The World Economic Forum has just recently published its annual rankings of countries in terms of gender equality and gender participation. In preparing the rankings it obtains comparable data from every country, ranks the countries from best to worst, scores each in terms of inequality, and compares each to the average score for all countries in terms of inequality. It makes interesting and for Canada discouraging reading. Canada for all its wealth, believe in equality, and highly developed civil institutions, does not do very well.

Country rankings, in order from one to ten, are Iceland, Finland, Norway, Sweden, New Zealand, South Africa, Denmark, Ireland, Philippines and Lesotho. Canada ranks an embarrassing 25th. Five of the countries which out-rank Canada are lower income developing countries- including countries like Lesotho and South Africa, which as indicated are in the top 10. So much for Canada’s ability to capitalize on its progressive views and high level of economic development to become a truly modern country. Clearly it takes more than an advanced developed economy to achieve equality.

The rankings are also broken down by sub-categories of participation and inequality. Our ranking compared to other countries in terms of income equality is 28th, pay for equal work 21st, labour force participation 22nd, enrollment in high school 87th, healthy life expectancy 67th, and women in ministerial positions in government 69th. These results are embarrassing and disturbing. How is that Canada is so far behind so much of the world when it comes to equality for women?

The Economic Forum understand what all of this means, stating: “From a values and social justice perspective, empowering women and providing them with equal rights and opportunities for fulfilling their potential is long overdue. From a business, economic and competitiveness viewpoint, targeting gender parity is a necessary condition for progress”. This is not coming from some bleeding heart social NGO. The World Economic Forum is the top big business organization in the world. It is the world equivalent of the BC Business Council in BC and the Council of Chief Executives (CCCE) representing the CEOs of Canada’s leading enterprises. It is not known for radical positions. And of course gender equality is no longer radical anywhere else except Canada. Can anyone imagine the C.D. Howe Institute, another Canadian pillar of business thought, even contemplating producing a report like this? The worthies there probably believe that lower pay, employment and opportunities generally for women are simply the result of the market at work, proving in fact that women are less capable, productive and deservng.

How is it that Canada remains so far behind the rest of the world on gender issues? The reasons are not hard to find. We still have a third world child care policy, no federal women’s equality agenda, weak employment laws, and continuing cuts to women’s programs that do exist. Neither the public nor private sectors here take promotion of women seriously. Our corporations still have a cowboy frontier mind set, valuing manly aggressiveness and macho behavior in the work place and the boardroom. Women are still treated as second class by our political parties. The BC Campbell government, always happy to claim it is progressive and forward looking, has virtually abandoned any semblance of support for action on women’s equality. Most other provinces are no better. And of course Harper is still holds 19th century views on women. For more on all of this go to http://www.policycentre.ca/2009/09/06/failing-women-at-work-unfair.

In 1998, Canada had a per capita GDP of $39,300 (US). The average for the Northern hemisphere was $17,950, and for the Southern hemisphere $6,835. We are by no means a poor country unable to afford basic programs and commitments. The time has long passed to put this off any longer. Shame on us. Shame on our leaders.

Last week, Canada’s Supreme Court struck down Bill 104, a Quebec law that clarified the status of immigrants and non-English speaking children who attend early grade English language schools. There was understandable disappointment and anger from Quebec politicians.  The unanimous Supreme Court ruling called Bill 104 “excessive”, saying it unjustifiably infringed on minority language rights under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom.  In fact the decision itself infringes on the legitimate role of government.  The government’s policy was perfectly consistent with the Constitution, which guarantees children from English speaking families or who have attended English speaking schools the right to go to English speaking publicly financed schools throughout their schooling.

Bill 104 was passed in to 2002 close a loophole that some non-English educated families had been using to get their very young children into an English language school and thus “earn” the right to attend publicly funded English language schools.  The right belongs to the English speaking minority in Quebec, and not to those who attend private English schools set up to provide non-English speaking children their first year of school solely in order to qualify them for publicly funded English language schooling for the remainder of their education.

Before Bill 104 was passed in 2002, students not eligible for English language schooling  were enrolling in these private English language elementary schools for up to a year solely to  become eligible to transfer to a publicly funded English language school.   Once the child qualified for a public English language school, the same qualification was transferred to his or her siblings.  Private schools were set up solely for the purpose of getting this kind of bogus qualification.

This was never intended or contemplated when the provisions of the constitution were passed.  And logically enough the Supreme Court agreed that the ability to make such a transfer can be interfered in these circumstances.   Such an interference is a legitimate and justifiable infringement of the right to attend English schools, since these schools there simply to create a loophole.  Preventing the exploitation of this loophole, the court agreed, is sufficiently important and legitimate to justify the government’s infringement of a generally guaranteed right.

It stated in its decision: “When schools are established primarily to bring about the transfer of ineligible students to the publicly funded English‑language system, and the instruction they give in fact serves that end, it cannot be said that the resulting educational pathway is genuine.  A short period of attendance at a minority language school is not indicative of a genuine commitment and cannot on its own be enough for a child’s parent to obtain the status of a rights holder under the Canadian Charter.”

However, according to the court, the Quebec Government failed to calibrate the policy in the correct way.  The judges said that rather than setting an administrative rule, “it is necessary to review the situation of each institution (school), as well as the nature of its clientele and the conduct of individual clients”.

This is ridiculous.  It should not be up the courts to decide how much bureaucracy is needed to make a legitimate policy workable.  It should be up to the legislature of the province to decide policy details of this sort. If  the government judges that generally applicable rules are preferable, as opposed to a case by case review of each school and student, that should be its choice.  The courts should leave these matters to legitimate policy makers who know something about the running of schools.  If they do not, they are guilty as charged, of taking on the role of administrative policy makers and thus of judicial activism.

