Canada at 150: Truly Groundbreaking

It wasn’t about the Liberal platform, but turning “an experiment into an example and a conference into a community.”

The recent Canada at 150 Conference was not the unveiling of the Liberal Party of Canada platform. That wasn’t the point. Indeed, those who were listening heard, in a number of cases, quite different and sometimes even competing views on the same topic.

It was, however, a terrific opportunity to hear from various experts, explore ideas, and encourage serious debate about the various solutions to the challenges we all face – discussions that all of us, not just Liberals, should benefit and learn from. It’s unfortunate, but the level of partisan criticism seems to increase in inverse proportion to the level of appreciation for exchanging different opinions to work toward responsible solutions (or maybe it’s just tied to a fear of what real debate might do to challenge preconceived and politically useful notions of right and wrong).

I am very proud of the fact that the Liberal Party had the courage to engage in this process, knowing full well the risks of not just allowing, but of encouraging some very challenging and provocative discussions in our currently hyper-partisan climate. We don’t learn if we’re not willing to challenge and be challenged.

And it worked. Some of the speakers effectively (and in some cases rather depressingly) highlighted serious issues facing Canada and Canadians, including those caused by changing demographics, the problem of jobs without people and people without jobs, and continuing environmental challenges. There was also optimism – witness the presentation by Dominic Barton of McKinsey & Company, which highlighted extraordinary economic opportunities for Canada internationally.

Many people were also struck by the blunt, hard-hitting (but welcome) nature of some of the speeches. All on his own, Robert Fowler stirred up controversy that transcended all political parties. And yes, there has been much commentary about what those discussions will mean in terms of Liberal Party policy. We’ll see …

But there was something truly groundbreaking about Canada at 150, which was summed up beautifully with the concluding comment by Randy Boissonnault: “We turned an experiment into an example and a conference into a community.”

Experiment into example:

This was the first time, in Canada at least, that a conference of this type was set up to include such a massive online presence and to work in conjunction with dozens of “parallel conferences” around the country. It was a pretty bold undertaking.

And it was really scary.

Everyone involved was nervous. Everyone knew it was a pretty bold experiment. What if the internet crashed? What if the servers couldn’t handle the volume? What if the online security systems were hijacked? What if people couldn’t get through? And the worst fear of all – what if nobody bothered to participate?

But what a success! Kudos to the organizers, in particular Pat Sorbara and the staff in Michael Ignatieff’s office, the folks at the Liberal Party of Canada, and Mauril Belanger, who advanced an idea into reality. Conferences and policy debates will never be the same.

Conference into community:

There were more than 70 parallel “satellite” conferences across the country. There were more than 6,200 participants in the live chat and more than 20,000 webcast viewers from more than 25 countries! Participants were well connected online to the Montreal proceedings (a personal plug for the Willowdale team, which did such a great job). Most importantly it was active participation. Many questions came to the speakers from online. Parallel-conference participants found themselves engaged in parallel discussions, taking in what was being said by panelists and then engaging in their own challenging discussions. The people on the webcast chat lines were wonderfully engaged, providing all sorts of other commentary and ideas.

What it meant from a conference perspective is that one didn’t need to be physically in Montreal to participate, to engage, and to be heard – it didn’t matter where you were. The Canada at 150 Conference indeed became a community – a community of people of different political persuasions, all of whom are interested and engaged in the challenges facing Canada and the solutions we need to find to ensure we have the country we want when Canada officially turns 150 in 2017.

Where do we go from here? It’s not clear yet, but there’s no question that what happened with Canada at 150 – not just the content but also the scope of the challenging discussions – will help inform that direction. And that’s a good thing.