Featured News & Events (Secondary)

Professor Paul Evans was featured as a panelist in this virtual Q&A Town Hall event hosted by the Munk School of Public Policy, questioning whats next for Canada-China relations following the return of the two Micheals.

The UBC School of Public Policy and Global Affairs welcomes applicants interested in applying for nomination to the prestigious Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship Program.

Dozens of scientists say they have received death threats and other forms of harassment after media interviews on Covid-19. Professor Heidi Tworek (SPPGA; History) comments on this phenomenon.

Read this new collection of essays and illustrations from the Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies, offering 10 illustrated meditations on crisis from the 2020 Wall Scholars. Professor Ramana writes on the nuclear crisis in Japan at a time of global upheaval.

Achieving carbon neutrality is a matter that’s the source of headache for many politicians. But if there’s one country with clear and ambitious energy targets, it’s Finland. Former Postdoctoral Fellow Vincent Ialenti comments on Finland’s “mankala model”.

As the country ramps up for the Canadian federal election taking place on September 20, 2021, our SPPGA faculty are observing closely as political fervor sweeps the nation.

While candidates of the 2021 Canadian election have taken to social media to promote their campaigns, they often receive hostile responses. Professor Heidi Tworek and Chris Tenove discuss the impact that negative social media posts are having on political candidates, and states that all Canadians need to be part of the strategy to combat incivility.

East Asian countries aced the COVID-19 battle in 2020 through strategies of implementing strict measures rapidly and effectively. Professor Yves Tiberghien (SPPGA Faculty Associate; Political Science) discusses how the largely successful East Asia COVID-19 model has partially fragmented since the summer of 2021 in the face of the Delta variant and growing socio-economic costs.

Latin America and Caribbean continues to face dire ecological challenges. Claudia Ituarte-Lima argues that cooperation between vibrant grass-roots, civil society and government will be vital in championing the global recognition of the right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment.

SPPGA Professor Ramana says it would be hard for Reliance Industries, which owns the world’s largest oil refining complex, to dissociate from the emissions-heavy fossil fuel business despite their efforts to build more environmentally friendly products.

A rapidly warming climate has people questioning whether nuclear power is a viable option for decarbonisation. Director Allison Macfarlane warns that the construction time for nuclear plants is much longer compared to renewable projects and America “can’t afford to wait that long” (Subscription).

Climate services are intended to improve climate-sensitive decisions by making climate information ‘useful, useable and used’. Professor Milind Kandlikar’s (SPPGA; IRES) co-authors a study to evaluate whether this model of climate science has been successfully implemented in the public sector (Subscription).

Read the latest paper that Professor Veena Sriram (SPPGA; SPPH) co-authored on the governance of health workforces. In particular, the paper focuses on the colonial origins of regulatory policies and their impact on low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) today.

“We were born on a damaged planet careening toward environmental collapse. Yet our intellects are poorly equipped to grasp the scale of the Earth’s ecological death spiral.” As an anthropologist, Postdoctoral Fellow Vincent Ialenti shows us how thinking across time can help us become more responsible planetary stewards and foster empathy across generations.

How do current discussions around disinformation leave out or misinterpret history, and why should policymakers care? Professor Heidi Tworek (SPPGA; History) delves into how to better inform conversations around disinformation and misinformation.

After state officials unveiled Wyoming’s Natrium nuclear project, industry critics are doubtful plans will follow through. Director Allison Macfarlane warns that “we can’t pin our hopes on [nuclear] as the thing that’s going to get us out of the next 20 [crucial] years.”

Professor Heidi Tworek (SPPGA; History) breaks down how we can have healthy conversations with our loved ones about getting vaccinated and what could be done to address the factors behind vaccine hesitancy.