Category Archives: AIUofT Candlelight

FAST-TRACKING DISASTER: Industry Regulation and Environmental Disaster-Making in East Palestine, Ohio

Posted on March 23, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Emma Celeste Thornley

On February 3rd, 2023, a Norfolk Southern freight train derailed by East Palestine, Ohio (Ebrahimji and Yan, 2023). 38 of its cargo-hauling cars jumped the rails, scattering its hazardous contents into the earth, air and groundwater. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would respond within a day; the Ohio National Guard would mobilize a day after that. By February 8th, the initial evacuation order issued to East Palestine and the immediate area would be lifted (Ebrahimji and Yan, 2023). As of March 17th, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine maintains that East Palestine is safe for inhabitation (Keller, 2023). Locals and EPA representatives disagree. Carcinogenic dioxides still permeate the earth by the initial spill sites at a density 100 times the legal limit (Perkins, 2023); 4.85 million gallons of toxic wastewater have been extracted from broader East Palestine in the month since the initial spill (Government of Ohio, 2023). Activists like Erin Brockovich, who previously uncovered a massive corporate coverup of water poisoning during her tenure as a paralegal at a law firm (Brokovich, 2023), warned that coverups and late-blooming dangers are likely to threaten the health of locals for years (Flesher, 2023).

Disasters like these are far from uncommon in the United States. The first seven weeks of 2023 saw 30 incidents reported by the Coalition to Prevent Chemical Disasters. The EPA performs, on average, 235 individual emergency responses to chemical spills a year (Gillam, 2023). Averaged out, across the United States, a chemical spill occurs once every two days (Bennett, 2023). Every spill, regardless of size or chemical composition, is dangerous. Injury and illness resulting from exposure can incite chronic or acute consequences (Gillam, 2023). In East Palestine, residents were flooded with vinyl chloride, butyl acrylate, isobutylene ethylene glycol and ethylhexyl acrylate (Chow and Abou-Sabe). Vinyl Chloride is a colourless, flammable, carcinogenic gas that causes a range of neurological symptoms in those exposed. Butyl acrylate is similarly irritating, and triggers rashes and respiratory complications. The effects of long-term exposure to any one of these chemicals is unknown, let alone multiple (Chow and Abou-Sade, 2023). The issues emerging from this chemical spill will be further compounded by the EPA’s recent performance decrease, triggered in large part by budget slashes (Beitsch and Frazin, 2023).

Amnesty International has held that humans have a right to a safe environment (Amnesty International 2022). While often couched in climate change rhetoric, it is equally applicable to toxic exposure. It is well established that racialized and impoverished communities are disproportionately exposed to environmental hazards (Johnston and Cushing, 2020) akin to the East Palestine spill. In recent memory, the predominantly Black communities of Flint, Michigan (Almasy and Ly, 2017) and Hayneville, Alabama (Alcindor, 2022) were respectively victimized by gross state misconduct in the wake of environmental contamination. In both cases, the contamination was preventable. Flint’s water-pipes were a known lead hazard (Almasy and Ly, 2017); Hayneville’s sewage systems were improperly operated (Alcindor, 2022). The case of East Palestine may seem, on its face, equally tragic but comparatively less insidious. Train derailments are accidents, not state failures. East Palestine is predominately white and conservative. As the state’s failures to respond to the EasPalestine crisis mounted, Trump’s campaign utilized East Palestine’s demographics to accuse the present administration of “woke” virtue signalling (Pilkington, 2023).

In reality, Trump’s administration tabled policy exposing countless locales to industrial disaster, and all American citizens in marginalized social groups are resultantly at risk of similar disasters. The EPA’s 2020 budget reduction was executed by Trump; the already overwhelmed federal branch lost about half of its funding (Beitsch and Frazin, 2023). This drastic rollback on government funding to emergency response and toxic waste management research was further compounded by the former administration’s proverbial derailing of train safety regulations (Levin, 2023). The federal regulations expunged from practice included reducing braking system standards and safety audits of railroads (Levin, 2023). While preliminary reports suggest the East Palestine derailment was not a direct result of Trump’s regulation policy (Kessler, 2023), it is a warning as to what disasters may loom on the American horizon. In cases where the disaster releases toxic chemicals into the environment, as was the case in East Palestine, the legacy of Trump’s rollbacks may have catastrophic consequences. A grand total of 100 environmental rules were repealed, designed to protect American air, drinking water, wildlife and urban infrastructure (Popovich, Albeck-Ripka and Pierre-Louis, 2021). The EPA is subsequently facing stacking disasters with only a fraction of its resources.

Political science scholarship has long held that natural disasters are made by the state (O’Lear, 2022). Food shortages are exacerbated by global food systems into famines (International Rescue Committee, 2022); storms like Hurricane Katrina turn to deadly floods when institutions fail to maintain storm levees (Pruitt, 2020). Our human rights to life, security of person and adequate standard of living are increasingly consolidating with labour and environmental rights. When states fail to recognize the overlap between these spheres of human life, or otherwise ignore them for profit margins, disastrous consequences emerge. The circumstances surrounding East Palestine’s spill are a stark reminder that attaining any one of these rights is contingent upon pursuit of the others.

Works Cited

Alcindor, Y. (n.d.) In rural Alabama, raw sewage spurs investigation into racial inequality. NBC. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/rural-alabama-raw-sewage-spurs-investigation-racial-inequality-rcna25475

Almasy, S. and Ly, L. (2017, February 18) Flint water crisis: Report says ‘systemic racism’ played role. CNN. https://www.cnn.com/2017/02/18/politics/flint-water-report-systemic-racism/index.html

Amnesty International (2022, July 27) Time to recognize that a safe environment is a human right. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/07/time-to-recognize-that-a-safe-environment-is-a-human-right/

Bennett, P. (2023, February 28) U.S. Averages One Chemical Accident Every Two Days, Analysis Finds. Eco Watch. https://www.ecowatch.com/chemical-accident-frequency-us.html

Brokovich, E. (2022) My Story. https://www.brockovich.com/my-story/

Ibrahimji, A. And Yan, H. (2023, March 10) It’s been more than a month since a freight train carrying hazardous chemicals derailed in Ohio. Here’s what’s happened since. CNN. https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/23/us/east-palestine-ohio-train-derailment-timeline/index.html

Flesher, J. (2023, March 11) ‘We don’t feel safe anymore.’ Trauma, health concerns remain after Ohio derailment. PBS. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/we-dont-feel-safe-anymore-trauma-health-concerns-remain-after-ohio-derailment

Governor of Ohio (2023, March 10) East Palestine Update – 3/10/23. https://
governor.ohio.gov/media/news-and-media/east-palestine-update-3-10-23-03102023#:~:text=Hazardous%20Waste%20Removal,of%20through%20deep%20well%20injection.

International Rescue Committee (2022, August 24) What is famine? How it’s caused and how to stop it. https://www.rescue.org/article/what-famine-how-its-caused-and-how-stop-it#:~:text=Famines%20are%20caused%20by%20multiple,of%20action%20to%20prevent%20it.

Johnston J, Cushing L. Chemical Exposures, Health, and Environmental Justice in Communities Living on the Fenceline of Industry. Curr Environ Health Rep. 2020 Mar;7(1):48-57. doi: 10.1007/s40572-020-00263-8. PMID: 31970715; PMCID: PMC7035204.

Keller, A. (2023, February 18) Gov. DeWine reiterates air and water are safe in East Palestine. Spectrum News.https://spectrumnews1.com/oh/columbus/news/2023/02/18/the-ohio-department-of-health-helps-east-palestine-move-forward-with-clinic

Kessler, G. (2023, February 27) So far, Trump’s rollback of regulations can’t be blamed for Ohio train wreck. Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/02/27/so-far-trumps-rollback-regulations-cant-be-blamed-ohio-train-wreck/

Levin, B. (2023, February 22) TRUMP FORGETS TO MENTION THE TRAIN SAFETY REGULATIONS HE GUTTED DURING VISIT TO EAST PALESTINE, OHIO. Vanity Fair. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/02/donald-trump-east-palestine-ohio-train

O’Lear, S., Masse, F., Dickinson, H., & Duffy, R. (2022). Disaster making in the
Capitalocene. Global Environmental Politics, 22(3), 2-11. https://muse-jhu-
edu.myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/article/861825

Perkins, T. (2023, March 17) Levels of carcinogenic chemical near Ohio derailment site far above safe limit. TheGuardian.https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/mar/17/norfolk-southern-derailment-east-palestine-ohio-carcinogenic-chemical-levels

Pruitt, S. (2020, August 27) How Levee Failures Made Hurricane Katrina a Bigger Disaster. History. https://www.history.com/news/hurricane-katrina-levee-failures

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , ,

Megan Thee Stallion v Tory Lanez: Dehumanizing Black Women to Justify Violence and Victim-Blaming

Posted on March 21, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Jasmin L.K. Smith

Courtesy of the Jim Crow Museum

Black women are the least protected group, I would argue, in the world. They are expected to be strong caretakers, and many view them through a lens of strength and survival through hardship. The latter, however positive, is more regressive than progressive, since it creates an idea that Black women should be viewed as a one-dimensional monolith. 

Black women have been discriminated against for centuries, not only by the misogynistic and racist outsiders within society, but in their own community, suffering at the hands of Black men and those that have more privileges than them due to lighter complexions. Black women are less likely to be attended to in hospitals, they are more likely to be viewed as aggressive and angry, and, most pressingly, they are less likely to be believed when they come out as victims.

