Canada – Page 97 – a sibilant intake of breath

Ignatieff on track to win

Michael Ignatieff seems to be well ahead in the ongoing Liberal Party leadership vote. I would be happy if he won; he certainly seems to be an interesting man, and I think he would inject some high level debate into Canadian federal politics, regardless of how well the Liberals perform in the next election. I also think that if he is able to develop an overall governing platform, the support of his party, and the support of Canadians in general, he would be able to forge a good successor government to the problematic present conservative minority. He may also be the kind of man who can rebuild Canada’s role in effective peacekeeping, diplomacy, and foreign aid – all of which suffered under Harper, Martin, and Chretien governments.

Once Emily gets back to Oxford, I shall need to borrow another of his books, returning the copy of Blood and Belonging I finished recently.

The Economist on climate change

Catching up on the reading that accumulated in my absence, I have just gone through the Survey on Climate Change in the September 9-15 issue of The Economist. Their basic argument is that the possibility of catastrophic harm is sufficient to justify the costs of stabilizing the level of carbon in the atmosphere around 550 parts per million, compared with 280 ppm before the industrial revolution, 380 ppm now, and an estimated 800 ppm by 2100 is current policy goes unchanged. The most plausible dangers identified are disastrous shifts in ocean currents, dramatically cooling Europe, and the prospect of rising sea levels. Even modest amounts of the second could do enormous harm both in the coastal cities of the developed world and the lowlands of places like Bangladesh. Other problems include the possibility of an increase in the frequency and severity of extreme weather events, and large scale species migration or extinction.

Canada is singled out several times as unlikely to meet its Kyoto targets. We are committed to reduce emissions to 6% below 1990 levels by 2012, but seem likely to be 23% above. The survey quotes Environment Minister Rona Ambrose as saying: “it is impossible, impossible for Canada to reach its Kyoto targets.” The Economist had not previously been a supporter of Kyoto, though they surely support countries living up to commitments they have made. With this survey, the magazine seems to have changed tack from general opposition to the Kyoto Protocol to recognition that it may be a valid stepping stone towards a better organized and more all-encompassing climate change policy.

At the very least, the editorial change of heart signals strongly that climate change is no longer an issue whose reality is disputed, not suited to serious consideration by scientists, policy-makers, and the media. With my thesis in mind, it is largely the first group that I paid most attention to while reading this. At several points, the article asserts that it is at the 550ppm level that scientists in aggregate start to become seriously concerned about adverse and irreversible problems associated with climate change. That said, the survey also highlights a number of scientific disagreements and failed predictions. The interplay between science and politics is basically portrayed as a simple relationship between two internally complex dialogs. That is a model I certainly mean to unpack further in my thesis work.

As I didn’t actually manage to go see An Inconvenient Truth at the Phoenix yesterday, I am making another foray tonight for the 7:00pm show.

The power of place

The contrast between the two weeks in Vancouver and my two days back here has amply demonstrated the simple fact that, fine a place as it is to take a degree in, I couldn’t actually live happily over an indefinite period in England.

Indeed, I would have a great deal of trouble anywhere that does not approximate the most essential features of Vancouver-ness: natural beauty (ideally, mountains), certain styles of food (ideally including inexpensive sushi), the acceptability of a Gore-Tex shell as a constant item of clothing, multiculturalism, reasonably good prices and customer service, good public transport, and myriad other factors that are less distinctly noticed than felt and appreciated at an intuitive level. In the end, it comes down to feeling properly yourself in a place or not. I have that feeling in Vancouver, I quickly had it in Montreal, parts of Toronto (Kensington Market) can evoke it, and I felt it in much of Dublin.

Being in a place that challenges you is certainly an essential part of education, but when the time comes to choose a place for the long haul (provided you have that luxury), the way to do it must be through proximity to friends, family, and those other things that define a place as one’s own.

All that said, it’s time to get back to cracking rocks for the thesis, and sorting things out for the upcoming optional paper (not a paper at all, but a series of seminars, for my fellow bewildered North Americans).

Minutes of the Senate Special Committee on Tormenting Graduate Students

Speaker: “Moving on. What can we do to this Ill-Nicky kid? Tax people?”

Tax Rep: “Hmm. We could reject all of his tuition credits from last year as a tax deduction, then surprise him with a bill for unpaid taxes…”

Speaker: “And…”

Tax Rep: “Nine days before we will start charging interest on them…”

Speaker: “And…”

Tax Rep: “Hmm, make sure he gets the letter just after traveling for a whole day, and while jetlagged?”

Speaker: “That will have to do. He should at least be glad he didn’t earn more money in the previous year for us to tax him on. Speaking of which, I see he has some student loan arrangements, what can you people offer me?”

Loan Rep: “We could allocate less than half the funds we did last year, when his educational expenses and personal assets were the same.”

Speaker: “Not bad, anything else?”

Loan Rep: “We could let him know just a week before classes start… just after he has travelled for a whole day and is both jetlagged and infected with illness!”

Speaker: “Not bad at all. I can always count on you guys.”

Speaker: “Now, you fellas at Disasters and Emergency Preparedness really haven’t been pulling your weight at these meetings. I just hope you have something extra special in the works.”

