Harpers Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power

As I sifted the evidence this became less and less convincing to me until I concluded that the opposite was closer to the truth: Flanagan developed a theory that Riel could be understood as a millenarian prophet, not just as a political figure. He translated and edited Riel's diaries [13] and co-edited a volume of Riel's youthful poetry which won the Prix Champlain.

Harper's Team - Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power (Paperback, 2 Rev Ed)

Flanagan later participated in the "Louis Riel Project", collecting and publishing all of Riel's writings, which have been dispersed among more than 40 archives in Canada and the United States. Flanagan later published the controversial First Nations, Second Thoughts , [18] which critiqued the report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples. The book received the Donner Prize for the best book of the year on Canadian public policy in , [notes 1] and the Donald Smiley Prize from the Canadian Political Science Association for the best book on Canadian government and politics.

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In his review, Yale D. He concluded that the ideas in First Nations? Second Thoughts should be made publicly available and read as a companion piece with Cairn's Citizens Plus. The books were written for very different audiences: Flanagan wrote First Nations, Second Thoughts for the lay reader while Cairns wrote for an informed academic audience. Belanger questioned why Flanagan as a professional academic did not access more robust peer-reviewed scholarly resources regarding analysis and statistics preferring instead to make extensive use of newspaper clippings from the Calgary Herald , the National Post , and The Globe and Mail and the conservative magazine the Alberta Report.

Flanagan did not visit any First Nation communities to research the publication nor did he quote any Aboriginal leader in support land privatization in exchange for the end of the reserve system Belanger Pamela Palmater , a Mi'kmaq lawyer who holds new chair in indigenous governance at Ryerson University, argued in her review that First Nations, Second Thoughts provides a summary of Flanagan's convictions that "since First Nations in Canada are uncivilized and their governments produce 'wasteful, destructive, familistic factionalism,' they should not be entitled to self-governing powers, special tax exemptions or federal funding, but should be assimilated and their reserves divided up into parcels of individually owned, ' fee simple ' lands available for sale to non-aboriginal people and corporations.

Flanagan claimed that "European civilization was several thousand years more advanced than the aboriginal cultures of North America" and colonization was therefore "inevitable" and "justifiable. In , he published Beyond the Indian Act: This book was a finalist for the Donner Prize. Flanagan has written a book on property rights, [24] a book on game theory, [25] and another about conservative Canadian political parties. Substantial grants of land provided to the Metis by the Manitoba Act were rapidly transferred from Metis to immigrants from Ontario who had arrived in large numbers.

New research in the s and s shifted the blame to the government's lack of administration of the land grants. Flanagan and Ens argued that the government acted appropriately and that the Metis had gained financially. The case involves Sir John A. Attorney General of Canada, et al. In he published Louis "David" Riel: Prophet of the New World. Macdonald and the Canadian government successfully kept them from obtaining title to the land they were to receive under terms of the Manitoba Act of He has since stated that he will no longer be serving in this capacity for ethical reasons.

Benoit established that Treaty Eight did not grant immunity from taxation to Indians living off reserve. In Victor Buffalo , the Samson Cree band, located near Hobbema, Alberta, unsuccessfully challenged the federal government's implementation of Treaty Six. Flanagan was also a witness for the University of Alberta in the Dickason case in which the Supreme Court of Canada ultimately upheld the validity of mandatory retirement for university professors.

Tom Flanagan adopts a libertarian point of view and defends personal freedom particularly in academia. Flanagan adopts the philosophical analysis of John Locke and Emer de Vattel that European colonization of North America by western civilization, was justifiable and inevitable. In February , Flanagan made controversial comments regarding child pornography see below.

He has since expanded on his views, stating that the controversy was the result of a hostile crowd creating a Gotcha! I'm the first to admit that I'm not an expert on sexual offences and never will be; I was dragged into the field by others who were seeking to undermine my academic and political reputation. But I have now read enough about it to be convinced that, in a laudable desire to protect our children, Canada has gone too far in the direction of trying to regulate personal conduct.

Our child pornography law covers too many types of material, does not adequately distinguish between natural adolescent sexuality and pathological desires for pre-pubescent children, and imposes penalties that are too harsh on offenders whose offences take place only in the mind. Flanagan is often described as a member of the Calgary School , which includes a group of conservatively inclined professors at the University of Calgary, such as Barry F. Ted Morton , Rainer Knopff and history professor David Bercuson [43] [44] [46] who are strongly committed to strategic and direct influence on public affairs with a long term vision.

By , the Center for Strategic and International Studies CSIS , a public policy research institution based in Washington, DC had already observed the ascendancy of the role of Calgary-based academics on Canadian public policy, specifically the Calgary School of political science Rovinsky Cooper and Bercuson's Deconfederation undermined the Meech Lake agenda of endless concessions to Quebec.

All these books were widely discussed in the media and have had some impact on the course of public affairs. He is also a senior fellow of the conservative think tank the Fraser Institute. In a jocular [notes 6] letter written to the Literary Review of Canada —12 , [43] Flanagan commented that, "Sylvia Bashevkin's plaintive cri de coeur confirmed my belief that conservatives are winning the war of ideas in Canada. The Calgary School of political science—Barry Cooper, Ted Morton, Rainer Knopff and I, along with our historian outrider David Bercuson—did not cause this transformation, but we and our students have played an honourable part in making it happen.

