Perspectives: A Canadian Journal of Political Economy and Social Democracy

Episod

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  How a Progressive Government Builds Digital Sovereignty 15.07.2026 26min

  Chile’s former Minister of Science, Technology, Knowledge and Innovation explains how her progressive government built capacity for digital sovereignty in anticipation of the age of AI. The global economy is overly dependent on U.S. tech giants for digital infrastructure, data, and artificial intelligence. U.S. laws and corporate dominance threaten external control over digital systems, putting sovereignty, privacy, and democracy at risk. Meanwhile, AI as a tool for the profit of Big Tech com...
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  Class & Climate: Debunking Degrowth with Matt Huber 23.06.2026 32min

  Author and professor Matt Huber argues that solving the climate crisis doesn’t require economic "degrowth". On this episode of Class & Climate: Perspectives on a Green Economy, Matt Huber, author of Climate Change as Class War, challenges commonly-held assumptions about responsibility for greenhouse gas emissions, debunking the myth of "degrowth" as the sole solution to our planetary climate crisis. Class & Climate is a podcast series from Perspectives Journal and the Green Economy Ne...
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  Social Democrats of the North: Frank Calder, Living in Two Worlds 21.06.2026 23min

  Early Canadian social democrats routinely ignored the issues facing Indigenous communities, despite regularly claiming concern with poverty and social justice. Frank Calder fought to change this when he was elected as an MLA for the British Columbia CCF in 1949. As the first status Indigenous person to be elected at either the federal or provincial level in Canada, Calder used his position to advocate for a modern, comprehensive land claims policy to facilitate the negotiation and clai...
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  Social Democrats of the North: M.J. Coldwell, From the Prairies to Parliament 04.06.2026 21min

  CCF Leader M.J. Coldwell fought in Parliament to establish unemployment insurance and old age pensions. When the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation burst onto the Canadian political scene as a new socialist political party in the 1930s, there was no guarantee it would survive. Building the CCF during the Great Depression required dedicated organizers and leaders willing to fight for the working class. M.J. Coldwell took on leadership of the CCF, and made it into a well-entrenched and long-l...
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  Class & Climate: Workers' Safety in the Climate Crisis 27.05.2026 1j

  How are unions protecting workers’ health and safety as temperatures rise, fires and floods increase, and environmental regulations are gutted? On May Day 2026, the Green Economy Network's Em Thompson brought together union health and safety experts for a public conversation on workers’ safety in the climate crisis. How is the labour union movement protecting workers from rising temperatures, increasing disasters, and weakening environmental regulations? Panelists include: Alex Callahan, Nati...
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  Socialism After Capitalism 22.05.2026 1j 3min

  2026 Ellen Meiksins Wood Prize and Lecturer Bhaskar Sunkara spoke to Luke Savage at Toronto Metropolitan University about what a modern 21st century socialism should look like. What’s worked, what’s failed, and what comes next? Is economic democracy compatible with capitalism? When so many figures, from Rosa Luxemburg, to Ed Broadbent, to Tony Blair, have at one point called themselves “social democrats,” is there a tension or confusion between social democracy and socialism? Sunkara’s discus...
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  Social Democrats of the North: Moses Coady, Antigonish Awakening 20.05.2026 20min

  Coady's ideas about collectivism and co-operation represented the first real challenge to the conservatism of Nova Scotia’s political culture. Moses Coady was a Catholic priest, a scholar at St. Francis Xavier University and, most importantly, he was an organizer who was best known for leading the Antigonish Movement: a co-operative movement focused on adult education, microfinance, and rural development. The Antigonish Movement, based at St. FX, sparked a co-operative movement wave across th...
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  Shaping Canada’s Economic Future with Barry Sawyer, Bea Bruske, and Magali Picard 14.05.2026 23min

  At the 2026 Progress Summit: Defending Democracy Across Borders, Canada’s labour leaders discussed what labour is fighting for: a different economic and trade future that puts workers at the centre. As Trump-era trade and economic policies reshape decisions about jobs, industry, and investment, workers and communities in Canada are feeling the effects. From manufacturing to public services to war-shock inflation, economic choices are being made that will reshape the future of work on both sid...
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  Class & Climate: The Politics of Electrification with Stephen Thomas 11.05.2026 49min

  The David Suzuki Foundation's Stephen Thomas discusses the political challenges and possibilities for building a truly green Canadian electricity grid. Stephen Thomas is a climate campaigner, policy analyst, and engineer working on the front lines of Canada’s transition to a 100% zero-emissions electricity grid as the Clean Energy Manager for the David Suzuki Foundation. For Class & Climate: Perspectives on a Green Economy, Green Economy Network National Convenor Em Thompson sits down wit...
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  Defending Democracy Across Borders with David Adler 06.05.2026 50min

  To defend democracy across borders, we must understand the global right-wing network and build the power to confront it. At the 2026 Progress Summit, David Adler highlighted the organized right-wing network of actors and institutions — what he calls the 'Reactionary International.' Adler is the Co-General Coordinator of the Progressive International, an group that unites, organizes and mobilizes the world’s progressive forces to fight for democracy. On March 5, 2026, he delivered a keynote on...
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  Social Democrats of the North: George Hara Williams 01.05.2026 23min