Blood and Belonging

While flying home, I finished Micheal Ignatieff’s Blood and Belonging. The main subject of the book is the examination of a number of contemporary examples of ethnic nationalism, both more and less violent in character. As he intended, it is a fairly chilling depiction of some of the uglier elements of human relations, in the more disputed parts of the world today. His description of the use of chemical weapons against the people of the Kurdish enclave in northern Iraq makes his initial support for the American led invasion more comprehensible.

At the same time as this book makes one fearful about the kind of world we will inhabit in twenty years, it also provides some hope. While I have not personally visited Quebec or Northern Ireland, it seems, on the basis of the coverage I have seen, that things are not as bad as they were when this book was written in the early nineties. Economic prosperity and civic forms of nationalism have the capacity, at least in theory, to slowly erode the bases of hatred and violence. Let us hope that this trend can win out in the long run over the one that seeks to define nation by something as arbitrary and damaging as an ethnic notion of identity.

I started reading this book in order to get a better sense of Ignatieff as a thinker and as a prospective leader. While my new sense is not sturdy enough to be definitive, I definitely think more of the man than I did in the period before I had read any of his writing. His understanding of difficult issues seems to have a subtlety and a compassion that is definitely not the mark of your standard politician. I will have to read more of his thinking, however, before I can issue or withhold a final endorsement.

Canada finale

Barring some final familial plans, frantic packing, and travel, this Vancouver visit has come to an end. The best part, of course, was spending time with friends and family. I am made up of parts from all of you, so seeing the whole of you makes me feel whole myself.

I will keep in touch from Oxford.

Britannia Mine copper leaching

A few years ago, I wrote a paper for an essay contest being run by the Fraser Institute, a notoriously right wing think tank in Vancouver. The assignment was to write about a free market solution to an environmental problem, and I suggested that a firm could extract and sell the 450kg of copper leaching out from the Britannia Mine into Howe Sound every day. Because of heavy metal pollution from that source, there is a large marine dead zone just offshore, along the road between the two venues where the 2010 Olympics will be held.

Today, while sitting in my dentist’s waiting room, I read in Time that a company called EPCOR has taken on the project I suggested. I didn’t win the contest, some paper about tradable carbon emissions did, but it’s nice to see that the idea was viable enough to implement in some form. It may be more about public relations than profit – especially since the company is advertising its benevolence – but I am glad to hear that one of the many scourges afflicting that particular marine ecosystem is to be somewhat abated.

Matters logistical

Permit me to apologize quickly for the scheduling problems that have cropped up in the last few days. While I would dearly like to spend time with all of my friends in Vancouver, limitations of time and communication capability have reduced the scope of what can be achieved. As it stands, I have visited Lonsdale, the UBC campus, downtown, and Commercial Drive on basically every day that I have been in Vancouver – averaging some ten bus journeys a day, criss-crossing the city.

Therefore, if I have been confusing or unavailable, please do not interpret it as any slight against you. This visit has been a marvelous opportunity to connect with family and friends and be reminded of the kind of deep networks that can surround you. While Oxford has much to recommend it, there is nothing to take the place of familial relations and ancient friendships.

PS. Anything that is not actually Vancouver centred is entirely on the back burner at the moment. Things like the final edit of the fish paper will just have to await my return to the city of spires.

Early morning politics

Now, I could – and probably should – write about my enjoyable hike up Dam Mountain with my father today. Likewise, the subject of this early morning post should be the fine dinner at Palki on Lonsdale with my mother, father, and brother Sasha. Failing that, I should certainly write about exploring English Bay with Nick, Neal, and Lauren, then getting a jumbo poutine with extra war sauce at Fritz, just off Granville. But people are quite rightly sick of me just narrating life, so I will present a bit of a puzzle instead.

The image above was taken of the back of a utility truck of the kind used by many of the Vancouver schoolboards, at Georgia and Granville at about 2:00am. A fairly odd looking character in a jacket was using various tools on the newspaper vending boxes at that intersection: unloading newer looking units for selling The Vancouver Sun and The Province – local newspapers with content of varying quality.

The real questions are, who attached the original sticker, who blacked out one flag with spray paint, and why. Presumably, it previously showed an American flag that has been blacked out subsequently due to the widespread hostility in much of the world that has developed towards the United States, particularly since the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

I don’t really know how I feel about this display, but I took a photo for much the same reasons I often photograph graffiti: any expression of a genuine sentiment is at least worthy of cursory examination, and frequently worthy of deep thought. Right now, I am far too exhausted to think it through.

Departure countdown

To all those Vancouverites thinking “naturally, I am going to be able to engage in Activity X with Milan during the period before he returns to Oxford,” take heed. I now have only three full days left in the city: days that are increasingly full of existing commitments. Arranging new ones at times that do not conflict is thus becoming ever more challenging. While I do want to do everything and see everyone, I shall be constrained by the limitations of my time and other people’s initiative.

My flight home is in the evening this Saturday. I have a family dinner on Friday, but if people would be up for a group outing on Thursday night (after eight), to somewhere where a bit of food and beer might be had, please list yourself and suggested locations as comments.

PS. I have made good, but not complete, progress through my list of Vancouver tasks.

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