The People's Summit Marquee Series Presents:
Maude Barlow
Council of Canadians
8 p.m.
Burke Education Centre
@ Saint Mary's University
(Inglis Street)
Opening Performance
by Sandy Greenberg
"Global South - Global North:
The Privatization of Social Security and the Universal Assault on
Citizen's Rights"
Political activist, author and policy critic -- Maude Barlow is an
outspoken crusader for Canadian sovereignty and citizens' rights. She is
the National Volunteer Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, a
non-profit, non-partisan public interest organization supported by 30,000
members. As a government watchdog, critic of corporate crime and catalyst
for grassroots organizing, the Council is working
to protect sovereignty and promote democratic development.
Maude is the founding Co-chair of the Action Canada Net-work, a
cross-sectoral coalition of over 50 groups working for progressive social
change. She is on the planning committee of the recently-established
International Forum on Globalization, a network of individuals and groups
from around the world working to take
democratic control of the global economy.
She is the author of three best-selling books: Parcel of
Rogues: How Free Trade is Failing Canada; Take Back the
Nation, with economist Bruce Campbell; and Class Warfare: The
Assault on Canada's Schools, with educator Heather-Jane Robertson.
She is currently writing Straight through the Heart, a critical
examination of the Liberal Government's role in developing and
dismantling Canada's social programs. She is a frequent contributor to
other books, periodicals and journals and was recognized with the Ontario
Teachers' Federation's highest award for her outstanding contribution
to education and equality in Canadian schools.
Maude has spoken to hundreds of conferences on the shift of power
from people and democratically-elected governments to transnational
corporations and its impact on our lives. Much of her energy is currently
dedicated to strengthening citizens' rights and developing strategies to
bring our society and
economy under public control while at the same time protecting the
environment.
Maude has served as a senior management consultant on employment
equity and social justice to all levels of government. She was the
Director of the Office of Equal Opportunity for the City of Ottawa and
served as Senior Advisor on Women's Issues to former Prime Minister,
Pierre Elliot Trudeau. She has worked as a volunteer on a landmark human
rights challenge at Kingston Prison for Women, established the Ottawa
Task Force on Wife Assault and led a national coalition against violent
pornography on television.
In 1991, Maude was the only Canadian on an international women's
peace mission to Iraq on the eve of the Gulf War. Her work has taken her
from the slums and low wage factories of Mexico's Maquiladora zone to the
jails of Chiapas, where indigenous people are fighting thebrutal fallout of
NAFTA.