Home
Analysis

Analysis

Making Peace in a Divided World: New Roles for the United Nations?0
- Analysis
- October 1, 2015
There is no more annoying phrase in discussions of international affairs than “If the United Nations did not exist, we would have to invent it!” It is certainly true that the world urgently needs an effective collective security organization …
READ MORE
Transition Memos Show Foreign Ministry Is Doing Its Job 0
- Analysis
- September 30, 2015
A series of foreign ministry memos, leaked to the media in recent days, offer an unflattering assessment of Canada’s declining international influence and reputation. They are apparently draft “transition” documents, which the federal bureaucracy prepares before every election.

Some defenders
…READ MORE
The Munk Leaders’ Debate: Opportunity Missed 0
- Analysis
- September 30, 2015
The Munk Leaders’ Debate was supposed to be about foreign policy, but at many times it was really about a three-man horse race. That race was about which progressive horse could finish first, or whether the conservative horse would end …
READ MORE
When we should, and shouldn’t, revoke citizenship 0
- Analysis
- September 30, 2015
The long federal election campaign has been knocked off course at various stages by the unexpected: revelations from the Duffy trial; the accelerating Syrian refugee crisis; the niqab issue in citizenship ceremonies; and now, courtesy of Monday night’s Munk debate …
READ MORE
Canada’s Military Spending Is Now Less than Half of NATO’s Target 0
- Analysis
- September 24, 2015
Last year I blogged about the decline in Canadian military spending as a percent of gross domestic product (GDP). The most recent figures at that time were for 2013. I noted that defence spending had fallen to 1.00 percent of …
READ MORE
Whose Views? Climate Change Governance and the Politics of Expertise 0
- Analysis
- September 22, 2015
The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has long been regarded as the most authoritative guide to the status of knowledge about climate change. Read any report by a government, international organization, business group or NGO and they almost …
READ MORE

On the Fence: Canada’s Role in the Western Pacific Through An Election Lens 0
- Analysis
- September 17, 2015
Canada’s election, in the 70^th anniversary year of the conclusion of World War II, should be a time to ponder Canada’s role in the Western Pacific. Most pressing is the challenge of how Canada should respond to China’s increasingly …
READ MORE
EU Countries Must Work Toward Common Refugee Solution 0
- Analysis
- September 15, 2015
The German minister of the interior announced on the weekend that Germany would temporarily close its southern border. In so doing, the government would temporarily leave the so-called Schengen agreement, which allows the free movement of people in the Euro …
READ MORE
Missing Indictments in the Case of Maher Arar 0
- Analysis
- September 10, 2015
^{© CHRIS WATTIE/Reuters/Corbis}

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police have laid a criminal charge against George Salloum, director of the Far Falestin prison in Damascus, Syria, where Maher Arar was tortured in 2002-03. At the same time, the Mounties issued an …
READ MORE
We Are All Responsible for the Safe Passage of Syrian Refugees 0
- Analysis
- September 8, 2015
Philosophers are fond of asking this question, to press peoples’ intuitions about the right thing to do: Imagine you are walking by a pond, in your fanciest suit on your way to an important meeting, and you notice a baby …
READ MORE
Low-Fee Private Schools and Development: What Do We Really Know?0
- Analysis
- September 8, 2015
by Prachi Srivastava

I have been researching low-fee private schooling for nearly a decade and a half. No one could be happier that the issue is finally receiving the high-level attention it deserves, with discussions in development circles and an …
READ MORE
Pause Before You Laugh at Governor Walker 0
- Analysis
- September 2, 2015
Election campaigns are comedy fodder. This week’s top supplier is Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, the man running for the Republican presidential nomination in the United States. When queried on Sunday by Chuck Todd of NBC News’ Meet the Press about …
READ MORE