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"Is there a grand strategy in Canadian foreign policy?" by David Pratt As Canada’s presence in Afghanistan and its role in the world more generally continue to make headlines and feed public debate, former defence minister David Pratt proposes a thorough analysis of Canada’s “grand strategy” since the end of World War II. In this excerpt from the Ross Ellis Memorial Lecture given last June at the University of Calgary, he analyzes the current situation and recommends that Canada “act as a unifying force between Europe and North America.” "McGuinty contre Tory : l'Ontario va aux urnes" by Luc Turgeon Ontarians go to the polls this coming October 10. Luc Turgeon reports from Toronto on the likely key issues of the campaign, including Dalton McGuinty’s record, electoral reform and the province’s ebbing economic and political influence. Even though the opposition has succeeded in highlighting broken promises as a hallmark of the Liberal mandate, the election of John Tory is not a foregone conclusion, he writes, because the conservatives face two major obstacles: the ghost of Mike Harris and the unpopular Harper government. But first and foremost, “the increasing alienation of the population and the political class” will likely be the backdrop to the campaign. “In the end,” he concludes, “Ontarians will be asked to choose a party and leader who will have the weighty task of turning the economy around and renegotiating the province’s place in the federation.” "Edgy Edmonton?" by Todd Hirsch [summary not available] "SES-Policy Options exclusive poll: The limits of reasonable accommodation" by L. Ian MacDonald [summary not available] "Neutralité de l'État et accommodements : convergence ou divergence ?" by José Woehrling The need for reasonable accommodation and the principle of the state’s religious neutrality are at the heart of the debate over religious and cultural diversity that has simmered in Quebec over the past 12 months. But combining these two principles sometimes produces paradoxical outcomes that are often difficult to explain and justify to the general public, writes law professor José Woehrling. For example, it is often asked, “Is it logical to ‘remove’ majority religions from schools while at the same time offering accommodations that ‘insert’ minority religions?” In this article, he sets forth the basic concepts underlying minority accommodation, reviews the principal criticisms of specific measures and explains why these criticisms are for the most part exaggerated. "Reasonable accommodation in a global village" by Yasmeen Abu-Laban and Baha Abu-Laban In the fall of 2005, Denmark was in the midst of the maelstrom generated by the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed in the Jyllands-Posten. What might have been merely a domestic political debate, observe Yasmeen and Baha Abu-Laban, quickly became a global controversy that had repercussions even in Canada, when two Calgary-based newspapers reprinted the cartoons in February 2006. The way the controversy unfolded in Canada, they say, “illustrates the value of deliberativeness before taking action on a ‘right,’ as well as the value of civil dialogue.” Before reviewing this instructive episode, the authors examine how accommodation has historically characterized inter-group relations in Canada, especially, though not exclusively, Catholics and Protestants. "The paradoxes of reasonable accommodation" by Julius Grey For Julius Grey, one of Quebec’s key experts in the field of civic liberties and human rights, individual freedom and effective integration of immigrants are the two fundamental reasons why accommodation is desirable in an open society such as Canada. Yet there are also some instances when accommodation is not desirable — for example, when it ends up victimizing innocent members of a group, such as in the case of blood transfusions for children, or when it ghettoizes a whole group, through the creation of separate schools, hospitals, or courts. “The word ‘reasonable’ when it precedes ‘accommodation’ is not a meaningless term of art,” says Grey. “Rather, it is a prism through which all accommodation must be seen and judged.” "De convictions et d'accommodements" by C. Allard, M. Blanchard, M. Bourque, A. León-Germain, S. Gervais, C. Giguère, J. Maclure, et F.-N. Pelletier As part of the reasonable accommodation debate, some observers and analysts have denounced these accommodations as a “threat to Quebec values,” even going so far as to predict the “disappearance of Quebec.” The authors explain why they do not feel at all threatened by such accommodation and how it is in fact an important part of modern Quebec’s historical evolution. They observe that part of the problem may stem from an excessively narrow view of religious tolerance, in which Quebec values seem compatible only with “a kind of broad Protestantism.” “The reasonable accommodation norm,” they conclude, “arises from neither moral relativism nor political rectitude. Rather, it comes from the view that requiring complete assimilation of cultural and religious minorities is morally excessive.” "Secular logic and faith: a dialogue of the deaf?" by David Mendelsohn Can the faithful and the secular understand each other? Is reason and logic the sole and ultimate recourse to settle conflicts and divergence of views? Maybe not, says Trudeau Scholar David Mendelsohn. Based on his personal experience as a secular Jew with Muslim friends and currently preparing a Ph.D. in Islamic studies, he explores some of these themes and concludes that “we will continue to miss the point whenever attempting to use Western style dialogue and reason or what we term ‘logic’ with people who live a life in which belief in God comes first.” To help shift the obstacles on the road to understanding and facilitate the dialogue, he suggests three types of expert should be questioned: religious figures such as rabbis, imams and priests; academic religious experts; and former practitioners of the faith who have chosen to live a secular life. "Des