On the night of the shooting between Tory Lanez and Megan Thee Stallion, I was involved in a groupchat of nearly 100 black women that were attending the same university as I had been. Within minutes the groupchat had gone from a simmer to a full-on kitchen fire, everyone sending details of what had happened and what the news had been saying. Over the following weeks, when discussing the case, our topics strayed away from Megan herself in favour of addressing the responses to her victimhood. Megan, a dark-skin Black woman, was called a cockroach, online personalities began to speculate that she was a man, and others simply said that she had made it all up. The responses were disgusting and abundant, and many of us in the groupchat were exposed to the true colours of our peers and loved ones; nobody was defending Megan like they had when white women cried ‘MeToo’, nobody was sympathizing with the pain that she must have felt, and she had been stripped of her identity in favour of people referring to her as a caricature. 

Black Women as Caricatures

In slavery-era minstrel shows, white people would portray Black women as one of two stereotypes: the Mammy, or the Jezebel. The Mammy is a character that possesses no personal life of her own, sacrificing everything to take care of a white family’s home or children, and she was supposed to be grateful for the space and privileges granted to her by the family that she ‘worked for’. A modern example of this caricature would be Viola Davis’ role in The Help, a film that, rather than focusing on the complex relationships of Black caretakers and the children that they watched over in the early 20th century, told the story of a white savior that ‘felt terrible’ for what she had to witness. The image of Aunt Jemima is also an example of the Mammy in popular culture, an image, and a false story, that was only changed after outrage in 2021 (Diaz).

During slavery, it was not rare for white women to express jealousy towards the slave women that would be sexually assaulted at the hand of white slave masters. This was not romance, yet it was interpreted as such by wives that longed for the attention of their husbands. The caricature of the Jezebel originated from such circumstances as these. White women believed that their husbands had been seduced by Black women and their sexuality, thus leading them to be victims of sexual assault. This, of course, is not the truth, and Black women suffered overwhelming abuses from slave owners, which is not reflected in the Jezebel stereotype. The Jezebel’s only influence is her body, which she offers in exchange for something that she desires, and though it is no longer common in media, the Jezebel caricature has left lasting traces in Hollywood films and series.

In the 70s, 80s, and 90s, the caricature of the Sapphire rose to prominence, and the public believed this to be a true representation of Black women. The sapphire is the stereotypical ‘sassy Black woman’, she is loud, overbeating, hard-headed, and rude, and has directly contributed to the stereotype of Black women being angry and aggressive. The Sapphire is the ‘Angry Black Women’ that the public is regularly exposed to, and she is masculinized by portraying her as the dominant person in her relationships. The most common caricature of Black women in modern media is the Strong Black Women, also a product of the usage of the Sapphire stereotype. The Strong Black Women is a two-dimensional, emotionally incompetent character that very rarely gets to express an emotion aside from determination.

With a handful of ways to portray Black women, “the audience, and the creators alike, are going to constantly think that [they] have represented Black women in the way they are. When really, they have represented the same racist caricature over and over” (3:38 Al Jazeera). Having played the role of another Black woman stereotype, the Welfare Queen, Babirye Bukilwa sees herself as having been complicit in propaganda targeting Black women (Al Jazeera 6:40). 

These stereotypes, even when put together, do not create a real character with personality and understandable motivations. None of these stereotypes or caricatures will ever be honest to the experience of Black women, because they lack depth and dimensionality. While there have been a few shows in recent years that have come out with honest stories about Black women, like Scandal, Insecure, and The Photograph, the startling lack of colour in media production has kept century-old stereotypes and caricatures alive, and these caricatures and stereotypes continue to thrive and work themselves into public opinions. 

Defeminizing Black Women

Michelle Obama is successful, her birth name must be Michael; Francine Niyonsaba has a hormonal disorder, she must be competing as a woman to cheat her way to a gold medal; Megan Thee Stallion has taken agency and embraced her own sexuality, she must be .Marcus Thee Stallion’. Do you recognize a pattern? Successful, dominant Black women are constantly torn down and defeminized, and Black women that identify with traditionally masculine traits are rumored by the masses to be men themselves.

The defeminization of Black women began, again, with minstrel shows and slavery. When Black women were stripped of their agency, or when they were only portrayed as being voiceless, or mothering, their ability to embrace their own sexualities ceased to exist. Black women, in the sense of the Mammy trope, were seen as being nurturing, without desire for anything themselves. At the same time, the only sexual experiences of Black women in slavery were those defined by their slave masters, creating a culture that connected victimhood and sexuality when examining relationships of Black women. 

Non-Black society has attributed masculinity as a whole to Black communities. They attribute perceived hypermasculine traits, such as violence and likelihood to commit a crime, to Black men, and both Black men and Women suffer as a result. Black men are more likely to be targeted by police violence, while Black women must suffer as they must prove themselves as being feminine beings to those around them. The default for femininity is the white damsel in distress, a character like Snow White, thus assuming Black women to lack femininity since they lack a light complexion (Blake). Even men in the Black community portray and discuss Black women as if they are lesser than because they have dark skin or because they have been brainwashed by the stereotypes of white society. 

Misogynoir

During the Womanism Movement in the 60s and 70s, Black women coined the word ‘misogynoir’ to encompass the extremely specific circumstances of which they are discriminated against. ‘Misogynoir’ is a word that not only captures the racism and misogyny that Black women endure at the hands of society as a whole, but also addresses, arguably, the biggest perpetrating group of stereotypes against Black women, Black men. 

Issues faced by Black women are usually not as bothersome to Black men as they should be. In Why Are Black Men So Quiet About the Things That Matter to Black Women?, Allison Wiltz talks about Black conservatism and how it directly affects Black women. Black conservative men have, for decades, described abortion as being a tool for Black genocide, however, they do not speak on the fact that Black women are more than three times more likely to die in childbirth than white women (Wiltz). Often times, these same men claim that Black women are living off of welfare or cheating the system, but they never bother to comment on wage disparities between Black men and Black women, or even Black women and White women. 

In recent years, books like Hood Feminism by Mikki Kendall have addressed the way that ‘ratchet’/’hood’ women are viewed as ‘ghetto’ or ‘uneducated’. Books such as these suggest that Black men view Black women as being less than white women because they have chosen to use AAVE, or because they wear certain clothes. These mentalities and styles invented by Black women often end up in mainstream media, by which point they are deemed as being socially acceptable while Black women are still being labeled as ‘ghetto’ for trendsetting. 

Black men have, in the past, picked up many of the stereotypes towards Black women that have been created by non-Black communities. Rather than speaking out against them, many Black men have, instead, chosen disbelief or complacency in order to advance in life.

In one apology addressed to Megan, a Black man said that he initially could not believe it, and that is why he chose to be hateful towards her. The “everyday violence that [Black women] deal with“sounds so crazy”as to be met with incredulity,” but this is the type of violence that they are faced with everyday of their lives, including from their very own community (Lane 295).

Parasociality

The Oxford English Dictionary defines parasociality as “Designating a relationship characterized by the one-sided, unreciprocated sense of intimacy felt by a viewer, fan, or follower for a well-known or prominent figure” (“Parasocial” O.E.D). In other words, a parasocial relationship is one in which a fan believes that they have a realistic, everyday relationship with a celebrity or creator because of the accessibility of their content. 

Parasocial relationships can be dangerous, as the person that perceives a parasocial relationship may defend the celebrity, creator, or character, as if they are a friend, and they are unable to decipher that their relationship is one-sided. In a study published in Psychology and Marketing, Siyoung Chung and her team discovered that, the more a celebrity tweeted or interacted with fans online, the more likely they were to be endorsed by their audience (Chung). Not only is this excellent branding, creating falsified, and seemingly personal connections with an audience, allowing for significantly more successful marketing, but it is also a wonderful PR tool.

When celebrities with large, parasocial audiences get into scandals, any bad publicity can be easily overshadowed by their fanbase spreading other information, or simply polluting related hashtags with unrelated events/media. For Tory Lanez, his parasocial audience mixed with racism, misogyny, and misogynoir from members of the Black community, created a perfect storm to distract from Megan’s retelling of the events. Rather than finding conversations about what happened on the night of the shooting, or seeing evidence on your timeline, it is much more common to come across tweets calling Megan a liar, or claiming her to be a man.

So What?

In the midst of her trauma, Megan Thee Stallion was forced to relentlessly explain herself, blame and insults being spewed on every platform. At the time of the shooting, it is reported that she lied to a police officer regarding what had happened. Many ridiculed her for this decision, overlooking the historic relationship between Black men and police departments, especially in the United States. Others called her a snitch for saying anything at all, “as if she were involved with some crime ring with Tory Lanez” (The Takeaway 4:45). Megan, like other Black women, could not win, and this trial has grown to be as much of a minstrel show as the ones that took place 100 years ago. If Megan is a Sapphire, she can’t feel pain, right? If she is a Strong Black Woman, then she must not be a victim. 

If you have gotten this far, and you feel anger towards my defense of Megan Thee Stallion, towards my defense of Black women as a whole, let me remind you: Tory Lanez is not your friend. Why are you defending him? Why are Black women stripped of any talents and education, viewed as even subhuman, once they reach fame? Why must Black women suffer no matter their position in life?

This trial is about Megan Thee Stallion and Tory Lanez, but it has never been solely about Megan Thee Stallion and Tory Lanez. This trial is about society and Black women, about Black men and Black women, this trial is about Black Women and pain. Nobody believes Black women, because society, including Black men, do not view them as people. If Black women are supposed to be protectors, who will protect them?

