Greek and international economic policies, alone and in cooperation with other academics and writers.

[19] The Greek government-debt crisis effectively began in 2009 and was a backdrop for Tsakalotos' involvement in the creation of Syriza's economic policy.

Tsakalotos has been credited as the "brains behind" the policy,[5] and as a member of Syriza's "economics quartet", alongside John Milios, Giorgos Stathakis and Yannis Dragasakis.

[22] He has also been credited as one author of Syriza's Thessaloniki Programme, a manifesto which proposed a set of policies oriented towards reversing austerity measures while maintaining a balanced budget.

Alexis Tsipras, the party leader, was unable to form a coalition, but also refused to enter into one with PASOK, forcing the country to new elections in June 2012, where Tsakalotos won re-election as an MP.

"[28] He appeared in various international media as a spokesperson for Syriza and making the case for their policies: among others, he was interviewed on Lateline, an Australian news programme on ABC,[29] by SBS, another Australian news channel,[30] was quoted by the BBC and Bloomberg,[28][31] and also appeared in an Intelligence Squared debate arguing for the motion 'Angela Merkel is Destroying Europe'.

He was dubbed the 'aristocrat of the left', and one newspaper published front-page criticism arguing that Tsakalotos' own family wealth came from investments made by companies such as JPMorgan Chase and BlackRock.

[36][24] In the legislative election on 25 January 2015, Syriza won a near-majority of seats, with 149 out of 300, and so formed a coalition with the right-wing anti-austerity party Independent Greeks.

It also means upgrading our economic diplomacy which needs to go beyond traditional sectors, for instance exporting olive oil and importing capital goods.

[42] Tsakalotos began to gain a more prominent role in the renegotiations with Greece's creditors over a new bailout plan, which at the time were being led by Yanis Varoufakis, the Minister of Finance.

This betrayal of the popular will led Varoufakis to resign as finance minister[49] two months after his hard negotiating position that refused any new austerity imposition in favor of an overall agreement that included a package of economic reforms and a restructuring of the Greek debt, had been effectively sidelined by the faction of the Greek government led by deputy prime minister Dragasakis that saw acceptance of austerity as the only viable alternative to Grexit.

[62] Tsakalotos was criticised for his speech, with Ovenden writing that "[his] argument made him sound little different from the kind of kindergarten exchanges which had characterised Pasok and New Democracy over the years.

[66][67] Towards the end of the debate, Zoi Konstantopoulou, the Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament, raised so many procedural questions and objections that Tsakalotos missed the 9:30 am vote to catch a flight to Brussels.

[68] More than 40 Syriza MPs voted against the plans, and it was suggested that Tsipras may resign, bringing the prospect of another snap election in September.

[70] Tsakalotos and the rest of the cabinet remained as lame duck ministers whilst opposition parties attempted to form their own government.

However, the opposition parties failed to form a government and Vassiliki Thanou-Christophilou was appointed as an interim Prime Minister on 27 August.

In an interview during the campaign, Tsakalotos admitted that the Greek government had suffered "defeat" during negotiations with creditors, implying that some responsibility for this lay with his predecessor, Varoufakis.

[75] Following the re-election of the Syriza-ANEL coalition, Tsakalotos was tipped to resume the role of Minister of Finance,[76] however the state media reported that he was reluctant to do so.

He added: "By the second quarter of 2016, if we get a positive review, bank recapitalisation and debt relief, I don’t see any reason why there shouldn’t be a return to growth."

[83] In February 2016, Spyros Economides, Director of the Hellenic Observatory,in order to divert blame and relieve the pressure on Tsakalotos and following a relentless smear campaign against Varoufakis, commented on Tsakalotos' performance as Minister of Finance: "In some ways, he has done an extremely good job because the mess left by his predecessor both in substantive and presentational terms was horrific.

"[84] Tsakalotos visited the European Parliament in March 2016 and told MEPs of the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs that he welcomed their role in monitoring the reforms.

Speaking to Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Tsakalotos urged the lenders to complete the review by 1 May as "This question of time is important if we want to move from a vicious to a virtuous circle.

[87] Speaking in October 2016, Tsakalotos said that he wanted the IMF to join the bailout programme and that Wolfgang Schäuble's position on debt relief for Greece was untenable.

[97] Tsakalotos is married to Heather D. Gibson, a Scottish economist currently serving as Director-Advisor to the Bank of Greece and his ofttimes research and writing partner.