Open to Debate with David Moscrop
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Open to Debate with David Moscrop
Smart, witty, and thoughtful political conversations that break from the limits of the 24-hour news cycle and the 280 character limit. Listeners will come away with a deeper understanding of the history and implications of the issues that shape us and our environment, anchored in discussions about p...
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Where does toxic political polarization come from and what can we do about it?
Toxic political polarization is on the rise around the world – and it’s making a mess of things. Ordinary people who might otherwise disagree, even st...
What’s actually getting better?
Everybody loves a pentalogy. In March of 2020, host David Moscrop and guest Amanda Watson discussed how we were managing early pandemic life. In the m...
How did women’s hockey become so popular?
Women’s hockey has surged in popularity in recent years. That growth has been a long time coming. The history of the women’s game stretches back more...
Is there a better way to do democracy?
Democratic life is increasingly marked by toxic polarisation and partisan hostility. Public institutions are overrun by the few, leaving the many on t...
How do non-profit organizations work – or not?
The non-profit sector is massive. According to Statistics Canada, in 2022 the non-profit sector accounted for over 8 percent of GDP – contributing mor...
Is Canada ready to get serious about tackling monopolies and oligopolies? A conversation with Denise Hearn
Is Canada ready to get serious about tackling monopolies and oligopolies?
You’ve heard it before, the old joke that Canada is three telec...
In conversation with Seamus O'Regan: What does an anti-scab worker bill tell us about the state of labour in Canada?
Canada has passed a law preventing federally-regulated businesses from using scab workers. Bill C-58 passed in June and marked a significant milestone...
Are universities ready to modernize?
Universities are medieval, risk averse institutions. Some like to think of them as bastions of radicalism, but they’re actually quite conservative by...
What are the hidden costs of climate change?
This week, we have good news and bad news. The bad news, you know already. Climate change is catching up to us. We’re feeling its effects and they sta...
What is AI and is Canada ready for it?
Artificial intelligence means different things to different people. As an amorphous set of technologies deployed in countless applications, AI is tric...
What is Kenneyism and why should we care?
A few weeks back, we spoke with Tiffany Balducci about the Alberta NDP leadership race. This week, we’re keeping on theme, but instead of looking ahea...
How is life becoming “enshitified"?
There’s no sharper way to assess the state of life in the early 21st century than through a lens of “enshitification,” a term this week's guest coined...
Who wants to lead the Alberta NDP?
The Alberta New Democratic Party leadership race is underway. In June, the party membership will select a new leader to replace Rachel Notley and squa...
What is the future of trans rights?
Trans rights are under attack throughout Canada. Policy changes in New Brunswick, Saskatchewan, and Alberta have already constrained rights and other...
Remembering Ed Broadbent
In January, former New Democratic Party leader Ed Broadbent died at the age of 87. Outpourings of grief, respect, and gratitude followed throughout th...
What does 2024 have in store for us?
Everybody loves a quadrilogy. In March of 2020, host David Moscrop and guest Amanda Watson discussed how we were managing our lives during the early d...
Could a land value tax help solve the housing crisis?
Canada’s housing crisis continues with no end in sight. Shelter – a fundamental human need – is unaffordable for millions, and the surge in property v...
Is AI a threat to democracy?
Artificial intelligence is already shaping the way we work, consume, and communicate with one another. It’s also shaping the way we govern ourselves –...
Can Canada protect itself from American democratic decline?
Around the world, democracies are on the back foot. For years, experts, commentators, politicians, and other practitioners and observers have discusse...
Does Canada have a foreign policy?
Foreign policy might not win elections, but it shapes domestic politics – and the world. Recent months have seen external affairs intersect with inter...
Can Olivia Chow remake Toronto?
In June, Olivia Chow was elected mayor of Toronto. She faces an all-too-often complacent city with a hefty budget shortfall and a series of longstandi...
How do we solve the housing crisis?
Canada’s housing crisis is persistent and brutal. In August, the average rent was nearly $2,100 a month – and much higher in cities including Vancouve...
What does fire weather mean for our future?
In June, this year became the worst wildfire season in Canadian history. Fires burned throughout the country. And there’s almost surely more to come....
Did cable television break America?
The United States of America is a polarized country marked by toxic partisan politics. The state of American politics comes from somewhere. And it mig...
How should we think about fat bodies?
There are all kinds of euphemisms for fat bodies. They capture and obscure a persistent social discomfort and prejudice that appears across fields and...
Who owns the future of public spaces?
For years, private interests have encroached upon public spaces. As time goes on, there are fewer and fewer places that belong to each of us regardles...
What just happened in Alberta–and what comes next?
Last week in Alberta, Premier Danielle Smith and the United Conservative Party held on to government in a race that was much closer than the 49-38 sea...
Who gets to spend time in nature?
This is the first episode in our three-piece series on the past, present, and future of public spaces in Canada. In these episodes we’ll cover nature,...
Who should care about rural development?
We spend an awful lot of time talking about housing and development—and we should. But often lost in the conversation is how we manage rural land and...
What does a campus labour struggle tell us about unions in Canada?
At Carleton University, a union local is fighting for a fair deal for its workers–and getting ready for a strike. Across Ontario and Canada, unionized...
Can we have a healthy digital public sphere?
Like it or not, we are stuck online. Digital life is a reflection and extension of life offline–if we can even talk about life offline anymore. It’s n...
How do we fix Canadian healthcare?
In Ontario, Premier Doug Ford is trying to address the province’s healthcare crisis. With over 200,000 people waiting for surgeries, long emergency ro...
Will the Canadian marketplace ever be competitive?
Canadians can be forgiven for making a national pastime out of expressing anger at the state of competition in the country. Telecom, grocery, transpor...
How should Canada engage with Indigenous legal traditions?
Reconciliation with Indigenous peoples in Canada requires structural transformation. One essential site of institutional reform is the country’s legal...
How do cities work?
This is the third and final episode in a three-part series on cities in Canada. So far, we’ve tackled how cities fit within the constitution and explo...
What can be done about the biggest issues facing our cities?
Around the world, more than 4 billion people live in cities. That’s just over 50 percent of the global population. The United Nations projects that by...
What is the state of cities in Canada?
This is the first in a three-episode series on cities in Canada. In 1911, 45 percent of people lived in cities in this country. By 2021, that number h...
How should we fight anti-trans hate?
Anti-trans hate and violence is on the rise in Canada and the United States. Indeed, 2021 was the most violent year for trans people on record worldwi...
What is the future of the labour movement?
The labour movement is having a moment. Both in the United States and in Canada, unions have won breakthroughs at workplaces including Amazon, Starbuc...
What is the new political capitalism?
In a pluralist society, individuals and groups each have their own preferences, interests, and goals. Together they compete, cooperate, intersect, and...