Works Cited

Al Jazeera. “Mammy, Jezebel and Sapphire: Stereotyping Black women in media | The Listening Post (Feature).” Youtube, uploaded by Al Jazeera English, 26 July 2020, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2teqoyPe3TU&ab_channel=AlJazeeraEnglish.

Blake, Arana. The Masculinization of Black Women. Nubian Message, 14 April 2022, https://www.thenubianmessage.com/2022/04/14/the-masculinization-of-black-women/.

Chung, Sarah., & Cho, Hichang. “Fostering Parasocial Relationships with Celebrities on Social Media: Implications for Celebrity Endorsement.” Psychology and Marketing, 34(4), 481-495,  https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21001.

.Diaz, Jaclyn. Aunt Jemima No More; Pancake Brand Renamed Pearl Milling Company. NPR, 10 February 2021, https://www.npr.org/2021/02/10/966166648/aunt-jemima-no-more-pancake-brand-renamed-pearl-milling-company.

Jim Crow Museum. The Sapphire Caricature. Ferris State University, 2023, https://www.ferris.edu/HTMLS/news/jimcrow/antiblack/sapphire.htm.

Lane, Nikki. “Ratchet Black Lives Matter: Megan Thee Stallion, Intra-Racial Violence, and the Elusion of Grief.” Linguistic Anthropology, 31, 293-297, August 2021, https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/jola.12323.

“Parasocial, adj.” OED Online, Oxford UP, 30 March 2022, https://www.oed.com/view/Entry/99961331?redirectedFrom=parasocial#eid.

Wiltz, Allison. Why Are Black Men So Quiet About the Things That Matter to Black Women?. Zora, 3 March 2022, https://zora.medium.com/why-are-black-men-so-quiet-about-the-things-that-matter-to-black-women-a8a5a865ec35.

Vega, Tanzia. “Megan Thee Stallion and Misogynoir in the Music Industry.” New York Public Radio, uploaded by The Takeaway, 31 August 2020, https://www.proquest.com/docview/2731268096?accountid=14771&parentSessionId=2YDtk50apX1Ex6Vp%2BiEgCQaImk5TT6JR8lJQanuITJQ%3D&parentSessionId=Q4gzv5f48uqTqetjiEQTYWS5JbSyG3BbLCKXgUIib0k%3D.

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , ,

“Humanitarian Exceptionalism” and the Failure of Imagination in the Progress of Human Rights in Canada

Posted on March 9, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Hero Aiken

In their book, Refugee States: Critical Refugee Studies in Canada, Vinh Nguyen and Thy Phu describe the concept of Canadian “humanitarian exceptionalism” in some detail. They describe it as “a belief that what sets Canada apart from the US and other nation-states is its distinct benevolence and commitment to human rights” (Nguyen and Phu, 3). As a result of this belief, Canadians may think themselves morally superior to inhabitants of other nations, especially the United States. In fact, a 2016 survey from the Angus Reid institute found that only 15% of Canadians considered the United States to be a “caring society” (Canada Guide). In other words, it seems clear that Canadian society both prides itself on its perceived humanitarian excellence, while also defining itself through its ethical superiority in comparison to other nations. This means that Canadian society, as well as individual Canadians, may feel less pressure or duty to investigate the human rights conditions in our own country and brought about by our government’s policies. “As long as we aren’t as ‘bad’ as the United States”, we reason, “can we really be all that ‘bad’”?


I would argue that this is not only lazy but an irresponsible and dangerous view to take on the protection of human rights in Canada. Why, if we view the United States to be so thoroughly disrespectful of human rights, can we not imagine an instance in which we might surpass their moral standards, but still fail to demonstrate humanitarian efforts of which we can be proud? Surely, if Canadians can so unanimously condemn the human rights violations which we have recently witnessed in the United States, we can muster a more rigorous and objective scale with which to measure our own actions. Unfortunately, the abdication of moral appraisal in favour of an assumed humanitarian supremacy over a handful of conveniently placed international rivals cannot be seen as anything other than a failure in the advancement of universal human rights.


Last year, while writing for Amnesty International U of T’s Candlelight blog, I submitted a piece highlighting the discrepancies between Canada’s benevolent image on the international scene and the difficult realities faced by its unhoused population. This year, I’d like to elaborate on this same theme while turning my attention towards the plight of refugees seeking asylum in Canada. This in the context of the trap set by the idea of “humanitarian exceptionalism”.

In the wake of Donald Trump’s infamous policies regarding the treatment of refugees or migrants seeking entrance into the United States, it perhaps became easier in recent years for Canadians to ignore the mistreatment of refugees by our own government. In a joint report released on World Refugee Day in 2021, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch declared that “Canada incarcerates thousands of people, including those with disabilities, on immigration-related ground every year in often abusive conditions” (Human Rights Watch). However, when
compared to the more conspicuous abuses carried out by United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (I.C.E.) agents during President Trump’s tenure, Canada’s mistreatment of immigrants and refugees has tended to fade into the background of our national consciousness. In 2017, Reuters reported that the Trump administration was considering the separation of Mexican children from their mothers upon “illegally” crossing the border into the United States (Reuters). The following year, the United States Department of Homeland Security (D.H.S.) publicly admitted for the first time to having separated 2 000 children from their parents as they
crossed the border into the United States from Mexico (CNN). Faced with this abhorrent example of human rights abuse, it became easy for Canadians to cease the examination of our own systemic mistreatment of immigrants and refugees. I would argue that much of the energy which would have previously been spent on the promotion of the amelioration of Canada’s humanitarian measures in these areas instead became focused on the derision of the United States’ methods. This is clearly detrimental to the progress of human rights in Canada, and is also only one example among many. As long as Canada continues to measure the morality of our humanitarian efforts in relation to the often gross human rights abuses levied by American institutions, we will be wasting energy and resources which could be better spent on the questioning and bettering of our own systems.

Finally, I would indicate that this is not an outright condemnation of Canada’s efforts in the realm of human rights. According to the Fraser Institute’s 2022 Human Rights Index, Canada ranks 13th highest among the nations of the world (Fraser Institute). This is above the United States, and other wealthy nations such as the United Kingdom and France. Instead, this article is meant to denounce the idea that human rights efforts can be reduced to the ways in which they compare to each other. Human rights efforts, whether they concern the treatment of vulnerable populations such as the unhoused and those seeking asylum as refugees, or whether they concern the status of marginalized populations such as racial or sexual
minorities, are inherently indicative of the ways in which we value the lives of our fellow humans. Is this pursuit not worthy of being measured in ways which transcend the petty temptation to comparison? If Canada wants to build a nation truly worthy of being deemed “exceptional” for its humanitarian pursuits, we ought to create an independent standard by which to measure our human rights efforts. If we seek “humanitarian exceptionalism” in the truest sense of the word, why do we lower ourselves to the standards of those nations we so readily condemn? The myth of “humanitarian exceptionalism” in Canada not only spells disaster for the progress of human rights in Canada, it also demonstrates a lack of imagination and belief in the true humanitarian potential of our nation.

Works Cited


Ainsley, Julia Edwards. “Exclusive: Trump Administration Considering
Separating Women, Children at Mexico Border.” Reuters, Thomson
Reuters, 3 Mar. 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-immigration-children-idUSKBN16A2ES.

“Anti-Americanism.” The Canada Guide, 17 Nov. 2020, https://thecanadaguide.com/culture/anti-americanism/.


“Canada: Abuse, Discrimination in Immigration Detention.” Human Rights
Watch, 20 July 2021, https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/06/17/canada-abuse-
discrimination-immigration-detention.


“Family Separation – a Timeline.” Southern Poverty Law Center, 23 Mar. 2022, https://www.splcenter.org/news/2022/03/23/family-separation-timeline#2017.

“Human Freedom Index 2022.” Fraser Institute, 26 Jan. 2023,
https://www.fraserinstitute.org/studies/human-freedom-index-2022#:~:tex
t=Selected%20jurisdictions%20rank%20as%20follows,)%2C%20China
%20(152)%2C.

Kopan, Tal. “DHS: 2,000 Children Separated from Parents at Border | CNN
Politics.” CNN, Cable News Network, 16 June 2018,
https://www.cnn.com/2018/06/15/politics/dhs-family-separation-numbers/
index.html.

Nguyen, Vinh and Thy Phu. Refugee States: Critical Refugee Studies in
Canada. University of Toronto Press, 2021.

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , , , ,

Refoulement: Europe Funds Migrant Capture and Detention in Libya

Posted on March 7, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Jenna Barhoush

The supposed synonymity of the word migration with mobility could not be more incorrectly reflected in the realities of 21st century migration. Instead, with migration come threats of humiliating immobility. People escape their unsafe conditions of oppression, war, and poverty and undergo a treacherous path with the hopes of reaching Europe’s promises of safety, opportunity, and equality. Yet, while European countries provide such promises for their citizens, their securities are not extended to migrants and asylum seekers from outside the continent. Instead, the European Union is involved in the process of refoulement – the return of migrants to unsafe places – by funding migration detention centres and surveillance in Libya, and by convicting volunteer refugee rescuers for crimes of human trafficking.

