Briarpatch Articles

Google and Meta are spending millions on programs and awards to help news outlets in crisis. What’s at stake when tech giants are allowed to brand themselves as the saviours of an industry they helped destroy?

From union-busting to systemic racism, when bad labour practices have embedded themselves in the very publications trying to write into existence a more just world, what is to be done?

After Russia invaded Ukraine, anything other than support for sending unlimited weapons to Ukraine was painted as pro-Russian propaganda. What does anti-war journalism look like in a climate of social media harassment and state attacks?

How New Brunswick’s Media Co-op is standing up to the Irvings’ corporate power

In the ’70s and ’80s, Saskatchewan’s left was chronicled by two formidable magazines: New Breed and Briarpatch. This is the story of how they made grassroots media in Saskatchewan.

The funny, strange, and dogged ways that Briarpatch’s readers have helped this magazine reach its 50th anniversary

Four editors reflect on decades of editing Briarpatch: what they learned, the stories that challenged them, what’s changed, and what’s stayed the same.

In 2009, Briarpatch’s $33,000 application to the Canada Magazine Fund was rejected, without explanation, by Stephen Harper’s Minister of Canadian Heritage. It would take an access to information request to reveal that, behind the scenes, the fund’s staff were also being stonewalled by the minister’s office. 

This issue tells the story of Briarpatch’s survival, and explores how to build better media in Canada.

Unions, union members, and people with access to wealth need to think big about shifting the media landscape in Canada.

A transition to a sustainable economy is a monumental task that will require transformative change. Whether this transition is just, democratic, and reflective of the scale of the crises we face is still to be determined.

Survivors are speaking up about the abuse they endured in Canada’s government-run institutions for disabled people. Class-action lawsuits promise them justice – but can they deliver?

Reclaiming mines is touted as an essential part of a just transition. But in Teck’s B.C. coal mines, two tree planters were left asking: were they part of reclamation, or greenwashing?

Workers and international students in Brampton are fighting back against wage theft, naming and shaming employers to recover over $250,000 in stolen wages. 12 workers share the lessons they’ve learned in the fight.

From leading one of British Columbia’s earliest strikes to fighting against low wages and racist bosses, some pivotal moments in Indigenous labour history.

If anti-scab legislation is to be extended across Canada, the NDP’s best efforts and the Liberals’ reluctant co-operation might not be enough. The history of the Quebec labour movement can show us how to fight for anti-scab legislation.

Across Canada, farm workers are facing hotter summers and extreme weather, while being denied basic labour protections like a minimum wage. The farm workers organizing within the National Farmers Union want to change agriculture’s unsustainable conditions.

An interview with the judges of Briarpatch’s 12th annual Writing In The Margins contest: Rana Nazzal Hamadeh, Jessica Johns, and Randy Lundy.

Sheltered workshops for disabled people allow employers to evade labour standards and pay workers below minimum wage, all under the guise of never-ending “training programs.”

As the term “just transition” gains traction with policymakers and fossil fuel companies trying to paint themselves green, the articles in this issue remind us that a just transition means justice for workers, migrants, and Indigenous Peoples.