Tom Flanagan joined the right-wing populist Reform Party of Canada in [47] and began working there in as director of policy research Rovinsky Tom Flanagan and Stephen Harper began publishing together in with "Canadian conservatism is at its strongest level in many years". Canada's system of one-party-plus rule has stunted democracy.

Two prominent conservatives present the case for more representative government" [50] which argued that the Liberal Party only retained power through a dysfunctional political system and a divided opposition. Harper and Flanagan argued that national conservative governments between and were founded on temporary alliances between Western populists and Quebec nationalists , and were unable to govern because of their fundamental contradictions.

The authors called for an alliance of Canada's conservative parties, and suggested that meaningful political change might require electoral reforms such as proportional representation. Flanagan managed his leadership campaigns for the Canadian Alliance and the Conservative Party of Canada He also managed the Conservative Party's national election campaign in He was the Senior Communications Adviser for the Conservatives successful — election campaign. In Flanagan published his book entitled Harper's Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power.

Flanagan speaks for himself He doesn't speak for the government and he hasn't advised the Prime Minister Office Stephen Harper for years. I certainly don't share his views. For those of you who are not yet familiar with Civitas, it grows out of Canadians' desire to take up one of the great challenges of Western civilization: Every society and age throws up new challenges requiring us to balance these precious values. As a "society where ideas meet," Civitas is an organization dedicated to promoting and nurturing that conversation in Canada today.

We bring together people with an interest in conservative, classical liberal and libertarian ideas and allow them to engage with some of the world's finest minds who are grappling with these questions. His critics claimed he had too much power in the shadows, advising Canadian politicians, to whittle "aboriginal claims on land and self-determination down to individual property rights and municipal self-government. In , Flanagan helped Harper seek the leadership of the Canadian Alliance. Flanagan managed Harper's leadership campaign, and Harper went on to win the Alliance leadership in March Flanagan then served for one year as chief of staff to Harper, who was then the Leader of the Opposition.

Flanagan returned to Calgary in but continued as campaign manager.

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Before the next election could take place, the Alliance merged in late with the Progressive Conservatives to form the new Conservative Party of Canada. After that was concluded, Flanagan organized and managed the Conservative national campaign for the general election of June 28, The Conservative Party lost that election but did succeed in bringing Paul Martin 's Liberals down to a minority government , which set the stage for future Conservative victories. In , Flanagan made controversial comments, later retracted, advocating the assassination of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.

In , Flanagan and Doug Finley were accused by Dona Cadman of offering her late husband, MP Chuck Cadman , a million-dollar life insurance policy on behalf of the Conservative Party of Canada in exchange for his vote against the Liberal budget in May This vote would have caused the government to fall and triggered an election.

In November , Flanagan was attending a lecture on Canadian election campaigning at the University of Manitoba. He was asked about Stockwell Day 's claim that a lawyer that defends a person against child pornography charges is defending the legitimacy of child pornography. Flanagan responded, then made a "side-bar" comment: George MacLean, but Flanagan's comments did not receive widespread attention. On February 27, , Flanagan was invited to give a speech on whether it was time to repeal the Indian Act to a group of students at the University of Lethbridge.

Flanagan was warned that members of Idle No More were planning on attending and disrupting the speech. Flanagan learned after the event that the Idle No More protesters had organized the event with the intent of creating a "Gotcha! One of the protesters, "Levi Little Moustache," stood and quoted Flanagan's comments on child pornography. Flanagan responded that "I certainly have no sympathy for child molesters, but I do have some grave doubts about putting people in jail because of their taste in pictures. I don't look at these pictures. Wildrose Party leader Danielle Smith cut her ties with Flanagan because "there is no language strong enough to condemn [his] comments"; Andrew McDougall the Director of Communications for the Prime Minister of Canada considered them to be "repugnant, ignorant, and appalling," and CBC News immediately announced that, "In light of recent remarks made by Tom Flanagan at the University of Lethbridge, CBC News has taken the decision to end our association with him as a commentator on Power and Politics.

While we support and encourage free speech across the country and a diverse range of voices, we believe Mr Flanagan's comments to have crossed the line and impacted his credibility as a commentator for us McGuire February 28, ". Flanagan subsequently apologized for his remarks, stating that his words were "badly chosen".

He also states he was posing a question to provoke thought, as he would have done in his role as a professor. In fact, he was intending to question whether mandatory jail time for simple possession of child pornography was an appropriate punishment. Tragedy in the Commons. Stephen Harper's Takeover of Canada.

Canada in the Great Power Game What's Happened to Politics? The Girl on the Train. Welcome To The Broadcast. A World in Disarray. No Place to Hide. Paikin and the Premiers. Right Here, Right Now. The War On Science. The Truth About Trudeau. The Dogs are Eating Them Now.

The War That Ended Peace. The Road to Character. The History of a Dangerous Idea. Is That a Fact? The Madmen of Benghazi. The Guns at Last Light.

Harper's Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power | Quill and Quire

Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs. Inside the Middle East. The Future of the Mind. Beyond the Indian Act. Waiting for the Wave: The Reform Party and the Conservative Movement. Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power. How to write a great review. The review must be at least 50 characters long.