The refugee ‘problem’ develops from situations of nation-wide violence or oppression that make a country uninhabitable for most people. This has been the case in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Eritrea in the past two decades, as the countries’ growing insecurities and oppression contributed to a large exodus of refugees. One Syrian claimed that leaving the house to go to school in the morning was preceded with a daily farewell to family members as survival until the end of the day was not guaranteed (Mardini, 2020). While the rate of lives lost accelerate, those who survive the daily onslaught of war are faced with unending insecurities and oppressive conditions. Basic necessities become scarce and incomes nonexistent for many as facilities are destroyed, and production and import halted (McCarthy, 2022). Seeking refuge in other countries thus becomes the only escape for many. Jordan became a popular asylum for many refugees due to its close proximity to the war-stricken countries and its open borders. Yet the country’s own deteriorating economic conditions meant that minimal securities were all it had to offer to the refugees (Francis, 2015). Its structural stresses and overpopulation of refugees led Jordan to increase regularization which in turn led potential migrants to seek other countries for refuge.

Thus, in 2015, refugees from Syria, Eritrea, Afghanistan and Iraq headed towards Europe. Europe’s migration policy was based on the 1951 Geneva Convention on the Protection of the Refugees, and it stipulated a distributed responsibility for the protection of refugees upon entry to European territory (European Commission). This meant that once an individual seeking asylum enters European land or water, their human rights should be met and protection secured.

However, following the 2015 refugee influx, also known as the Europe Migrant Crisis, the policy proved to be more strenuous than not. Countries that had recently opened their doors to refugees, such as Italy in its 2014 search-and-rescue program Operation Mare Nostrum, took a different turn following the migrant crisis (Urbina, 2021). Poland and Hungary completely shut off their doors to migrants, and shoreline countries such as Italy, Spain, Greece, and Malta began turning away migrant boats. Yet as public protest became global with the uncovering of the conditions refugees underwent on their way to Europe, governments could not be as blatant with their policies. Rather than contributing to direct refoulement, Europe began seeking ways to prevent migrants from even getting near to its shores. Two strategies were pursued: funding the capture of migrants in international waters, and ending the process of rescuing migrants from sea.

The former strategy was assisted by the European Union Trust Fund of Africa. Under the guise of addressing the root causes of political instability and displacement in Africa, the Trust Fund allocated 6 billion dollars to migration control (European Commission). Libya alone received half a billion dollars to capture illegal migrants heading to European shores. The year also highlighted the works of Frontex, the EU’s border agency responsible for coastal surveillance. Frontex was provided with resources that included surveillance drones to track migrant boats in both domestic and international waters in the Mediterranean (Urbina, 2021). Upon discovering migrant boats and dinghies, surveillance footage would be sent to Italy which would then signal Libyan coast guards to intercept the migrants. According to an Amnesty International report, around 15,000 people were intercepted at sea and taken to Libya in the first few months of 2021 (2021). European money taints the entire procedure starting with its funding of Frontex’s surveillance, to the training of the Libyan Coast Guard in migrant capture, and ending with the vehicles used to transport migrants from the seas to detention camps in Libya. In addition, a 2008 Treaty of Friendship between Libya and Italy formalized their cooperation in the containment and capture of migrants (Amnesty International, 2021). Italy would return those crossing central Mediterranean, and Libya would punish and detain them.

Upon capture, migrants are taken to detention camps in Ghout al-Shaal where gross human rights violations are carried out. People lie in overcrowded warehouses with poor ventilation and no sanitation (Urbina, 2021). Reports indicate the constant threat of individuals being singled out for physical torture and/or sexual assault (Amnesty International, 2021). Migrants are punished for assumed treachery and espionage, and their lack of cooperation with their oppressors leads to their assault. In the rare scenario where rebellions are successful, the authorities have been reported to conduct raids in shelters used by escaped migrants. HRW reports that on October 1, 5,152 people were arrested, 1 man killed and 15 injured (Roth, 2021). Reporters who attempt to contact prisoners are themselves detained and sometimes tortured under convictions of espionage.

Libyan law also allows for the indefinite detainment of unauthorized foreigners and their use for unpaid labor (Amnesty International, 2021). The migrants are stripped of their human rights as they enter an unending cycle of dehumanizing torture and enslavement with little to no hope for escape. Disappeared individuals are forced to work in factories or in the military indefinitely. Enforced disappearances allow for human rights violations to be conducted in detention centres with no accountability as individuals are erased, detention centres hidden, and violators protected from identification.

The second strategy of indirect refoulement adopted by Europe is the prevention of rescue operations in European waters. When migrants do escape Libyan Coast Guard and manage to enter European waters, calls for help are unheard. Migrants attempting to signal the coast guard are either ignored or are told to turn back. EU states withdrew naval assets from the central Mediterranean to avoid any chance encounters with migrant boats (Urbina, 2021). In the rare scenario where such an encounter does occur, migrants report to being passed by.

Non-state search-and-rescue operations and organizations have been continuously targeted by European states and reduced to powerless existence as they lose their abilities to actually help boats in distress. In 2018, volunteers working on the shores of Greece to provide blankets and water bottles to oncoming migrants were detained and persecuted under the false convictions of human trafficking and espionage (Cossé and Esveld, 2023). Sarah Mardini, a former Syrian refugee of whom the new Netflix movie Swimmers is partly based on, was held and detained in a Greek prison for over 100 days and is currently awaiting trial. Mardini, alongside fellow volunteer Sean Binder, face a sentence of up to 25 years for volunteering in the aid of migrants. In a Ted Talk interview with Odedre Mardini recounted the mental abuse and trauma she encountered in prison (2020). The conviction of volunteers and search-and-rescue organizations prevents any potential for migrant rescue whether that be in the sea or on the shores of Greece. It insinuates in potential volunteers and donors the fear of similar prosecution. Migrants have also become more vulnerable to the heinous consequences of refoulement as there is no longer anyone that can protect them.

The resentment of migrants is becoming more vocalized in Europe with growing accusations of migrants stealing jobs, threatening the safety of individuals, and tainting the European national and ethnic identities. It is thus necessary to point out here that Europe’s current prosperous conditions are tied to the juxtaposed insecurities in the war stricken countries. Firstly, the legacies of European colonialism that have created a perpetual cycle of detriment and exploitation in the global South have funded the parallel wealth and ‘development’ of Europe itself (Tusalem, 2016). Secondly, as indicated by the Treaty of Friendship and the African Fund, current European ties to the global South support oppression. After contributing to the dangerous conditions forcing people to migrate, the least European countries can now do is to protect refugees.

Accordingly, Europe should take responsibility for refoulement and provide compensation for its colonial legacies. This requires the deterring of ties with Libya and creating a more robust system of accountability and transparency for search-and-rescue operations. Only then will migration return to its synonymous equivalent of mobility and movement and be rid of its inappropriate association with life-threatening immobility.

Write for Rights – Sarah Mardini and Sean Binder: https://takeaction.amnesty.ca/page/50419/action/1?locale=en-US

Works Cited

Amnesty International. (2021). Libya: Horrific violations in detention highlight Europe’s shameful role in forced returns. Amnesty International. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/press-release/ 2021/07/libya-horrific-violations-in-detention-highlight-europes-shameful-role-in-forced-returns/

Cossé, E., Esveld, B.V. (2023). Sea Rescuers Still Waiting for Justice in Greece. Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/01/16/sea-rescuers-still-waiting-justice-greece

European Commission. Common European Asylum System. Migration and Home Affairs. European Commission. https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/policies/migration-and-asylum/ common-european-asylum-system_en

Francis, A. (2015). Jordan’s Refugee Crisis. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. https://carnegieendowment.org/2015/09/21/jordan-s-refugee-crisis-pub-61338

Mardini, S. Interviewed by Odedre, K. (2020). How I was arrested for handing out blankets to refugees | Sarah Mardini. TEDxLondonWomen.

McCarthy, J. (2022). How War Fuels Poverty. Global Citizen.

Roth, K. (2021). Libya. Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2022/country-chapters/ libya#13d8c3

Spindler, W. (2015). 2015: The year of Europe’s refugee crisis. The UN Refugee Agency. https://www.unhcr.org/news/stories/2015/12/56ec1ebde/2015-year-europes-refugee-crisis.html

Tusalem, R. F. (2016). The Colonial Foundations of State Fragility and Failure. Polity, 48(4), 445–495. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26358277

United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (1951). https://www.unhcr.org/ 4ca34be29.pdf

Urbina, I. (2021). The Secretive Prisons That Keep Migrants Out of Europe. The New Yorker. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/12/06/the-secretive-libyan-prisons-that-keep-migrantsout-of-europe 