There have been many nonsense complaints about judicial activism since 1982.  When the courts direct legislators to correct laws inconsistent with the 1982 constitution, they are doing their job.  In this case the court has taken on a different role – it has substituted its policy for the legitimate policy of the legislature and the government.  This kind of interference just adds to unnecessary tension and conflict.   The law will have to be re-written, with lots of political turmoil in Quebec, for nothing but trivial reasons. Nobody will be happy.  Please justices, exercise a little restraint.  Let governments do their job, and you do yours.

Try as I might, I am having trouble finding staunch defenses of Iceland from the economists and think tanks responsible for the country going over the economic precipice a few months ago.  Iceland, as many people probably know, was a poster child of Milton Friedman of the University of Chicago and Michael Walker of the Fraser Institute, who developed and steered the policies that led to the disaster.  Friedman made a fateful (for Iceland) visit to the country in 1984, where he gave a lecture at the University of Iceland on “The Tyranny of the Status Quo”, in which he offered up the elixir of economic freedom and market triumphalism.  While there, he engaged in a highly influential television debate with socialist thinkers in which he very effectively belittled the direction of economic policy in the country. He became enamoured with the possibilities of policy change there, and soon became an important advisor to a group of young intellectuals in the Independence Party.  The Party took the lead in pushing the adoption of a radical program of monetarism, conservative fiscal policy, privatization, deregulation, corporate tax cuts, fisheries privatization, cuts to government enterprises and liberalization of currency and capital markets. The Heritage Institute in the United States and the Fraser Institute in Canada fell in love with the country, featuring it repeatedly as one of the most successful countries in the world in their Economic Freedom Indexes and reports.  In 2005, the Mount Pelerin Society, keepers of the Friedman and Hayek tradition and supported by many highly respected economists, devoted its 2005 annual conference to many learned presentations extolling the successes of Iceland.  Nary a negative word was heard other than the odd suggestion that more was needed.  Leading economists took turns belittling those few left in the discipline who remained skeptical and parading the triumph of their beliefs in the fashion of intolerant ideologues everywhere.

Alas, Iceland soon turned out to be a huge bust.  The collapse of its financial system in 2008 was accompanied by crippling unemployment, currency collapse, credit paralysis and the failure of the banking system.  It became a failed economy and an abject warning about the dangers of listening to the economics profession’s elites.  Today it is a basket case of immense proportions, stuck in a deep in recession, deeply in debt, and without any prospects for recovery.  Its failures are attributable to the economic policies embraced by the Independence Party and pedaled by Friedman and his disciples.  All of the policies confidently advocated by Friedman, the Pelerin Society and the Fraser Institute failed miserably.  In fact they wrecked the country.  As a real life social and economic experiment, Iceland has turned into a wrecking machine of the ideas the monetarists and neo-conservatives so confidently peddled throughout the last decade.

Perhaps more disconcertingly, the economists and policy wonks so deeply implicated in what has happened have become silent.  Not a word is heard from the Fraser Institute, the other right wing think tanks, and the university professors who had so much to say earlier.  Not a word is heard to indicate that any of them are paying attention to Iceland at all or care about what has happened.  There is no admission of responsibility and no acknowledgment of the policy failures that they played such a big part in.  Iceland and its wonderful people are now left to take responsibility alone. This must be a bitter pill for all the Icelanders who faithfully followed all they were told.  Iceland as a country had so much going for it.  It could have persevered as a small nation supported by active and progressive governments of a mild social democratic bent – a smaller version of Sweden if you like.  But it fell victim to a group of academic theoreticians full of arrogance and swagger but lacking common sense and basic social knowledge.  Nations, like people, need to watch out for snake oil salesmen.  And social engineers who think they know it all and want to remake society.

Pity the Icelanders.  They are on their own now.  I suspect that not many social engineers from outside will be welcomed any time soon.  Perhaps the Fraser Institute and all the economists who had so much wrong headed advice for Iceland are finally revealing a modicum of common sense by lying low and keeping quiet.  Hopefully they will not find another hapless victim soon.

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He following is a description of a book that has something important to say about the Fraser Institute and  similar so-called “Think Tanks”.  It is recommended reading.

Think your vote counts on issues that matter
most to you? Like global warming or health care? Well, think again.

In Not a Conspiracy Theory, How Business
Propaganda Hijacks Democracy (Key Porter, $22.95)
Donald Gutstein skilfully documents one of the
most important but least recognized political
developments in the last thirty years: the
prolonged propaganda campaigns mounted by
business to influence our opinions on fundamental
issues of social and political life. Think tanks
with impressive names and populist-sounding
agendas and staffed with credentialed researchers
with well-honed reputations churn out research
that purports to be both independent and free of
bias. But peel back the curtain and what do you
find? Big business with its big bucks and
anti-democratic agenda: maximizing and
maintaining profits no matter what. Independent
and free of bias? Not even close.

Gutstein explores the roots of corporate
propaganda in the United States and traces its
rise and influence across Canada. He documents
how corporate propaganda works, who funds it and
how it is marketed to the mainstream media …
usually without you ever knowing. For anyone who
worries that the propaganda machine has hijacked
the democratic process, Not a Conspiracy Theory is a must read.

Donald Gutstein taught in the school of
communication at Simon Fraser University and is
the author of three acclaimed but controversial
books: e.con: How the Internet Undermines
Democracy, The New Landlords and Vancouver Ltd.
He has studied the media for more than thirty
years, was co-director of Projected Censored and
NewsWatch Canada and has written articles for
print and online magazines such as Maclean’s,
Vancouver Magazine, The Tyee, Georgia Straight and Straight Goods.”