People, Politics, and Purpose

People, Politics, and Purpose investigates the roles and reputations of a wide array of political actors, offering insight into Canada’s place in the world and stimulating fresh thinking about political biography.

The late Greg Donaghy was the director of the Bill Graham Centre for Contemporary International History at the University of Toronto. His publications include Grit: The Life and Politics of Paul Martin Sr and Tolerant Allies: Canada and the United States, 1963–1968. P. Whitney Lackenbauer is a professor and Canada Research Chair in the Study of the Canadian North at Trent University. Among his more than fifty books are The Canadian Rangers: A Living History; Breaking Through? Understanding Sovereignty and Security in the Circumpolar Arctic; and China’s Arctic Ambitions and What They Mean for Canada.

Contributors: Stephen Azzi, Jennifer Levin Bonder, Robert Bothwell, P.E. Bryden, Norman Hillmer, Galen Roger Perras, Asa McKercher, John Milloy, Angelika Sauer, Ryan Touhey.

"Readers of People, Politics, and Purpose will likely be academics — the book surely won’t make any holiday bestsellers list — but it is an entertaining and informative collection of portraits in Canadian leadership. In this way, it would be of interest to even non-specialists."

Patrice Dutil, editor of The Unexpected Louis St-Laurent: Politics and Policies for a Modern:

This volume brilliantly rescues from obscurity the Canadians who shaped the country's politics from the 1940s to the 1980s. All the portraits are as compelling as they are original and enlightening.

Patricia E. Roy, professor emerita, Department of History, University of Victoria:

In the tradition of the careful scholarship, intelligent analysis, and elegant prose of their friend, John English, the essayists here brilliantly demonstrate how well-informed biography enlivens and enhances an appreciation and understanding of Canadian political and diplomatic history.