The former strategy was assisted by the European Union Trust Fund of Africa. Under the
guise of addressing the root causes of political instability and displacement in Africa, the Trust
Fund allocated 6 billion dollars to migration control (European Commission). Libya alone
received half a billion dollars to capture illegal migrants heading to European shores. The year
also highlighted the works of Frontex, the EU’s border agency responsible for coastal
surveillance. Frontex was provided with resources that included surveillance drones to track
migrant boats in both domestic and international waters in the Mediterranean (Urbina, 2021).
Upon discovering migrant boats and dinghies, surveillance footage would be sent to Italy which
would then signal Libyan coast guards to intercept the migrants. According to an Amnesty
International report, around 15,000 people were intercepted at sea and taken to Libya in the first
few months of 2021 (2021). European money taints the entire procedure starting with its funding
of Frontex’s surveillance, to the training of the Libyan Coast Guard in migrant capture, and
ending with the vehicles used to transport migrants from the seas to detention camps in Libya. In
addition, a 2008 Treaty of Friendship between Libya and Italy formalized their cooperation in the
containment and capture of migrants (Amnesty International, 2021). Italy would return those
crossing central Mediterranean, and Libya would punish and detain them.
Upon capture, migrants are taken to detention camps in Ghout al-Shaal where gross
human rights violations are carried out. People lie in overcrowded warehouses with poor
ventilation and no sanitation (Urbina, 2021). Reports indicate the constant threat of individuals
being singled out for physical torture and/or sexual assault (Amnesty International, 2021).
Migrants are punished for assumed treachery and espionage, and their lack of cooperation with
their oppressors leads to their assault. In the rare scenario where rebellions are successful, the
authorities have been reported to conduct raids in shelters used by escaped migrants. HRW
reports that on October 1, 5,152 people were arrested, 1 man killed and 15 injured (Roth, 2021).
Reporters who attempt to contact prisoners are themselves detained and sometimes tortured
under convictions of espionage.
Libyan law also allows for the indefinite detainment of unauthorized foreigners and their
use for unpaid labor (Amnesty International, 2021). The migrants are stripped of their human
rights as they enter an unending cycle of dehumanizing torture and enslavement with little to no
hope for escape. Disappeared individuals are forced to work in factories or in the military
indefinitely. Enforced disappearances allow for human rights violations to be conducted in
detention centres with no accountability as individuals are erased, detention centres hidden, and
violators protected from identification.
The second strategy of indirect refoulement adopted by Europe is the prevention of
rescue operations in European waters. When migrants do escape Libyan Coast Guard and
manage to enter European waters, calls for help are unheard. Migrants attempting to signal the
coast guard are either ignored or are told to turn back. EU states withdrew naval assets from the
central Mediterranean to avoid any chance encounters with migrant boats (Urbina, 2021). In the
rare scenario where such an encounter does occur, migrants report to being passed by.
Non-state search-and-rescue operations and organizations have been continuously
targeted by European states and reduced to powerless existence as they lose their abilities to
actually help boats in distress. In 2018, volunteers working on the shores of Greece to provide blankets and water bottles to oncoming migrants were detained and persecuted under the false
convictions of human trafficking and espionage (Cossé and Esveld, 2023). Sarah Mardini, a
former Syrian refugee of whom the new Netflix movie Swimmers is partly based on, was held
and detained in a Greek prison for over 100 days and is currently awaiting trial. Mardini,
alongside fellow volunteer Sean Binder, face a sentence of up to 25 years for volunteering in the
aid of migrants. In a Ted Talk interview with Odedre Mardini recounted the mental abuse and
trauma she encountered in prison (2020). The conviction of volunteers and search-and-rescue
organizations prevents any potential for migrant rescue whether that be in the sea or on the
shores of Greece. It insinuates in potential volunteers and donors the fear of similar prosecution.
Migrants have also become more vulnerable to the heinous consequences of refoulement as there
is no longer anyone that can protect them.
The resentment of migrants is becoming more vocalized in Europe with growing
accusations of migrants stealing jobs, threatening the safety of individuals, and tainting the
European national and ethnic identities. It is thus necessary to point out here that Europe’s
current prosperous conditions are tied to the juxtaposed insecurities in the war stricken countries.
Firstly, the legacies of European colonialism that have created a perpetual cycle of detriment and
exploitation in the global South have funded the parallel wealth and ‘development’ of Europe
itself (Tusalem, 2016). Secondly, as indicated by the Treaty of Friendship and the African Fund,
current European ties to the global South support oppression. After contributing to the dangerous
conditions forcing people to migrate, the least European countries can now do is to protect
refugees.
Accordingly, Europe should take responsibility for refoulement and provide
compensation for its colonial legacies. This requires the deterring of ties with Libya and creating
a more robust system of accountability and transparency for search-and-rescue operations. Only
then will migration return to its synonymous equivalent of mobility and movement and be rid of
its inappropriate association with life-threatening immobility.
Write for Rights – Sarah Mardini and Sean Binder:
https://takeaction.amnesty.ca/page/50419/action/1?locale=en-US Works cited:
Amnesty International. (2021). Libya: Horrific violations in detention highlight Europe’s
shameful role in forced returns. Amnesty International. https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/press-
release/2021/07/libya-horrific-violations-in-detention-highlight-europes-shameful-role-in-forced-
returns/
Cossé, E., Esveld, B.V. (2023). Sea Rescuers Still Waiting for Justice in Greece. Human Rights
Watch. https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/01/16/sea-rescuers-still-waiting-justice-greece
European Commission. Common European Asylum System. Migration and Home Affairs.
European Commission. https://home-affairs.ec.europa.eu/policies/migration-and-asylum/
common-european-asylum-system_en
Francis, A. (2015). Jordan’s Refugee Crisis. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
https://carnegieendowment.org/2015/09/21/jordan-s-refugee-crisis-pub-61338
Mardini, S. Interviewed by Odedre, K. (2020). How I was arrested for handing out blankets to
refugees | Sarah Mardini. TEDxLondonWomen.
McCarthy, J. (2022). How War Fuels Poverty. Global Citizen.
Roth, K. (2021). Libya. Human Rights Watch. https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2022/country-
chapters/libya#13d8c3
Spindler, W. (2015). 2015: The year of Europe’s refugee crisis. The UN Refugee Agency. https://
www.unhcr.org/news/stories/2015/12/56ec1ebde/2015-year-europes-refugee-crisis.html
Tusalem, R. F. (2016). The Colonial Foundations of State Fragility and Failure. Polity, 48(4),
445–495. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26358277
United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (1951). https://www.unhcr.org/
4ca34be29.pdf
Urbina, I. (2021). The Secretive Prisons That Keep Migrants Out of Europe. The New Yorker.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/12/06/the-secretive-libyan-prisons-that-keep-
migrants-out-of-europe

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Crimes of Humanity

Posted on March 2, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Saba Brittain

On the 10th of January of 2023, the trial of 24 individuals involved in volunteering humanitarian assistance to migrants on the shores of Greece began (Kennedy 2023). This trial appears to follow the trend of European authorities targeting humanitarian workers to discourage solidarity with migrants and deter the arrival of refugees to Europe (Kennedy 2023).

The defendants face serious charges for their work at the Emergency Response Centre International (ERCI), a Greek non-profit organisation that provides emergency aid in dangerous environments. Operating on the Greek island of Lesbos, the “crimes” committed at the ERCI include assisting people whose lives are at risk, searching and rescuing migrant boats in distress, assisting migrant boats on the shoreline (Kitsantonis 2023).

The defendants are accused of facilitating illegal migration to Europe, these accusations have drawn widespread criticism among international human rights organizations. Their charges include espionage, forgery, involvement in a criminal organization, people-smuggling, money laundering and other “farcical” accusations according to Amnesty International (Kitsantonis 2023).

The accusations of espionage condemn the defendants’ initiatives of monitoring local radio channels to learn the whereabouts of migrant boats in distress. (Smith, 2023). The money-laundering allegations incriminate fundraising efforts for the ERCI organization (Smith 2023).

“I am not a people smuggler”, says Sarah Mardini during an interview with BBC, a human rights activist accused of criminal activity and people smuggling following her lifesaving work at the Emergency Response Centre International (BBC 2018). She is one of the 24 defendants on trial and is herself a refugee from Syria (BBC 2018).

A European Parliament report has described this trial as the “largest case of criminalization of solidarity in Europe” (Aljazeera 2023). Many other critiques have suggested this trial is indicative of the efforts to discourage the work of migrant rights defenders and organizations, and deter refugees from coming to Europe (Amnesty International 2022). Simply put, the compassion and solidarity driving the action of the volunteers has been weaponized and criminalized (Amnesty International 2022).

In addition to creating a hostile and insecure environment for human rights volunteers showing solidarity to migrants, this trial delays the work of the ERCI organization. A UN human rights expert suggested that a guilty verdict for the defendants could lead to more migrant deaths at sea (OHCHR 2021). Along with this trial in Greece, several other prosecutions have been set in motion across Europe against NGOs and individuals. Considering the thousands of migrant deaths at sea every year, the effects of these sorts of trials must not be overlooked. Many are calling upon Greek prosecutors to drop all charges against the 24 individuals. (Amnesty International 2022).

Works Cited

“Greece: Guilty Verdict for Migrant Rights Defenders Could Mean More Deaths at Sea – UN Expert.” OHCHR, 18 Nov. 2021, www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/01/greece-guilty-verdict-migrant-rights-defenders-could-mean-more-deaths-sea-un.

“Greece: Migrant Rescue Trial to Begin.” Human Rights Watch, 22 Dec. 2022, www.hrw.org/news/2022/12/22/greece-migrant-rescue-trial-begin.

“Solidarity on Trial in Europe.” Amnesty International, 6 May 2022, www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2020/03/free-to-help/.

Al Jazeera. “Drop All Charges against Refugee Aid Workers, UN Tells Greece.” Migration News | Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera, 13 Jan. 2023, www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/1/13/un-asks-greece-drop-charges-in-syrian-migrant-rescuer-trial.

Kennedy, Niamh. “They Saved Refugees Stranded at Sea. Now They’re on Trial.” CNN, Cable News Network, 10 Jan. 2023, www.cnn.com/2023/01/10/europe/migrant-aid-workers-mardini-binder-trial-intl/index.html.

Kitsantonis, Niki. “Greece Opens Espionage Trial of Aid Workers Who Helped Migrants.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 10 Jan. 2023, www.nytimes.com/2023/01/10/world/europe/greece-trial-migrants.html?searchResultPosition=1.

