Cynthia Levine-Rasky (editor) - We Resist: Defending the Common Good in Hostile Times

WE RESIST

WE RESIST

Defending the Common Good
in Hostile Times

Edited by Cynthia Levine-Rasky and Lisa Kowalchuk

McGill-Queens University Press

Montreal & Kingston London Chicago

McGill-Queens University Press 2020

ISBN 978-0-2280-0141-6 (cloth)

ISBN 978-0-2280-0142-3 (paper)

ISBN 978-0-2280-0280-2 (ePDF)

ISBN 978-0-2280-0281-9 (ePUB)

Legal deposit second quarter 2020

Bibliothque nationale du Qubec

Printed in Canada on acid-free paper that is 100% ancient forest free (100% post-consumer recycled), processed chlorine free

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.

Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: We resist : defending the common good in hostile times / edited by Cynthia Levine-Rasky and Lisa Kowalchuk.

Names: Levine-Rasky, Cynthia, editor. | Kowalchuk, Lisa (Lisa Marie), editor.

Description: Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20200176285 | Canadiana (ebook) 20200176331 | ISBN 9780228001423 (softcover) | ISBN 9780228001416 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780228002802 (ePDF) | ISBN 9780228002819 (ePUB)

Subjects: LCSH: Common good. | LCSH: Social problems. | LCSH: Social action.

Classification: LCC JC330.15 .W4 2020 | DDC 320.01/1dc23

CONTENTS

Lisa Kowalchuk and Cynthia Levine-Rasky

Caitlyn E. Kasper

Philip S.S. Howard

Uzma Jamil

Amira Elghawaby

Bernie M. Farber and Len Rudner

Dan Irving

Tim McCaskell

Kim Sauder

Vanessa Watts

Kiklola Roach

Pat Armstrong

Margaret Reid

Janice A. Newson

Neil McLaughlin

Stephen Sheps

Matthew Behrens

Lesley J. Wood

Carolyn Egan and Michelle Robidoux

El-Farouk Khaki

Barbara Perry

David Murakami Wood

John Clarke

Aziz Choudry and Mostafa Henaway

Steven Tufts, Mark P. Thomas, and Ian MacDonald

Alia Hogben

Keith Stewart

Edward C. Corrigan

Lorne Waldman

Richard J.F. Day

Stephen DArcy

Alex Neve

Alan Sears

Lisa Kowalchuk and Cynthia Levine-Rasky

Pamela Palmater

Melissa Graham

Yasmin Jiwani

Morgane Oger

Max Haiven

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book came to be through the efforts of forty-two authors; it is them we wish to thank first. Some are academics representing the disciplines of communication, education, gender and sexuality, geography, health, industrial relations, media, philosophy, sociology, and a few others. They are practitioners, activists, and writers in law, the environment, human rights, Indigenous rights, education, disability rights, anti-racism, the media, and many other areas. This division of occupations and fields is arbitrary, since many contributors straddle them, as do the editors. Given the timeliness of the book, authors were pushed to produce within uncomfortably short deadlines. All of them stepped up to the challenge and wrote provocative and important essays on where we are today, how we got here, and what we can do to defend the preciousness of a common good subjected to multiple threats in our hostile times.

Elia Rasky and Adam Rasky provided thorough research assistance, creating individual files for over two hundred potential contributors who appeared on an original list early in 2017. Jen Danch, Dustin Galer, Adam Rasky, Herman Rosenfeld, Quentin Rowe-Codner, Stephen Sheps, and Jasmin Zine suggested a few of the authors. Our colleague nonpareil, Neil McLaughlin, provided his candid thoughts and welcome input through the inevitable ups and downs of the book-production process. Richard Day and David Murakami Wood offered valuable comments about its development and orientation. For the unconditional investment in our general well-being by our friends and families, we are extremely grateful.

At McGill-Queens University Press, Kathleen Kearnss immediate yes to our proposal led to an excellent dialogue with editor Jacqueline Mason, who made the production process painless. We are grateful to our reviewers and to you, our readers. Together we amass the collective capacity to resist social and political forces that often feel overwhelming. Their consequences are not inevitable. We hope that readers find their people and seek their cause and find authentic forms of resistance that bridge differences in politics and identities. We make the common good, indeed we are the common good, in all its complexity and uncertainty. We stand together to defend it.

WE RESIST

INTRODUCTION

Lisa Kowalchuk and Cynthia Levine-Rasky

The past fifty years have had their share of catastrophes, both natural and human-made. Some, like the assassination of revered leaders, war, or climate-related disasters, have had such profound and far-reaching effects that many people can say where they were when the news broke. The US presidential election of 8 November 2016, may qualify as one of those events. The largely unpredicted win of Donald J. Trump gave rise to a plethora of books and articles attempting to explain what happened and to analyze its likely impacts. The monsters ball (Blow 2016) of characters who came to make up his cabinet, his advisors, and the heads of highly sensitive governmental portfolios has confirmed the worst fears of people who were aghast at the success of Trumps audacious run.

As Canadian researchers, we are concerned with what the Trump victory implies for trends and events in Canada, specifically the problems that Trumps rise to power has exacerbated and made more visible. We recognize that the positioning of Trump at the centre of the picture implies that the outcomes of his presidency begin and end with his activities. This would be an error. Policies and legislation affecting citizenship, security, health care, education, employment, the economy, the environment, indeed everything that affects quality of life, were established long before Trumps arrival. Their consequences are endured by us all and are deepened by the particular violence exercised by the growing number of authoritarian leaders worldwide. Passionately motivated by these concerns, we invited forty-two Canadian scholars, community workers, and activists to describe their perspectives on the problems and the work they do to overcome them. Before we summarize a few of their themes, the next few sections explain the terms in our title.

What We Mean by the Common Good

Our conception of the common good is built on what Amitai Etzioni (2004) called human flourishing, a state in which human beings thrive and enjoy physical, intellectual, and emotional well-being. This involves the complete range of human rights civil, political, and social and human capabilities that encompass the ability to think, learn, laugh, play, love, and grieve (Nussbaum 2002). The common good also involves the health of ecosystems and the natural environment, and the global climate conditions necessary for their sustainability. Though social justice in the form of socio-economic equality may be considered implicit in universal human rights and capabilities, it is worth underscoring it as a central element of the common good.