Deibert hopes his book Reset triggers a pause
The Hill Times caught up with Ronald J. Deibert, author of Reset: Reclaiming the Internet for Civilized Society, and winner of this year’s prestigious $25,000 Writers’ Trust of Canada Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing, while camping his way home from British Colombia to Ontario. Mr. Deibert, who won the award on Sept. 22, is […]
Wells takes a look back at a handful of women who pushed for safer access to abortion
Karin Wells, author of The Abortion Caravan: When Women Shut Down Government in the Battle for the Right to Choose, published by Second Story Press, talked about her first book and recent nomination for the prestigious Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing. “The Abortion Caravan is a vibrant tale of a seminal but forgotten time […]
Whipped takes a deep dive into political party culture and, yes, Marland thinks parties need whips
Alex Marland, the award-winning author and Memorial University political science professor, who has carved out a niche as an expert in political communications, political marketing, election campaigning, and Canadian political parties, dishes up another delightful read in Whipped: Party Discipline in Canada, published by UBC Press. In it, he delves into the world of political party […]
Caesar-Chavannes offers a ‘breathtakingly candid’ look at life in politics
In her memoir Can You Hear Me Now?: How I Found My Voice and Learned to Live with Passion and Purpose, which was one of this year’s finalists for the Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for the best political book of the year, former Liberal-turned-Independent MP Celina Caesar-Chavannes details, among other aspects of rawly examined life, her […]
‘We see a lot of denial, but when it’s brought right into view, there’s a deep sense of shame and denial’: Cole
Desmond Cole wants Canadians to abandon their reflexive impulse to measure social and racial progress against their southern neighbours. In 2015, his awarding-winning Toronto Life cover story, in which he offered a searing account of his own experiences of being carded by the police, disrupted stubborn notions that Canada is largely immune to the injustices […]
Award-winning author of Washington Black, Esi Edugyan to release new book next month, Out of the Sun: On Race and Storytelling
International bestselling Canadian author and novelist Esi Edugyan, who is a two-time winner of the prestigious Scotiabank Giller Prize, will be releasing a new book next month, Out of the Sun: On Race and Storytelling. Both her novels, Half-Blood Blues and Washington Black, were Giller Prize winners. Half-Blood Blues was also shortlisted in 2011 for the Man Booker […]
Keeping the bailiff from repossessing your car: the case for a basic income
A basic income for all Canadians, an unconditional, guaranteed income floor below which no one’s income can fall, is an idea that has been growing in refinement and acceptance since the early 1900s. It has some enthusiastic opponents, but unlike other policy ideas, the enemies of basic income come from both the right and the […]
Jaccard offers up solid advice on what citizens can do to fight climate change
This leaves one last task on the simple path to climate success. We must be able to detect and elect climate-sincere politicians, and then pressure them to implement a few simple policies, such that any citizen can detect procrastination and evasion. The nature of this task crystalized for me a few years ago during the […]
Ramin unpacks opioid crisis response in The Age of Fentanyl
One day on vacation last summer, I did something stupid. As the sun was just beginning to rise and while everyone else was sleeping, I sat outside in the cool morning, looked up briefly at Lake Ontario stretching toward the horizon, and began to read Mayhem by Sigrid Rausing. I had pre-ordered the book months […]
Heath digs deep into the institution of the permanent civil service in The Machinery of Government
The institution of the permanent civil service, I have suggested, generates significant benefits for the quality of public policy, delivery of public services, and ultimately, promotion of social welfare. It is also, one might add, an arrangement that seems objectively rather improbable. Clearly, the more natural impulse of politicians is to bring in partisans, or […]
