In western Canadian cities like Winnipeg, a new and particularly destructive form of poverty has emerged over the past thirty years. It is inextricably linked with racism, is disproportionately concentrated in the inner city and has especially damaging effects on Aboriginal people. At the same time, it is Aboriginal people and especially Aboriginal women who are in the lead in developing effective, close-to-the-ground strategies to combat this new poverty.

Most English-speaking leftists over the age of forty grew up reading the New Left Review (NLR). Founded in 1960, the journal brought together the first British New Left, which exited the Communist Party in 1956, publishing the New Reasoner, and a younger generation that put out the Universities and Left Review.

Regarding the deeply rooted apathy that many students exhibit, my observation, and that of those with whom I have consulted in writing this article, is that it is an offshoot of a sense of self-entitlement. Most students have yet to experience any political upheaval or economic hardship for themselves. The wave of relatively steady economic growth in Canada, and the consumer culture that accompanies it, results in a dangerous combination of political complacency and consumer insatiability. Coupled with the demolishment of the welfare state, the resulting competitive individualism produces a sense of hostility expressed as self-entitlement, which has had a potent demobilizing effect across campuses nationwide.

With A World of Gangs: Armed Young Men and Gangsta Culture, author John Hagedorn heeds Antonio Gramsci’s call for “pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will.” “Gangs aren’t going away soon … no matter what we do,” Hagedorn says gloomily, but with Gramscian optimism he continues, “this means we better figure out how to reduce the violence and encourage gangs and others in ghettoes, barrios, favelas, and townships to join movements for social change.”

The Canadian peace movement has just held a series of marches to mark the fifth anniversary of the war in Iraq and to call on the Canadian government to end our military involvement in Afghanistan. A majority of Canadians want the troops home, and over sixty per cent oppose extending the mission past 2009. Yet, almost every Liberal MP lined up with the Conservatives on March 13 to support Stephen Harper’s plan to extend Canada’s mission in Afghanistan to 2011.

The earth moved. It was one of those rare moments in history when all that had been solid (and stultifying) seemed to melt into air. As William Wordsworth wrote of the epoch of the French Revolution, in 1805 – verse that also captured something of the spirit of the ‘68: “Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive,/ But to be young was very heaven!”

In Canada and elsewhere there is currently a wide range of impressive constituency-based struggles around specific issues. But without some broader coherence to these movements, this fragmented politics leaves us frustratingly marginalized in terms of reversing and reshaping the larger agenda.

Tony Clarke and Maude Barlow, joint recipients of the prestigious Right Livelihood Award were honoured at the May Day, 2006 Ottawa Annual Benefit Dinner for Canadian Dimension. Here is the text of Tony’s remarks on that occasion

The Left today confronts several hard realities about the political terrain that has formed over the last two decades.

Canadian food activists celebrated World Food Day 2004 by creating a new national organization to be the voice and vehicle for accomplishing our food-security goals. Members are united in their commitment to the following three principles: “zero hunger,” “sustainable food systems” and “healthy and safe food”.