Smith, Helen. “Long-Awaited Trial of 24 Aid Workers Accused of Espionage Starts in Lesbos.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 13 Jan. 2023, www.theguardian.com/global-development/2023/jan/13/long-awaited-trial-of-24-aid-workers-accused-of-espionage-starts-in-lesbos.

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , , ,

The Crisis of MAID and the Argument for Social Reform

Posted on February 28, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Shivahn Garvie

In early February, the Canadian government deferred the expansion of medical assistance in dying (MAID) to individuals suffering solely from mental illness by one year (Zimonjic 2023). Justice Minister David Lametti requested a delay for Bill C-39 to further investigate the potential risks of this new legislation (Zimonjic 2023). An interim report released in June 2022 concluded that “more remains to be done to ensure the necessary steps have been taken” before the March 2023 deadline (Zimonjic 2023).

According to the new bill, “mental illness” encompasses psychiatric conditions like depression and personality disorders, and excludes neurodevelopmental or neurocognitive disorders (Zimonjic 2023). Euthanasia was introduced to Canada in 2015 when the Canadian Supreme Court ruled that prohibiting assisted death stripped citizens of dignity and autonomy (Cheng 2022). Assisted suicide was approved in Canada for individuals 18 and older with terminal illness in 2016, and was extended to those with non-threatening severe and chronic physical conditions in 2021 (Honderich 2023). Since 2016, the number of people receiving medical assistance in dying has increased each year, constituting 3.3% of all deaths in Canada in 2021 (Honderich 2023). The planned expansion to those suffering solely from mental illness has raised concerns about the MAID program as a whole.

Recent reports have indicated that vulnerable individuals are requesting and receiving assisted death due to poverty, loneliness, or lack of housing rather than failing health (Honderich 2023). Some argue that this indicates a crisis of Canada’s social safety net. In May 2022, Marie-Claud Landry, chief commissioner of the Canadian Human Rights Commission, stated that giving people the option of assisted death because the government is, “failing to fulfill their fundamental human rights is unacceptable.” (Honderich 2023).

Bill C-39 attracted further criticism from three United Nations human rights experts in 2021 who warned that the expanded law will denigrate Canada’s disabled community, sending a message that serious disability is worse than death (Cheng 2022). Critics point to the story of Alan Nichols as evidence that MAID lacks sufficient safeguards. Nichols was a 61-year-old Canadian with a history of depression and concurrent mental health issues who was hospitalized in June 2019 following concerns that he was suicidal (Cheng 2022). The next month, Nichols requested euthanasia through MAID and was killed despite objections from his family and nurse practitioner (Cheng 2022). After his death, it was revealed that Nichols’ MAID application listed hearing loss as the reason for his request to die (Cheng 2022). Nichols’ family brought this case to the police, claiming that he had not been suffering unbearably, but was confused as he had been refusing to take necessary medication and wear a cochlear implant that helped him hear (Cheng 2022).

Most of the controversy surrounding this expansion is centered on assessing the “irremediability” of mental illness (Honderich 2023). Individuals only qualify for MAID in Canada if their

condition is considered incurable (Honderich 2023). However, the Canadian Mental Health Association cautions that it is “not possible” to classify any mental illness as irremediable, and thus disapproves of the upcoming expansion (Honderich 2023).

Despite fears from the public and professionals, Mr. Lametti assures that this legislation is not being taken lightly, claiming, “We are listening to what we are hearing and being responsive” (Honderich 2023). The federal government promises that Bill-C-39 will respect individuals’ autonomy but prioritize their safety (Honderich 2023). While the expansion of MAID may intimidate many Canadians, this delay should bolster their faith in the governments’ commitment and responsiveness to its people’s concerns.

Works Cited

Cheng, Maria. “‘Disturbing’: Experts troubled by Canada’s euthanasia laws.” AP International News, Associated Press, 11 August 2022, https://apnews.com/article/covid-science-heaalth-toronto-7c631558a457188d2bd2b5cfd360a867.

France-Presse, Agence. “Canada seeks to delay euthanasia for mentally ill.” SCMP, South China Morning Post, 3 February 2023, https://www.scmp.com/news/world/united-states-canada/article/3208926/canada-seeks-delay-euthanasia-mentally-ill.

Honderich, Holly. “Who can die? Canada wrestles with euthanasia for the mentally ill.” BBC News, British Broadcasting Corporation, 14 January 2023. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64004329.

Zimonjic, Peter. “Federal government moves to delay MAID for people suffering solely from mental illness.” CBC, Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 2 February 2023. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/maid-delay-solely-mental-illness-1.6734686.

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , , ,

Inhibiting or Protecting? – Questioning the Politics of the Notwithstanding Clause

Posted on February 23, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Tia DeRuiter

In November of 2022, as negotiations over wages and contracts stalled with Ontario education workers, Premier Doug Ford elected to invoke Section 33 of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). Also known as the notwithstanding clause, this section of the Charter allows for parliamentary powers in Canada to negate other Charter rights when legislating, for a five-year period (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). In addition, once utilized, this clause eliminates the potential for, and dismisses any objections to the legislation brought forth at the judicial level (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). In Ford’s most recent use of Section 33, he sought to prevent the strike of educational workers, after bargaining with the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) failed to reach a mutual agreement (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). By invoking this clause, Ford, in effect, restricted the right of peaceful assembly, as codified in Section 2 of the Charter (Government of Canada, n.d.b).

Originally intended to distribute power equally among the federal and provincial levels, in recent years, the use of the notwithstanding clause has been questioned by human and civil rights organizations in Canada (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). Though this Section is meant to be invoked in challenging times, many provincial assemblies have begun to utilize this clause more frequently, and often not for its intended circumstances (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). As this clause is ultimately a violation of the rights of Canadians, many scholars and activists have called for its abrogation, and identified its overuse by provincial parliaments (Serebrin, 2022; Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022).

In Ontario, this clause has been called on three times by Doug Ford and his government, though was only enacted twice (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). The first of which was in June of 2021, when Ford utilized Section 33 to limit election funding by third party sources, after his original implementation of the legislation was overruled by an Ontarian judge (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). Though it was argued that this restriction of funding sought to eliminate outside influence in the provincial election, some argued it was ultimately a restriction of free speech (The Canadian Press, 2021).

Though Ford’s use of Section 33 is certainly troubling for the rights it restricts, it also is not the most blatant nor severe use of this policy to date. Many other provincial governments have utilized this clause to rescind Charter rights, such as the right to freedom of religion (Government of Canada, n.d.a). In 2019, the Government of Quebec passed the controversial and highly opposed Bill 21, that bans public employees from donning religious symbols while at work (Rukavina, 2022). Including hijabs, turbans, and any other religious wear, this bill, in effect, has targeted many of Quebec’s minority groups, and accordingly, has had horrific consequences (Rukavina, 2022). Not only has this legislation passed under the notwithstanding clause taken a large step backwards in religious and personal autonomy, but has, according to the Association for Canadian Studies, led to steep increases in hate speech and violence against these communities (Rukavina, 2022). Though in violation of fundamental rights guaranteed by the Charter, the Quebec government’s discriminatory and exclusive policy may persist with the protection Section 33 confers. Further, in 2000, the notwithstanding clause was also invoked in Alberta, to make changes to the province’s Marriage Act, and lay out a definition that saw marriage as an act that should only occur between a man and a woman (Mckay-Panos, 2018). Though not renewed after the clause’s five-year period, this too posed severe limitations on Albertan’s rights guaranteed by the Charter at that time (Mckay-Panos, 2018).

Though established with good intentions, the notwithstanding clause appears to have evolved as a weapon wielded by provincial governments to restrict the rights of Canadian citizens. Alongside concerns over the use of Section 33 comes calls to eliminate its existence from the Charter, for the injustices it has both enabled, and has the power to permit. Human and civil rights groups alike have begun these calls, such as the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, believing that this policy must be reversed to protect the very rights upon which the clause infringes (Zimonjic & Chevalier, 2022). While the repeal of this clause is highly improbable, it is nevertheless important to direct attention to, and call into question the invocation of a Charter section being used to inhibit rights, as opposed to protecting them. Ultimately, as Wherry elucidates, this clause allows the rights and freedoms of the majority to be dictated and controlled by the majority and those in power, which is contrary to the nature of the human rights Canada claims to defend (2022).

Works Cited

Government of Canada. (n.d.a). Section 2(a) – Freedom of religion. Government of Canada. https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art2a.html

Government of Canada. (n.d.b). Section 2(c) – Freedom of peaceful assembly. Government of Canada. https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/rfc-dlc/ccrf-ccdl/check/art2c.html

Mckay-Panos, L. (2018, November 2). Effects of the notwithstanding clause on human rights. LawNow. https://www.lawnow.org/effects-of-the-notwithstanding-clause-on-human-rights/

Rukavina, S. (2022, August 4). New research shows Bill 21 having ‘devastating’ impact on religious minorities in Quebec. CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/bill-21-impact-religious-minorities-survey-1.6541241

Serebrin, J. (2022, May 29). Quebec’s use of notwithstanding clause in language law opens constitutional debate. CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/quebec-notwithstanding-clause-constitutional-debate-1.6470091

The Canadian Press. (2021, June 14). Ford government pushes through controversial election spending bill with notwithstanding clause. CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/notwithstanding-clause-vote-ontario-1.6064952

Wherry, A. (2022, June 1). The case for making the notwithstanding clause politically awkward again. CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/charter-rights-notwithstanding-clause-constitution-1.6472317#content

Zimonjic, P., & Chevalier, J. (2022, November 6). The notwithstanding clause – what it is, why it was used and what happens next. CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/notwithstanding-clause-explained-ford-1.6641293

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , ,

A Glimpse of Russia’s North: Indigenous Resistance and the Rise of the Voice of the Tundra

Posted on February 23, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Pengyu Chen

The Voice of the Tundra (Golos tundry) is an activist community on Russia’s media platform, “V Kontakte,” which represents the voices of Arctic Indigenous peoples in Russia’s Northwest Yamal Peninsula. Organized by and under the leadership of Nenets reindeer breeder Eiko Sérotétto, this local activism emerged in response to the state’s ongoing and intensifying industrialization in the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug (YaNAO). Specifically, Golos tundry is concerned about environmental degradation, loss of land to extractivist industries, impoverishment of traditional Indigenous lifestyle, and state curtailment of Indigenous political organization.


