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Roy Halladay vs. the G-20 Summit
One of the questions on my recent public management exam asked students to resolve the logistical conflicts between the G-20 Summit, scheduled for June 26-27 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, and baseball games between the Toronto Blue Jays and Philadelphia Phillies at the Rogers Centre next door. The Phillies’ pitcher at one of those…
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Closed and Open Politics
C.P. Snow, in Strangers and Brothers, his series of eleven novels about life in academe, business, and government, often referred to “closed politics.” By this he meant decisions made on the basis of confidential consultations among politicians and public servants and announced as a fait accompli. There is, of course, another side to political life.…
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Hung Parliament or Minority Government?
As the UK election approaches, with the prospect of no clear majority, let’s think a bit about what happens on May 7. Unaccustomed to such situations, people in the UK refer to it as a hung Parliament, a term that suggests political immobility. Canadians, who have had considerable such experience at the federal level refer…
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Cultural Travel and Foodie Travel
First, an explanation for my silence for most of the month. One week I was in Cambridge, MA for the end of the week (when I normally post), and I have also been busy preparing and grading exams, doing my annual reports for the university, writing a grant application, and revising a paper for resubmission.…
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Standing Up to the Russians: Return of A Presidential Narrative
In my graduate narratives course, our narrative-of-the-week feature has frequently looked at how journalists incorporate narratives at the start of their articles to capture the reader’s attention. This is an alternative to the standard inverted pyramid model that involves summarizing the entire story in the first paragraph. My guess is that roughly 80 percent of…
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Presenting Complex Narratives on Film: Three Different Approaches
During the last three weeks, my graduate narratives course has looked at three films, each an adaptation of an historical book: North Country, based on the book Class Action about the Jensen versus Eveleth Taconite legal battle over sexual harassment; All the President’s Men, based on the book by that name; and Charlie Wilson’s War,…
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Chinese President Taken Hostage by Tibetans at G20 Summit: What If?
Last week’s public management class was about crisis management, and I always start with a simulation. The scenario I came up with this year involved a high-level hostage-taking at the upcoming G20 summit in Toronto. Somehow, a group called the Tibetan Liberation Organization takes President Hu of China hostage in his hotel suite. Students were…
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Simulating the Ontario Budget Process
Over the last three weeks, I had the students in my public management course simulate the Ontario budget process, and here’s what happened. I assigned them to two-person teams, including the premier and chief of staff, minister and deputy minister of finance and of the largest program departments (Health; Education; Training, Colleges, and Universities; Community…
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Joining Nexus
I travel to the US fairly frequently and, as a result of the lengthy delays after the foiled terrorist incident last December 25, I decided to join the Nexus program. Nexus is a voluntary program in which travelers who are qualified and willing to provide an iris scan can avoid lineups at both Canada and…
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Who is an Ideal Juror?
One of the questions we discussed in yesterday’s narratives and management class is what would constitute an ideal juror and whether the protagonists of A Trial by Jury (Graham Burnett) and Twelve Angry Men (juror number 8, portrayed by Henry Fonda) meet that definition. Burnett came off well in the discussion, with the conclusion that,…
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The Narratives Around Us
This week I was on the lookout for compelling narratives out there in the zeitgeist and found two worth discussing, both focusing on automobile safety (or the lack thereof). The anchor story on the front page of last Monday’s (Feb. 1, 2010) New York Times was headlined “Toyota’s Slow Awakening to a Deadly Problem.” The…
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The Canada Revenue Agency: A Hotbed of Innovation?
For the skeptics who claim that innovation in government is an oxymoron, the notion that a tax collection agency could be innovative seems even more oxymoronic. Yet my intuition tells me that the Canada Revenue Agency indeed has bragging rights to such a claim. Historically, it has been a rapid adopter of information technology, using…
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A Look Back at the Final Exam in Management and Narrative
I see a final exam as an opportunity to challenge students to demonstrate what they have learned by applying the course material to situations they have not encountered in the course. But because the examinations are never returned, the learning loop is not completed. To rectify this, today’s post will be about the final exam…
- 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.
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