Edited by the Graphic History Collective, this compilation of comics presents readers with an alternative narrative to the dominant comic book discourse. Our militaristic, macho, male heroes are replaced with people like Québécois union activist Madeleine Parent, or Indigenous workers fighting for the land in B.C., or the women who fought hard labour battles in the retail sector.

Regardless of the Canadian Labour Congress presidential outcome, the need for a grassroots labour revival is clear. The stakes are simply too high not to rebuild from the ground up.

In many respects, nothing has changed following the April 7 Québec elections. Big business remains in power, only its colour has altered from light blue to a Liberal shade of red.

The National Post state that a “rogue Québec billionaire launching takeover bid” of provincial politics, but the reality is that billionaires have already taken over, and an urgent task is for people to launch a takeover bid of their own.

The resilience of Indigenous communities in the face of ongoing corporate and state coercion is incredible, and the problems of our age will not be resolved until Canada honours its relationship with First Nations. We discuss Canada’s history of disease, deliberate starvation, ethnic cleansing, tar sands expansion, neglect of treaties and a legacy of colonialism that continues today with author James Daschuk.

The federal Conservatives continue to take part in the global austerity Olympics with their 2014 budget as fallout from the largest economic crisis since the Great Depression continues, and people and the planet are suffering as a result. Nobody wins with this approach.

Activist and author Harsha Walia discusses Canada’s ongoing colonial legacy and how to challenge global border imperialism with Canadian Dimension editorial collective member, Matthew Brett.

Migrant prisoners in Canada have been beaten back into their cells, imprisoned for “preventive” reasons, reallocated to prevent political organising, and lied to by prison authorities in an ongoing and historic migrant prisoner strike.

The Harper Conservatives are going to great lengths to highlight the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812, when the British and Americans fought for control over the north. It is in this context that James Laxer has published his history of the war.

The student movement in Quebec is an incredibly important development, with implications that reach well beyond provincial borders, rekindling the political imagination to a degree not seen since the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s. This is the most troubling and dynamic period in recent Quebec history, and the possibility that this energy will foster fundamental social change is very real.