As political scientist Arbakhan K. Magomedov recently noted, as a result of the state’s push for accelerated industrial development in YaNAO, the social tension between the Indigenous peoples of this region, the Nenets tundra aborigines, and the state and businesses have been “pushed to the limit” (Magomedov 220). The Russian government has turned the YaNAO into its “new oil-and-gas province” at the expense of the habitat and Indigenous way of life (Magomedov 216). Relying on Magomedov’s research, this article brings to light some of the material and political challenges the Indigenous peoples of this intensely industrialized region face.


Similar to Indigenous struggles against settler colonial states in Canada, the United States, and elsewhere, Indigenous peoples of the Nenets tundra perceive themselves as struggling against the Kremlin’s extensive encroachment of their land and aggressive deprivation of the Indigenous way of life. This social change and tension were triggered by the state’s industrial development plans as early as 2009. The Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug has been experiencing extraordinary transformative changes in its resource-extraction capacity compared to other regions in the last decade (Magomedov 220). In September 2009, the then-premier of the Russian government, Vladimir Putin, declared during a conference in Salekhard that “The fields discovered on the peninsula can and must become our new oil-and-gas province” (Magomedov 220). Numerous industrial large-scale development projects soon followed. For example, the massive gas project Bovanenkovskoe was launched in 2012, and it was followed in 2013 by the construction of the USD$27 billion “Yamal LNG” (Liquefied Natural Gas) project, which consists of the production, liquefaction, and delivery of gas at the Yuzhno-Tambeiskii field. Additionally, the “Arctic LNG-2” project is set to launch this year. As of 2019, there were about sixty oil-and-gas companies (Magomedov 226).


These industrial development projects of the past decade have altered the natural landscape within Indigenous communities. For example, large areas previously used by Nenets for breeding and grazing reindeer are now occupied by oil-and-gas companies to extract, store, and transport natural resources. At least 6 percent of the land previously used by the locals for grazing is in the grip of the “Yamal LNG” project in Sabett (Magomedov 226-227). Eleven million hectares of land are in the hands of “Gazprom,” the partially state-owned multinational energy corporation (Magomedov 227). Infrastructure of all sorts, from gas pipelines to airfields and highways to settlements, had led to “the further contamination and degeneration of tundra expanses” (Magomedov 227). A significant amount of water surface area has been siphoned for the port of Sabetta, and a large amount of the Gulf of Ob’s aquatic area has been claimed for oil-and-gas industries (Magomedov 277). All of these industrial developments contribute to making the resources and land scarce for Nenets, contributing to the emergence of the Golos tundry.


Moreover, Indigenous peoples’ material well-being is at stake. Because economic actors are unwilling to give up these oil-and-gas industries, which contribute to the region’s economic growth and revenue, it is impossible for oil-and-gas companies to return former Indigenous kin-group land. Nenets, therefore, cannot access their land for breeding and grazing their reindeer. Many Yamal reindeer breeders expressed that they will face a depletion of land for reindeer husbandry, the threatened starvation and malnutrition of reindeer, and, as a result, loss of income (Magomedov 224).


In fact, the acute social tension between the Nenets and oil-and-gas companies is exacerbated by the disruptive intersection between the large-scale industrial complex and the largest reindeer herd in Russia (Magomedov 226). Natural disasters further exacerbate this predicament. For example, in the winter of 2013-14, about 90,000 reindeer perished due to a severe ice storm, and, in the spring of 2018, many more perished from a cold spring and an ice storm in addition to the shortage of grazing lands (Magomedov 232). Neither the state nor industrial enterprises compensate for these losses, although they are responsible for excluding reindeer breeders from using the land. Many reindeer breeders indicated to Magomedov that “an atmosphere of living on the edge, frequent environmental and natural cataclysms, and persistent risks have created an atmosphere of uncertainty and fear for tomorrow” (233-234).


Another pressing concern of the Indigenous peoples is the absence of leadership and formal representation in the system. There is a lack of statistical representation of Indigenous concerns. According to Magomedov, because the social interests of the Indigenous peoples and organizations are inherently contradictory from the alliance between the state and the capital, “the authorities are not going to support such research, as this threatens the reputation and status of the official Indigenous organizations supported by the state” (231).


In his interview with many Nenets, Magomedov notes that the“existing official Indigenous organizations and leaders are not defending the rights and interests of aborigines” (231). Seventy percent of the respondents expressed that they would “count only on themselves, friends, and relatives,” while 17 percent of them responded that they could rely on the help of “organizations and civic movements representing the interests of the region’s Indigenous peoples,” and only 13 percent of the respondents believe they can rely on “local, okrug, and federal organs of power (Magomedov 231).


This reality reflects the severity of the state’s curtailment of Indigenous organizations. While its activity was suspended in late 2012 by the Russian government, the Association of Indigenous Numerically Small Peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East (RAIPON), which represents the interests of about 300,000 Indigenous peoples, was reinstated in March 2013 with government pressures to reorganize its leadership in a new direction (Magomedov 221). The current elected president, Grigorii Ledkov, is a pro-government United Russia member and State Duma deputy (Magomedov 221). According to Magomedov, this change of leadership seemed forced. The loyal president Sergei Khariuchi was removed, and so were two brothers, Rodion and Pavel Suliandziga, who acted as vice presidents. The latter, Pavel Suliandziga, emigrated to the United States in 2017 because he was subjected to state persecution (Magomedov 241).


The Nenets ethnographer and anthropologist Galina Khariuchi remarked on the Kremlin’s encroachment of Indigenous organizations and Indigenous lands: “I compare the current situation with the 1990s. Then we were deciding our fate ourselves. We freely spoke out and argued at congresses. These days everything is written out for us. Now only delegates can be present at congresses of organizations of Indigenous peoples; they don’t allow ordinary people” (Magomedov 222). For Sergei Khariuchi, this change was not only a “new extensive turn towards industrialization of northern territories” but also the reflection that “[Indigenous peoples] are one of the last barriers standing in the way of companies and states in the extraction of these resources” (Magomedov 222).


Worse, according to Magomedov, the state has double-downed on Indigenous activism in the Okrug. In response to increasing Indigenous activism—the politicization of Indigenous and environmental issues—the authorities of the Okrug perceived it as a “subversive activity” and accused the reindeer breeders of “waging an information war” (Magomedov 235). They also declare Golos tundry as “foreign agents” (Magomedov 235). Furthermore, the director of the YaNAO department of internal policy, Sergei Kliment’ev, declared in the regional parliament that “a stress point is being artificially created in the region, to create a new political reality,” indicating that the concerns of Indigenous peoples are falsely exaggerated (Magomedov 235).


Despite the state’s effort to curtail its movement, Golos tundry continues to raise awareness of its predicament on social media platforms (https://vk.com/golos_tundry) in tandem with the region’s Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF). The leader, Eiko Sérotétto, established a political alliance with CPRF to contend with the Kremlin, becoming the authorized representative of Pavel Grudinin (Putin’s political opponent in the 2018 presidential elections) and, in 2018, a candidate for deputy to the regional parliament as a member of the CPRF (Magomedov 237). Sérotétto expressed his motivation for becoming a deputy: “I am troubled by the poverty and lack of protection of the Yamal’s Indigenous population, the reduction in the size of the reindeer herds and fishery resources. I am worried by the issue of preserving the nature of the tundra. This is our home, we must safeguard it for future generations.”


All of the above is but a glimpse of Russia’s North. As Magomedov’s research shows, political contestation and negotiation between the alliance of the state and capital and local Indigenous peoples have been “pushed to the limit.” And here in this article, I invite the reader to take a step back (but not look away) from the well-covered and hotly discussed ongoing Russo-Ukraine war and learn about the less-talked-about state intervention and capital accumulation in Russia’s peninsula.

Work Cited


Magomedov, Arbakhan. “How the Indigenous Peoples of the Russian Arctic Defend Their Interests: The Social, Economic, and Political Foundations of Indigenous Resistance.” Anthropology & Archeology of Eurasia, vol. 58, no. 4, 16 Nov. 2019, pp. 215–245., https://doi.org/10.1080/10611959.2020.1811560.

See also:
Kharyuchi, Galina. “Sacred Places in the Nenets Traditional Culture.” Sibirica, vol. 17, no. 3, Dec. 2018, p. 116–137., https://doi.org/10.3167/sib.2018.170310.

Liarskaya, Elena V. “Settlement Nenets on the Yamal Peninsula: Who Are They?” Folklore: Electronic Journal of Folklore, vol. 41, Apr. 2009, pp. 33–46., https://doi.org/10.7592/fejf2009.41.liarskaya.

