Parliaments & Power: Canada in the Parliamentary World

From Tokyo to Canberra, from Warsaw to Westminster, prime ministers are more often removed from power by their own backbenchers than by voters in general elections. In Canada, the idea of MPs wielding that kind of power shocks experts and the public alike. Today the parliamentary system thrives all over the world, but every country’s parliamentary system has its unique quirks and conventions. Historian Christopher Moore, author of 1867: How the Fathers Made a Deal invites us to consider Canada’s parliamentary culture in world context.

BIOGRAPHY:

Christopher Moore has been called Canada’s most versatile writer of history. He’s a Toronto-based writer who has been presenting Canadian history to non-specialist audiences through many media for many years. Moore’s books include 1867: How the Fathers Made a Deal, which Dalton Camp called “just about the best book on our history I’ve ever read,” and Louisbourg Portraits: Life in An Eighteenth Century Garrison Town. That book, his first, won the Governor General’s Award in non-fiction for 1982. In 2011 From Then to Now: A Short History of the World, won another GG, this time in Children’s Literature. Moore is a full-time writer. His other writing includes magazine essays, a blog, columns, film scripts, radio documentaries, and reference works. His provocative commentaries on history and politics have appeared in the Globe & Mail, the National Post, Maclean’s, The Literary Review of Canada, and other periodicals. He is a past chair of The Writers’ Union of Canada.