Event Date: September 17, 2019 - 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Location: FSS4004, 120 University Private, Ottawa

Video recording of the event is available here.

Canada is a peaceful country in a turbulent world. Today’s global security threats are complex and multiple, ranging from the spread of violent extremism to the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and cyber attacks. In an interconnected world, no country is immune from these threats. At the same time, many countries are withdrawing their commitment to peacekeeping operations, and international arms treaties are being abandoned and a new nuclear arms race is under way. What is Canada’s role in this new security global security landscape? What steps can the next government take toward building a more secure world?   Join our panel of expert for a lively discussion of the main security and defence issues to consider ahead of the election.

Panelists:

Alex Boutilier, The Star

Alex Boutilier is a national politics reporter with the Toronto Star’s Ottawa bureau. Originally from Cape Breton, he has covered municipal politics in Halifax and Ottawa, provincial politics in Nova Scotia, and crime and entertainment in Fort McMurray, Alberta. Boutilier has been covering Parliament Hill for the Star since 2013, and has lived in Ottawa since 2012.

Richard Fadden, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs

Richard Fadden was the National Security Adviser to the Prime Minister of Canada from January 2015 to March 2016. Previously, he was Deputy Minister of National Defence (2013-2015) and served as Director of the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (2009-2013). He also served as Deputy Minister for Citizenship and Immigration Canada (2006-2009) and Natural Resources Canada (2005-2006). He was President of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (2002-2005) and Deputy Clerk and Counsel in the Privy Council Office (2000-2002), during which he assumed the additional duties for Security and Intelligence Coordinator in 2001. Over the course of his career, Richard worked in a variety of positions in the Department of External Affairs, the Office of the Auditor General of Canada, Natural Resources Canada and the Treasury Board Secretariat. He holds a Graduate Diploma in Law from the University of Ottawa, a Bachelor of Laws from the University of Montreal and a B.A. (Political Science) from McGill University. 

Barbara Falk, Canadian Forces College 

Barbara J. Falk is an associate professor in the Department of Defence Studies at the Canadian Forces College/Royal Military College of Canada, and author of The Dilemmas of Dissidence: Citizen Intellectuals and Philosopher Kings. Her teaching and research interests include comparative genocide, national security law and policy, and the persecution and prosecution of dissent. She is currently writing a book on comparative political trials across the East-West divide during the early Cold War. Prior to her academic career, she worked in the both the private and public sectors in human resources, labour relations and women’s issues. For more information, see: http://www.cfc.forces.gc.ca/136/277-eng.html.

Thomas Juneau, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs 

Thomas Juneau is associate professor at the University of Ottawa’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs. His research focuses on the Middle East, in particular Iran and Yemen, and on Canadian foreign and defence policy and international relations theory. He is also currently conducting a number of research projects on the relationship between intelligence analysis and policy-making in Canada. He is the author of Squandered Opportunity: Neoclassical realism and Iranian foreign policy (Stanford University Press, 2015), editor of Strategic Analysis in Support of International Policy Making: Case studies in achieving analytical relevance (Rowman & Littlefield, 2017), and co-editor of Canadian Defence Policy in Theory and Practice (forthcoming) and of Iranian Foreign Policy Since 2001: Alone in the World (Routledge, 2013). He has published book chapters and articles in, among other publications, International Affairs, Political Science Quarterly, Nonproliferation Review, Orbis, International Journal, Canadian Foreign Policy, Middle East Policy, and International Studies Perspectives. From 2003 until 2014, he worked with Canada’s Department of National Defence, mostly as a policy analyst covering the Middle East. He also acts as a consultant for various departments with the Canadian government and is a frequent commentator in Canadian and international media.

Moderated by Rita Abrahamsen. Rita Abrahamsen is Professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs and the Director of the Centre for International Policy Studies (CIPS). Her research interests are in African politics, security and development, security privatization and postcolonial theory. She is the author (with M.C. Williams) of Security Beyond the State: Private Security in International Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2011) and Disciplining Democracy: Development Discourse and the Good Governance Agenda in Africa (Zed Books, 2000). Her articles have appeared in leading journals including African Affairs, Alternatives, International Political Sociology, Journal of Modern African Studies, Political Studies, Third World Quarterly and Review of African Political Economy. She was joint-editor of African Affairs, the highest ranked journal in African studies, from 2009 to 2014. Prior to joining the University of Ottawa, she was in the Department of International Politics at the University of Aberystwyth, and she has been visiting fellow at the University of Cape Town, the European University Institute in Florence, the University of Queensland in Brisbane, the International Peace Research Institute (PRIO) in Oslo, the Centre for Advanced Security Theory (CAST) at the University of Copenhagen, Queen Mary University of London and University of Sydney

This panel is the third in the series “Voting for a Better World? Foreign Policy in the 2019 Election,” hosted by CIPS and funded by an SSHRC Exchange Grant.

For more information on this event series, click here.