Magomedov, Arbakhan K. “Oil Derricks or Reindeer? A Clash of Economics and Traditional Lifeway in Russia’s Far North.” Wilson Center, 22 Feb. 2019, https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/oil-derricks-or-reindeer-clash-economics-and-traditional-lifeway-russias-far-north.

Mirovalev, Mansur. “In Russia, Indigenous Land Defenders Face Intimidation and Exile.” Indigenous Rights | Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera, 23 Jan. 2023, https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2022/1/23/in-russia-indigenous-land-defenders-face-intimidation-and-exile.

Staalesen, Atle. “In Russian Tundra Tragedy, up to 80,000 Reindeer Might Have Starved to Death.” The Independent Barents Observer, 3 Mar. 2021, https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/climate-crisis/2021/03/russian-tundra-tragedy-80000-reindeer-might-have-starved-death.

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , ,

Indian Prime Minister Modi Bans BBC Documentary While Allegations of Human Rights Violations Still Mount

Posted on February 16, 2023 | Leave a comment

by Nesane Nakanthiran

On January 17, the BBC aired a documentary detailing the rise of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and it closely connected the political figure to the 2002 anti-Muslim riots in the Western state of Gujarat, which constituted one of the worst outbreaks of religious violence in recent Indian history.  Subsequently, the Indian government imposed an emergency law which banned the documentary and any of its screenings—even in universities. Unsurprisingly, heavy policing and brutal arrests took place across several campuses as students began protesting against the ban.

As leader of the Hindu nationalist, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), India’s largest right-wing party, PM Modi has been haunted for decades due to his inaction and complicity throughout the riots, although he still refuses to take proportionate accountability.

In fact, this was not his first time using the emergency law, nor his first time facing allegations of violating human rights. International human rights organizations and advocates have long been calling upon European leaders to address Modi’s “growing abuses and discriminatory policies” (Molander 2022). For example, BJP-led states have seen increasing illegal demolitions of Muslim properties, while Indian authorities have seen a heavy crackdown on students, journalists, civil society, human rights activists, and others who prove either critical towards the state or work to defend human rights amongst vulnerable communities (Molander 2022). Indeed, PM Modi even sanctions the increased use of intrusive technologies, such as Israeli-produced spyware, to curtail human rights and freedom of expression —a decision which proves unsurprising from the BJP leader.

The 2002 anti-Muslim riots took place in response to the burning of a train carrying Hindu pilgrims. Local citizens had blamed the 59 deaths on Gujarat’s Muslims, which led to instances of religious violence claiming over 1,000 lives. At the time, Modi was the Chief Minister of the state of Gujarat, and thus, Muslim criticisms against the current Indian PM are substantial. Furthermore, police are accused of standing by while Modi faced such criticisms, perhaps even supporting Hindu extremists throughout the riots. Specifically, the documentary highlights an “unpublished report from the U.K. Foreign Office that claims Modi was ‘directly responsible’ for the ‘climate of impunity’ that enabled the violence” (Syed 2023), despite the leader’s supporters citing a 2013 Supreme Court ruling “insufficient evidence to prosecute.”

PM Modi is not alone in facing immense backlash for his use of censorship. By invoking emergency laws on Twitter and YouTube, Twitter CEO and self-proclaimed saviour of free speech, Elon Musk, has come under criticism for carrying out acts which proved contradictory to his public campaign against censorship throughout his Twitter takeover. To be clear, emergency laws extend government censorship over social media companies, which would explain how Twitter and YouTube had their hands tied. Yet, this does not diminish the Indian government’s violations against democracy, free speech, and human rights—rather, it only further substantiates the dangers of granting unchecked authority over media to a powerful few.

Currently, the emergency law remains enforced across Twitter and YouTube, and Indian police continue to crack down on illegal screenings of the documentary.

Works Cited

Ellis-Petersen, Hannah. 2023. “India invokes emergency laws to ban BBC Modi documentary.” The Guardian, January 23, 2023. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jan/23/india-emergency-laws-to-ban-bbc-narendra-modi-documentary

Hussain, Murtaza and Ryan Grim. 2023. “Elon Musk Caves to Pressure from India to Remove BBC Doc Critical of Modi.” The Intercept, January 24, 2023. https://theintercept.com/2023/01/24/twitter-elon-musk-modi-india-bbc/

Molander, Måns. 2022. “European Leaders Should Raise Human Rights Concerns with Modi.” Human Rights Watch, May 3, 2022. https://www.hrw.org/news/2022/05/03/european-leaders-should-raise-human-rights-concerns-modi

Syed, Armani. 2023. “India Banned a BBC Documentary Critical of Modi. Here’s How People Are Watching Anyway.” Time, January 26, 2023. https://time.com/6250480/bbc-modi-documentary-skirting-censors/

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , ,

Canada’s Feminist Foreign Policy

Posted on February 14, 2023 | Leave a comment

By Laura Moldoveanu

Canada has had a nearly six-year commitment to feminist foreign policy, with the Feminist International Assistance Policy (FAIP) announced on June 9th, 2017 as a means of rendering Canada into a global leader in women’s empowerment. Though it is a somewhat overlooked and forgotten development, the FAIP substantiates the importance of women’s rights in the international system, thus warranting this article’s assessment of the policy’s context, intent, implementation, success, and issues.

In Canadian society, women face unique adversities to equality, including forced marriage, gender-based violence, fewer education opportunities, legal barriers to work, more familial responsibilities than men, and limited control over reproductive health (Global Affairs Canada, 2021). Essential to Canada’s FAIP is the belief that, by promoting gender equality, the nation may effectively decrease poverty rates. In theory, allowing women greater participation in the economy would increase economic growth in the targeted nation(s), thus concerning Canada as such an investment in assistance would enhance national prosperity. The FAIP was announced after a year of consultation with over fifteen thousand people in sixty-five countries, including several women’s rights groups (Lamensch, 2020). Furthermore, the policy referenced a 2015 plan to reduce poverty and build peace, entitled the “2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.”

Six key areas of the policy include gender equality, human dignity, inclusive governance, climate action, peace and security, and “growth that works for everyone” (Global Affairs Canada, 2021). Gender equality involves a sexual violence initiative and engages with differing levels of government to deliver programs supporting women’s rights; human dignity pertains to health and education; governance stresses the importance of political participation; climate action covers loss of resources, such as clean drinking water and renewable energy; peace and security involves women in post-conflict nation-building and peace negotiations; lastly, growth engages with economic and ownership rights. Overall, it is clear that the policy covers a huge range of issues. In one sense, this is beneficial because the policy is not limited, however, it also indicates that the policy lacks a cohesive vision.

Implementation involves investment, innovation, and partnerships. Canada vowed to put fifteen percent of its bilateral international development assistance investments towards gender equality. The policy abandons Canada’s previous “countries-of-focus” approach that concentrated assistance on a small list of countries and, instead, involves a broader range of countries, with a focus on Sub-Saharan Africa. Involvement with multilateral groups such as the UN, G7, and G20—as well as the private sector, for financial assistance—is also a key part of the policy. Finally, civil society organizations such as women’s rights groups are expected to receive one hundred and fifty million dollars to develop programs to help promote gender equality (Global Affairs Canada, 2021).

Turning to real-world results, the official policy website boasts a list of success stories under the subheading “our policy in action.” From setting up community centres in Iraq refugee camps to clearing landmines out of Colombia, the policy seems to live up to its many goals in terms of both mission diversity and cross-global span.

With that being said, however, the policy must also be looked at through a more critical lens. There are contradictions and issues associated with Canadian foreign policy, and feminist foreign policy in particular. Scholars and policy analysts argue that the policy does not include definitions of gender or feminism, leaving out marginalized groups such as intersex or transgender persons (Tiessen, 2019), while also lacking inclusion of LGBTQ+ individuals who may face added discrimination beyond gender. Furthermore, the efficacy of the policy is inhibited by other Canadian foreign policy objectives; for example, while the FAIP promotes the empowerment of female peacekeepers, the Canadian government nonetheless continues in concurrently selling weapons to Saudi Arabia (Bouka, 2021). As for more technical problems, the policy has no clear measures of success or ways to monitor long-term impact.

So, is the policy just performative activism? Canada has made it clear that the government views women’s empowerment as an important area to focus on, with a long-term goal of reducing poverty around the world. With that being said, the current impact and efficacy of the FAIP is a mixed bag. In the coming years, perhaps a revaluation will be needed to judge whether the policy is making any substantial long-term impact on gender equality.

Works Cited

Bouka, Yolande, et al. “Is Canada’s Foreign Policy Really Feminist?” Network for Strategic Analysis , Network for Strategic Analysis , 7 Oct. 2021, https://ras-nsa.ca/publication/is-canadas-foreign-policy-really-feminist-analysis-and-recommend ations/.

“Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy.” Global Affairs Canada. Government of Canada, August 24, 2021. https://www.international.gc.ca/world-monde/issues_development-enjeux_developpement/priorit ies-priorites/policy-politique.aspx?lang=eng.

Lamensch, Marie. “Canada’s Feminist Foreign Policy.” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada, July 31, 2020. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/canada-s-feminist-foreign-policy.

Tiessen, Rebecca. “What’s New About Canada’s Feminist International Assistance Policy.” Canadian Global Affairs Institute, Canadian Global Affairs Institute , Dec. 2019, https://www.cgai.ca/whats_new_about_canadas_feminist_international_assistance_policy_the_ problem_and_possibilities_of_more_of_the_same.

Leave a comment

Posted in AIUofT Candlelight

Tagged , , , ,