"The media through a looking glass: Building the brand by getting it right" by Hugh Segal
Former IRPP president Hugh Segal is an active critic, as well as an engaged
participant, in the news media. In this excerpt from a speech to the Canadian
Journalism Foundation, he makes a case for a getting a story right as opposed to
getting it first. He adds: “Authenticity matters…Being in and from a place
matters.”
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"Financial regulatory reform: A Maginot line?" by Todd Hirsch
[summary not available]
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"Shock and awe: Government's role in recession and recovery" by Kevin Lynch
As the economic recovery takes hold, governments will need “to develop exit
strategies” from the monetary and fiscal stimulus programs they devised to fight the
recession, writes the former clerk of the Privy Council. Canada’s current deficit of
$55 billion is still only 3.75 percent of GDP, compared with $1.6 trillion or
11 percent of GDP in the US, but our tax revenue base has been shrunk by the
downturn and will need time to recover. Meantime, Kevin Lynch sees productivity
growth and innovation as the keys for Canada’s future growth.
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"Coming out of the great recession: Running the economic hurdle race" by Eric Gales
Canada is coming out of the global recession having “weathered the storm better
than most,” writes Eric Gales, president of Microsoft Canada. First, as he notes, “our
financial sector is in pretty good shape,” which brings all kinds of benefits, including
the accessibility of capital. And from the perspective of creating a world-competitive
economy, Canada has many of the “softer qualities” and the “creative class” needed
to compete. Transformational change has already revolutionized the media. Similar
change is coming to industrial sectors such as manufacturing, and service sectors
such as health care.
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"Deconstructing Copenhagen" by Velma McColl
In Copenhagen, the effectiveness of large multilateral meetings was tested and found
wanting. After 10 days of stalemate among negotiators for 193 countries, it took
smaller and smaller circles of countries to finally unlock agreement and only five leaders
to broker the Copenhagen Accord. Though many were disappointed, the accord brings
developed and developing countries to the same table and marks important shifts away
from the philosophy of the Kyoto Protocol. The next legally binding global climate
agreement remains elusive, but if the negotiations are to be resolved among countries
(in whatever configuration), then Copenhagen offers important lessons.
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"Copenhagen: Flawed process meets new geopolitical reality" by Daniel Gagnier
Copenhagen was unlike any other COP (Conference of the Parties). It suffered from
too many accredited parties, exaggerated expectations, multiple demonstrations
and, most important, a shifting geopolitical reality, writes Daniel Gagnier, who was
there as an adviser to the Canadian government. Canadian negotiators held their
positions, while trying to bridge the differences — an impossible task, as even
President Barack Obama was snubbed by the leaders of the G77, with
consequences yet to be determined, despite a last-minute and only partially
supported accord. Canada's task now, he concludes, “is to build a better consensus
in this country before returning to the heady vapours of significantly different
multilateral negotiations.”
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"Toward a North American climate accord : by Robin V. Sears
After four years in office, Stephen Harper is developing a comfort level, growing into
the role as well as the job of prime minister. As Contributing Writer Robin Sears
notes, he has both a strategic vision and a strong sense of tactics that comes in
handy in a minority House. Whether proroguing the House (again), or lying low at
Copenhagen, he seems indifferent to storms of criticism raging around him.
Harper’s pragmatic approach on climate change, aligning Canada’s position with
that of the Obama administration, could well lead to a North American agreement
modelled on the acid rain accord of 1991. After the chaos of Copenhagen, this may
prove to be a more realistic and achievable approach.
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Federal and provincial climate change policy after Copenhagen
Had a binding international agreement on climate change emerged from last month’s
conference in Copenhagen, the federal government would now be under increased
pressure to adopt an effective Canada-wide policy to reduce emissions. However, says
Tracy Snoddon, without a plan to convince the provinces to give up their existing
climate initiatives, we would probably fail to achieve our reduction target or would
achieve it at a very high cost. The summit’s failure to produce a binding agreement
means that Canada now has time to consider how best to implement a cost-effective
policy that both addresses provincial concerns about regional burden sharing and
compensates the provinces for withdrawing their own initiatives. The author examines
some options and argues that a Canada-wide carbon tax coupled with a federalprovincial
revenue-sharing arrangement is a cost-effective and workable option.
