Articles

Over 40 countries have banned the use of asbestos—a known and dangerous carcinogen. So why does Canada continue to oppose a ban? And where does the labour movement stand on the question?

What connects singer/songwriter Fred Eaglesmith, a rape crisis centre in Brantford, Ontario, and an anti-poverty group in nearby Port Dover? They’ve all come together to help ensure the safety of migrant farm workers on Canadian roads. Perhaps an odd combination for social justice work, but it seems to be working.

Sometimes a term comes along that enables us to name—-to make visible—-our situation, to better understand the social and economic forces that shape our choices, and to connect various struggles within a broader tapestry of social change. Precarity is perhaps such a term.

As part of an ongoing project, Making the Links Radio is conducting interviews and producing radio shows focused on immigrant communities in Canada. From these conversations, we bring you glimpses of three important sites of struggle against the exploitation and marginalization of (im)migrant groups in Canada: the Philippine Women Centres, the Workers’ Action Centre, and Justicia for Migrant Workers.

Former farmers driven north in search of work have found that the rules governing the free flow of capital don’t apply to them—indeed, that crossing borders has never been more difficult.

Precarious work is on the rise in Canada. Although the quantity of jobs has increased, often dramatically, during recent years of economic boom, there has also been a strong tendency for full-time, relatively well-paid jobs with benefits and security of tenure to be replaced by part-time, short-term, insecure jobs that pay low wages and provide no employment-related benefits. As a result, the level of economic insecurity of most individuals and households in Canada has increased significantly over the last several years.

I’ll never forget my first day at the Centre, the beginning of a nearly two-year period that would alter my life forever. They’re not all bad memories, but still, they stand as reminders of a traumatic childhood and a time of immense and difficult transition in my young life.

Book review of A Great Restlessness: The Life and Politics of Dorise Nielsen

Film review of Unrepentant: Kevin Annett and Canada’s Genocide

STOP eating meat. STOP driving. STOP bush junior. No, I’m not trying to tell you what to do with your life. But somebody is.

Ethanol’s environmental credentials are dubious at best. Governments everywhere have managed to ignore this mounting evidence. Instead, they have piled aboard the ethanol bandwagon, plowing significant amounts of taxpayer dollars into the production of ethanol and other “biofuels,” claiming this will help both the environment and farmers’ net incomes.

Does the rise of the “naturals” industry represent a small step in the right direction or merely a distraction from a much larger problem?

As long as hunting is dismissed as unethical while the act of paying for food at the grocery store is seen as benign, we are unlikely to make much progress

Shayna and Dominique have just set out on a cross-Canada trip to seek out intentional communities and learn from their experiences. They’ll be blogging about what they find right here on www.briarpatchmagazine.com.

Who is in jail in today’s Haiti, it seems, has a lot more to do with stifling political dissent than with bringing criminals to justice. And Canada has played a key role

Hassan Husseini interviews Joel Kovel, author of Overocming Zionism: Creating a Single Democratic State in Israel/Palestine