External Op-ed Pieces

The Canadians Abroad Project collects a range of external op-ed discussions on timely issues related to Canadians living abroad. Most of these are available at related media websites.

Our Overlooked Diaspora
by Jennifer Welsh
Canada’s millions of citizens abroad could be a national treasure – given the right strategy.
Read Full Article in Literary Review of Canada

Published: March 1, 2011

Top spy’s allegations about politicians are an afiront to millions of immigrants
by Vancouver Sun
Canada’s top intelligence official has made dangerous allegations that must be clarified or withdrawn. The claim is disturbing on a number of levels, but most importantly for what it says about what our necessarily secretive domestic intelligence agency is doing with the extraordinary powers it has been granted.
Read Full Article in Vancouver Sun

Published: June 24, 2010

Being Canadian with Vitality
by the Globe Editorial
Canada has been shortchanging Canadian immigrants preparing for their citizenship tests with a bad guidebook. The federal government’s newly revised preparatory booklet distributed to test-takers, to be released today, is a welcome move that places a new and appropriate emphasis on Canada’s history and personalities.
Read Full Article in The Globe and Mail

Published: November 12, 2009

Canada, Out in the World
by The Ottawa Citizen Editorial
There are so many Canadians living overseas that Don DeVoretz calls them the “missing province.” DeVoretz’s study of Canadian expatriots, released by the Asia-Pacific Foundation, paints a portrait of this country from an angle most Canadians have never considered. Canada is a nation of wanderers, with 2.8 million citizens living permanently overseas. That puts Canada third only to Israel and New Zealand on the list of countries with the biggest proportions of their population living abroad. What does that mean?
Read Full Article in The Ottawa Citizen

Published: October 31, 2009

移民何價？
by Victor Ho
香港太平山下多「叻」人，當中不少一身兼有加中兩個國籍的人，實行兩邊好處一把抓。殊不知，這樣可能喪失加國領事保護權。
Read Full Article in Sing Tao Daily, or English Translation

Published: October 6, 2009

Disowning Canadians Abroad
by the Globe Editorial
Justice Minister Rob Nicholson is taking the Canadian government out onto a weak limb, in its appeal of a court order on the issue of Omar Khadr’s repatriation from the United States. It is weak legally and even weaker morally. There is no serious principle worth defending.
Read Full Article in The Globe and Mail

Published: September 9, 2009

Voting is a Privilege, Not a Freebie: Giving Non-Citizens the Right to Vote is a Thoroughly Awful Idea
by Marcus Gee
If Mayor David Miller has his way, Toronto will become the first city in Canada to give non-citizens the right to vote, allowing permanent residents of Canada to cast a ballot in Toronto elections.
What a thoroughly awful idea. Canada’s biggest and most multicultural city should be encouraging newcomers to choose the path to citizenship, not giving them a free pass to one of its most valuable privileges.
Read Full Article in The Globe and Mail

Published: June 16, 2009

Tory Ads Play on Parochial Spite
by Lysiane Gagnon
As mean-spirited as they are, the negative Conservative ads launched against Michael Ignatieff will hurt him and his Liberal Party. The ads are not targeting urban, well-travelled voters, but a wider constituency that weighs much more in the polling booths.
Read Full Article in The Globe and Mail 

Published: June 1, 2009