balises pour une société ouverte et inclusive" by Marie Mc Andrew As currently framed, particularly in the media and political circles, the reasonable accommodation controversy is worrying because it has gone off the rails in many ways, writes Marie Mc Andrew. Drawing on her long experience as a researcher, educator and policy adviser on the issue, she proposes five major guideposts that will allow the debate to be “civil, civic and inclusive, all while respecting a minimum level of complexity.” Among them are the need to stop reducing the issues surrounding reasonable accommodation to the sole presence of newcomers and to oppose the spread of religious and other stereotypes. "Reasonable or mutual accommodation? The integration debate in Germany" by Rita Süssmuth In this article, the former president of the German Parliament and chair of the German Independent Commission on Migration, Rita Süssmuth, provides a detailed account of how the debate over migration and integration has unfolded recently in Germany. While Germany has been a country of immigration since the 1950s, Germans have had difficulty coming to terms with this, and “it was only in the year 2000 that politicians reached an agreement to publicly admit it.” Since then, the country has undergone phases of rapid deceleration (2001-04) and acceleration (2000, 2005-07) in advancing its integration and migration policy, and attitudes toward integration have often swung from mutual accommodation to one-way demands placed on immigrants. Since integration is a process for creating equality among unequals, she argues that it is not likely to increase significantly without mutual accommodation and dialogue. "Un débat inachevé qui refait surface" by Rachida Azdouz Despite what we hear these days, the reasonable accommodation debate didn’t begin with Mario Dumont’s statements, says University of Montreal’s Rachida Azdouz. Rather, his remarks re-ignited a debate that dates over 10 years: The controversy surrounding the wearing of Islamic veils in public schools and the use of cultural and religious arguments as mitigating factors in a rape case. Even at that time, she writes, “issues of identity were silhouetted behind judicial considerations.” This phenomenon is due to the fact that the issue addresses sensitive questions such as the role of religion in public life and male-female relationships. The author examines the evolution of the debate over the past ten years, particularly with regard to schools, and proposes several ways to promote constructive debate rather than sliding into polemics. "Is there a British solution to the RCMP's problems?" by Peter Kasurak From the death of Ian Bush while in RCMP custody in 2006, up to the mismanagement of the pension and insurance administration funds and the Maher Arar affair, the RCMP has recently been engulfed by a sea of troubles. The former head of the National Audit team at the Office of the Auditor General, Peter Kasurak takes a broad look at the governance problems that have surfaced from within the organization and finds there are three major deficiencies: the doctrine of constabulary independence, inadequate capacity to support the minister in his role, and the absence of effective oversight. He carefully examines what Britain has done to modernize the governance of its police forces in the face of crises of its own and argues that the British model of governance has several features worth considering. "Reforming security management: prospects for the RCMP" by Christian Leuprecht According to Christian Leuprecht, the root cause of the RCMP’s problems is structural. Many of the structures, he says, are reminiscent of a nineteenth-century paramilitary organization far from the sort of administrative and governance structures one might expect to find in a liberal democracy’s national police service at the dawn of the twenty-first century. Paying particular attention to lessons that might be learned from its national defence counterpart, the author assesses the prospects for security-sector reform and changing civil-security sector relations. "Canadian medicare and the global health care bazaar" by Leigh Turner In a world where inexpensive air travel, low cost telecommunications and digitized patient records make travelling for health care increasingly easy, there is now a global health care marketplace, says William Dawson Scholar Leigh Turner. He reviews the scattered evidence regarding these new international health options, notably the rapid emergence of medical tourism companies across Canada. Unfortunately, says Turner, “politicians and health policy-makers pay surprisingly little attention to the ready availability of health care in other countries,” and no one knows precisely how many Canadians travel abroad specifically for this reason. But given the implications for our universal health care system and our health, he argues that better documentation and investigation of health-related travel outside Canada will be an important part of improving public policy in this field. "Is bigger really better? TV and radio ownership policy under review" by Monica Auer In March of this year, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) launched a proceeding to review its broadcasting ownership policies. Unfortunately, says Monica Auer, the CRTC did not publish any information about the current state of broadcasting ownership in Canada, and this, she states, will prevent meaningful public participation in the hearings that are scheduled to take place this September. In this article, she presents aggregated quantitative information about changes in the control of Canada’s conventional radio and television services. Her dataset consists of 25,500 entries describing the control of individual, privately owned radio and television stations from 1922 to 2007. The results show that concentration has increased, and they lend little support to arguments that larger ownership groups will naturally yield increased spending on Canadian programming. "Le traité modificatif européen" by Alain Noël [summary not available] |
