Canada and the World Backgrounder articles from May 2005

Canada and the World Backgrounder archives from May 2005

Against injustice.(INTRODUCTION)
May 1, 2005... When political columnist Dalton Camp died in March 2002 he was described as a man of the people, representing those who believe in justice, compassion, and generosity. While he was well known as president of Canada's Progressive Conservative...

The pendulum swings: in Canada, the popularity of government-funded social programs rises and falls in a cycle.(SOCIAL POLICY)
May 1, 2005... Otto von Bismarck seems an unlikely person to get the credit as creator of social programs to support the poor and disadvantaged. He was born in 1815 into the privileged landowning class of Prussia (a kingdom roughly covering the territory of...

Under the weather: politicians say they are fixing our ailing health-care system and, in September 2004, the provinces signed a new funding deal, with Ottawa which may or may not make a difference.(HEALTH)
May 1, 2005... Canada's publicly funded health-care system is a product of the belief that the community is stronger when it acts together than when we act as individuals; it is the essence of The Public Good. It guarantees that someone facing a catastrophic...

Bread and circuses? Almost 2,000 years ago, the Roman poet Juvenal coined the phrase in our headline to describe leaders who organized entertainments for unhappy citizens to take their minds off the fact that all they had to eat was bread.(economic aspects of Olymic Games)
May 1, 2005... So, you've got $15 billion and a country desperate for quality health care, schools, proper roads, public transportation, and housing. What do you do? Spend it all on a party of course. Well, that's what Greece's socialist government did. ...

Minding our future: Canada's largely informal child-care system falls far behind what is offered in several European countries.(CHILD CARE)
May 1, 2005... A report released in October 2004 described Canada's child-care system as underfunded, inefficient, and failing, with a patchwork of fragmented services. The report was published by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and...

The debate continues: in most countries, utilities such as electricity and water supplies are considered essential services that are to be provided by government and funded by user fees.(UTILITIES)
May 1, 2005... Generally, utilities have been considered a public good--services that should be available to all citizens at reasonable cost. But, under public management, utilities have not always performed very well: Ontario Hydro is a case in point. ...

Aiming higher: across Canada, about 1.1 million full-time students were enrolled in post-secondary institutions in 2001, but thousands have been turned away because of lack of space or they have not applied for admission because the cost of tuition is too high for them.
May 1, 2005... It is widely accepted that the future prosperity of Canada rests on having a well-educated workforce. Yet, the cost to students of postsecondary education has risen rapidly over the last few years as government funding has dropped dramatically....

Quote ... unquote.
May 1, 2005... "Here in Canada, we believe in the public good, as in 'good for all the public.' We don't believe in private affluence and public squalor. We like to balance those two things." Globe and Mail columnist Heather Mallick, 2004. "If by a...

The greater good.(middle class people in the society)
May 1, 2005... Studying how people behave within societies has occupied some of the world's most brilliant minds for thousands of years. And, a central question that has caused deep furrows in many brows is: How can people obtain the 'good life' given the...

Detached, disinterested, and disengaged.(POLITICS)(Governments (political expression))
May 1, 2005... Noreena Hertz is Associate Director of the Centre for International Business at the University of Cambridge in England. In 2003, her book The Silent Takeover (ISBN: 006055973X) was published, and it has be-come hotly debated since then. In the...

Taking back democracy.(ANTI-GLOBALIZATION)
May 1, 2005... Tracing the birth of the anti-globalization movement is difficult. Many believe the movement's flashbulb moment came with the public embarrassment of Kathie Lee Gifford in 1996. That's when it was revealed that the wholesome talk-show host's...

Nature's friends.(THE ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT)
May 1, 2005... There is no single event that can be pointed to for which we can say: "Aha! That's when the environmental movement began." Environmentalism grew slowly from a developing awareness that human activity was degrading Nature. That's as far as the...

Defending the defenceless.(human rights)
May 1, 2005... Cyrus the Great wasn't called "The Great" because he was a big man. His greatness came from his military skill but more from his compassion towards ordinary people. On the day of his coronation as Emperor of Persia (559 BC), Cyrus proclaimed a...