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"A strong dose of climate skepticism: Seeing Copenhagen as an opportunity" by Michael Hart and Bill Dymond
In this decidedly skeptical article challenging received scientific wisdom on climate
change, the authors assert that the failure to reach an agreement at Copenhagen
signals an opportunity to begin a more reasoned conversation on global warming,
free of the alarmism spread by the UN, activists, scientists and the media. While
they’re at it, the authors also denounce “the stifling impact of Official Science” and
other forms of conventional wisdom. In calling for a new debate, Michael Hart and
Bill Dymond may be starting one.
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"Obama's year one and the making of presidential character" by Gil Troy
Barack Obama marked his first year in the White House on January 20. Though
he told his friend Oprah Winfrey that he gave himself a “a B+” for his first year in
office, this review is better left to presidential historians such as McGill
University’s Gil Troy, who notes that “the presidential learning curve, especially in
foreign affairs, can be steep.” Obama’s first year has been marked by challenges
as diverse as economic recovery and homeland security in domestic affairs, to
Afghanistan, Iran and climate change in global policy. What is emerging is a style
of leadership and “the making of presidential character.”
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"The border after 9/11 - security trumps all" by Kathryn Bryk Friedman
At the end of the 1990s, Canada and the United States signed an agreement to streamline
and harmonize border management, expand cooperation in customs and immigration,
and collaborate on common threats from outside North America. But after the events of
September 11, 2001, the preoccupation with security became the prism through which all
policy dictates and outcomes were measured. It remains the case to this day, and the
attempted Christmas Day bombing aboard an airliner approaching Detroit has only
heightened those concerns. But as Kathryn Friedman writes, there is a governance
framework for making the Canada-US border a priority in Washington, and facilitating the
world’s largest trading relationship could help spark a recovery from the recession.
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"Canadians need better access to medicines" by George Wyatt
Around the world, innovative new treatments are being developed and deployed to
treat diseases from Alzheimer’s and cancer to diabetes and osteoporosis. Yet
Canadian patients who rely on public drug plans are not getting the same level of
access to these new medicines as patients in other developed countries. These are
the conclusions of a report commissioned by Rx&D, and written by George Wyatt
of Wyatt Health Management, which studied public drug plan reimbursement of
medicines in 25 OECD countries. In this article he outlines the report.
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"Toronto: Trouble in the megacity, facing a financial crisis in 2010" by Harvey Schwartz
This article examines how the new City of Toronto evolved from the regional
Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto. It also looks at the problems related to the
amalgamation of the former municipalities of Metropolitan Toronto into the new
City of Toronto. More importantly, it is concerned with the financial problems facing
the new City of Toronto. The City has a large number of responsibilities that arose
from amalgamation and provincial downloading and has limited financial resources
to pay for these responsibilities.
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"Human Rights and a Canada-China free trade agreement" by Jason Lacharite and Caroline Clarke
Since 1994 Ottawa has attempted to negotiate a foreign investment promotion and
protection agreement (FIPA) with China. But as Jason Lacharite and Caroline Clarke
write, Canada would be better served by “focusing on a trade agreement that
would protect and promote investment in both countries as well as protect and
promote the existing exchange configurations that are currently on the rise.”
Furthermore, the authors suggest that the Harper government can actually improve
China’s human rights situation and facilitate a degree of political reform by
collaborating on a comprehensive free trade accord with Beijing. They conclude
that pursuing a course of constructive engagement (couched in a commitment to
free trade) is likely to have a positive impact on Canada’s competitiveness and
China’s political development.
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"Employment insurance: How Canada can remain competitive and be fair to migrant workers" by Barbara MacLaren and Luc Lapointe
An aging workforce and perceived labour shortages in Canada have resulted in a
boom in the number of temporary foreign workers to over 250,000 in 2008, up
from 112,000 only two years prior. Despite the fact that these workers provide
valuable contributions to the Canadian economy and to host communities, say
Barbara MacLaren and Luc Lapointe, they have likely borne the brunt of the
economic slump over the past 18 months — through lay-offs and lack of social
security access in Canada. They propose a re-thinking of social benefits for migrant
workers from both an ethical and economic perspective.
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"Menaçante" by Alain Noël
[summary not available]
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Décembre 2009
November 2009
September 2009
July-August 2009
May 2009