-
Living in a Natural World
Readers of a certain age will recognize that this post’s title evokes but also contradicts a line in a pop anthem of the mid-Eighties. It wasn’t the music of my youth, but rather of my early adulthood. Lately numerous events and encounters have kept reminding me of the natural world I live in. The Eclipse…
-
Why CAPPA Matters
This week I have been participating online in the annual research conference and AGM of the Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration. CAPPA is the professional association for Canadian academics in the field of public administration, similar to the Canadian Economics Association or Canadian Political Science Association. As the thumbnail for this post on…
-
Making Sense of Toronto Real Estate
This is a bit of a change from the topics I usually explore, but in a hot real estate market like everyone else I’m watching the action in the neighbourhood. The most interesting nearby street is Sandfield Road, particularly the long block between Misty Crescent and York Mills Road. Sandfield is a wide street with…
-
Worthwhile American Initiatives
In 1986, Flora Lewis, a columnist for The New York Times, wrote a column about the Canadian government’s proposal for free trade negotiations with the US with the headline “Worthwhile Canadian Initiative.” Three weeks later, The New Republic, describing this as “possibly the most boring headline ever written,” launched a contest for readers to identify…
-
Business Travel for a Flaneur
With the prospect of Covid – 19 coming under control, we can contemplate the revival of business travel. Some will have mixed feelings, seeing business travel as an imposition that often can be avoided by conducting meetings and conferences online. Others may look forward to business travel as an opportunity to get away from home.…
-
A Future for Canadian Political Film?
Is there a future for Canadian political film? This is the question I will be asking in my presentation to the Canadian public administration research conference in June. The conference, sponsored by the Canadian Association of Programs in Public Administration (CAPPA), will of course be conducted online. I have completed a draft of my Powerpoint…
-
The Humanities Informing Political Science
Articles in Journals or Chapters in Books? In my experience with academic incentives, chapters in edited books get far less credit than peer-reviewed articles in journals. Edited books rarely use double-blind reviewing. When the editor of the book asks you to write a chapter, it would seem ungracious for her to then send it out…
-
Sherry Turkle: The Right Time and Place
Sherry Turkle’s just-published bildungsroman-like memoir demonstrates her knack of being in the right place at the right time. Taking a year off college, she landed at Sciences Po in fall 1968, the best place imaginable to study “les evenements de Mai 1968.” A few years later she was having personal tutorials with Jacques Lacan just…
-
In the Name of God, Go!
When the British Parliament debated the disastrous military operation in Norway in 1940, a Conservative backbencher, Leo Amery, quoted Oliver Cromwell’s dismissal of the Long Parliament, hurling at Neville Chamberlain the words “You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you.…
-
Bleeding (a Little) for Research
Several years ago I volunteered to participate in the Ontario Health Study (OHS), though I can’t recall the specific impetus. But I am one of 225,000 who did. About the Study OHS is a longitudinal study that tracks its participants over a long period of time, likely decades. The study is investigating the risk factors…
-
Creating My Legacy at UTSC
When I retired last year, my department and I discussed creating a legacy to build on my teaching and research on narrative and management. We came up with the idea of creating a digital communications fund to train students in digital storytelling (such as podcasts or videos) and run a competition. We need to raise…
-
The Leisure of the Theoried Class
In 1979 and 1980 I participated in a study commissioned by the US National Academy of Engineering on the impacts and appropriate regulation of diesel automobiles. The study came about because the 1979 energy supply shock due to the Iranian Revolution led US policy makers to anticipate widespread consumer adoption of energy-efficient diesel-powered automobiles. I…
- I am Professor of Public Management Emeritus at the University of Toronto, having retired in July 2020 after a 45-year academic career.
- My latest book, Public Representations: Screen Stories, Narrative, and the Public Sphere, co-authored with Beth Herst, was published in April 2026 by University of Toronto Press (open access).
- On this website I post blogs about politics, narrative, and my life experiences.
Proudly powered by WordPress