  In 1944, the Saskatchewan CCF formed the first social democratic government in North America. Behind this landmark achievement was George Hara Williams, the oft-forgotten architect of the CCF’s success in the province, who laid the organizational groundwork that brought together labour and farmers movements to produce the history-making victory. After building these foundations, he left to fight in the Second World War while still a Member of the Legislative Assembly. He became Minister of Ag...
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  Class & Climate: The COP Folly with Martin Empson 09.04.2026 37min

  The UK-based climate activist and writer explains how the Conferences of Parties have bureaucratized climate organizing. Martin Empson is a climate activist from the UK and the editor and a contributor to System Change not Climate Change, a book of essays from socialists around the world on the nature of capitalism's ecological crisis and the radical response that is needed. On this eighth episode of Class & Climate: Perspectives on a Green Economy, the Green Economy Network's national co...
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  Social Democrats of the North: École Sociale Populaire 07.04.2026 23min

  Learn about the unique Catholic roots of Quebec's social democratic tradition. While Quebec's social democratic tradition is often traced back to the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s, the province's left-wing roots are planted deeper than that. This episode examines the Catholic roots of social democracy surrounding L’École Sociale Populaire. This socially-driven organization of Jesuit priests had a dramatic effect on Quebec politics during the 1930s, revealing Quebec social democracy to be a ge...
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  Social Democrats of the North: Ernest Winch and Harold Winch 15.03.2026 25min

  Social democracy has long been a powerful political force in British Columbia. This episode explores its origins in the province through the lives and ideas of two of British Columbia’s left-wing pioneers: Ernest Winch and Harold Winch. This father-son duo was known for uncompromising Marxist defence of the interests of workers against exploitation by big business, enshrining a class dynamic to BC politics that impacts electoral outcomes to this day. -- Social Democrats of the North: Canadian...
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  Social Democrats of the North: League for Social Reconstruction 18.02.2026 26min

  The League for Social Reconstruction was a group of socialist thinkers, brought together by the crisis of the Great Depression, that laid the intellectual foundations for modern Canadian social democracy. Through the crisis of the Great Depression, Canadian socialist intellectuals came together as 'The League for Social Reconstruction' to lay out the political and economic ideas that would become the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and the 1933 Regina Manifesto; the party's policy progra...
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  Activists Make History: Winning for Working People with Rob Ashton 10.02.2026 35min

  The longshoreman and leadership hopeful shares his vision for Canada's NDP as the party of workers and everyday people. SUBSCRIBE to the Perspectives Journal Podcast and Activists Make History for previous interviews with the 2026 NDP leadership race candidates. Rob Ashton is a trade unionist, longshoreman, and candidate running to be the next leader of the federal NDP. He has spent more than three decades working on Canada’s docks and in the labour movement, rising through the ranks of the I...
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  Activists Make History: A New Era for the NDP with Tanille Johnston 04.02.2026 31min

  The NDP leadership hopeful reflects on her roots in student organizing to usher in a new era for progressive organizing in the federal NDP. SUBSCRIBE to the Perspectives Journal Podcast and Activists Make History for previous and upcoming interviews with the 2026 NDP leadership race candidates. Tanille Johnston is a social worker, city councilor, and candidate running to be the next leader of the federal NDP. A member of the We Wai Kai First Nation, she has led an impactful career in Indigeno...
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  Social Democrats of the North: Agnes Macphail, Canada's First Female MP 03.02.2026 20min

  Rather than treating feminism and social democracy as separate projects, Agnes Macphail understood both as essential to building a more democratic and equal society. A committed social democrat, Agnes Macphail was Canada’s first woman elected to Parliament and a leader whose politics were shaped by a lifelong opposition to patriarchy and sexism. Over two decades in the House of Commons, she used her parliamentary career to champion causes including peace, prison reform, progressive taxation, ...
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  Extreme Wealth’s Threat to Democracy with Patriotic Millionaires Canada 28.01.2026 32min

  Even the rich agree: extreme wealth inequality is a threat to democracy. In a new survey conducted by Patriotic Millionaires of millionaires and billionaires across G20 countries, 65% agree that extreme wealth is a threat to democracy. Yet, in front of billionaires on the Davos stage of the World Economic Forum, Prime Minister Mark Carney touts tax cuts and subsidies for AI data centres while mourning the end of the liberal world order and democratic backsliding. On the other hand, NDP leader...
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  Activists Make History: Big Tent Organizing with Heather McPherson 27.01.2026 35min

  Heather McPherson is channeling value-driven politics in her campaign for NDP leadership. SUBSCRIBE to the Perspectives Journal Podcast and Activists Make History for previous and upcoming interviews with the 2026 NDP leadership race candidates. Since 2019, Heather McPherson has been Member of Parliament for Edmonton Strathcona, securing a once-contentious parliamentary seat through three federal elections. Raised in a working-class home in Edmonton, she spent more than 15 years working with ...