2012 Ethics in Public Administration: Speaking Truth to Power

Transcription

1 2012 Ethics in Public Administration: Speaking Truth to Power 12 th Atlantic Conference on Public Administration 10th February 2012 Halifax, Nova Scotia Presented by the School of Public Administration, Faculty of Management, Dalhousie University

2 Acknowledgements The organizers of the conference gratefully acknowledge the financial support provided for this event by: the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency; Province of Nova Scotia; Nova Scotia Federal Council; The Institute of Public Administration Canada; Faculty of Graduate Studies, Dalhousie University; the Office of the President, Dalhousie University; the Public Administration Student Society (PASS), and the School of Public Administration at Dalhousie University. We would also like to thank the Westin Nova Scotian for providing exceptional food and venue services during the event. On Behalf of the 2012 Atlantic Conference on Public Administration Organizing Committee: Ben Bisset Nichole Bush Laura Campbell David Caplan Peter Carr Eamonn Gaffney Karyn Hemsworth Colin MacDonald Katherine LaFortune Brian LeBlanc Laura Lewis Sarah Maher Melissa Oldrieve Katie Olthuis Rhia Perkins Lisa Perkins Joseph O Brien Karan Riarh Candice Smith Matthew Scott-Moncrieff Kate Somers Sara Strickland Fiona Wang Shangqing Wang Faculty Advisor Dr. Robert Moody Student Paper Adjudicators Dr. Paul Brown Dr. Robert Moody SPA Administrative Assistant Krista Cullymore Masters of Ceremonies Melissa Oldrieve Brett Taylor 1

3 Conference Abstract On February 10th, 2012 The School of Public Administration at Dalhousie University hosted the 12th Annual Atlantic Conference on Public Administration. Programming for this year s conference focused on the topic of Ethics: Speaking Truth to Power. Speakers highlighted many of the ethical issues faced by public servants in an era of complex and multidisciplinary problems. Keynote speakers included Douglas Keefe, former Deputy Minister of Justice and Deputy Attorney General of Nova Scotia; Daphne Meredith, Chief Human Resources Officer for the Government of Canada; and Kelliann Dean, Public Service Commissioner for Nova Scotia. Presentations were also be made by faculty members of the Dalhousie School of Public Administration and students who have participated in the annual paper competition. Private sector perspectives were represented through panel discussion on how the public sector can cooperate and innovate through work with their private sector counterparts. This was our largest and most successful conference to date with a total of 175 attendees. In addition to the 17 speakers and panelists (including several senior private sector participations), there were 78 public servants from all three levels of government, 68 graduate students, and 12 Dalhousie Faculty of Management faculty members. Outlined below is detailed conference program, biographies of keynote speakers and panelists, summaries of Faculty led sessions, and abstracts of the papers submitted and presented for competition for the David MacDonald Memorial Award. Agenda 8:15 REGISTRATION AND BREAKFAST BUFFET Lobby 9:00 WELCOME AND INTRODUCTIONS Dr. Kevin Quigley, Acting Director, Dalhousie School of Public Administration Commonwealth 9:10 OPENING KEYNOTE Douglas Keefe, Doug Keefe Consulting Inc. Commonwealth 10:00 BREAK 10:15 FACULTY LED SESSIONS SESSION A: PUBLIC SERVICE AS TRUE NORTH Dr. Paul Brown, Professor, Dalhousie University SESSION B: MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT AND ENGAGING WITH THE PRIVATE SECTOR RESEARCH AND CASE STUDY Dr. Mark Gilbert, Professor, Dalhousie University Dr. Robert Moody, Adjunct Professor, Dalhousie University Dr. Robert Blunden, Professor, Dalhousie University Commonwealth Lunenburg 2

4 SESSION C: DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION AT WORK Dr. Marguerite Cassin s Diversity Class 11:15 SESSION A: MUNICIPAL SPEAKER Anna Allen, Deputy Mayor, Bridgetown SESSION B: FEDERAL SPEAKER Dr. Jean-François Tremblay, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada 12:00 LUNCH AND KEYNOTE Daphne Meredith, Chief Human Resource Officer, Treasury Board Secretariat of Canada 1:45 PANEL: ENGAGING ETHICALLY WITH THE PRIVATE SECTOR Moderator: Dr. Peggy Cunningham, Dean, Dalhousie Faculty of Management Panelists: Wadih Fares, President and CEO, WM Fares Group Thelma Costello, Partner, Costello Fitt Limited Gordon Stewart, Executive Director, Restaurant Association of Nova Scotia Larry E. Munroe, Auditor General, Halifax Regional Municipality Maritime Lunenburg Commonwealth Commonwealth Commonwealth 2:45 BREAK 3:00 STUDENT PRESENTATIONS G8 Legacy Fund: Ethical Considerations for Public Administration Keira Hanrahan, Meaghan McClurg, Siobhan Shears and Laura Swain Democratizing the Constitution: Evaluating the Proposal to Allow Caucus to Remove a Party Leader Brett Taylor Managing Current Complexity: Critical Energy Infrastructure Failures in North America Colin MacDonald, Melissa Oldreive and Eric Pegolo Relationship between NDP Votes and Income, Age, Education and Immigration in Nova Scotia Constituencies Ben Bisset, David Kruch, Katie Mercier and Connor Thompson Canadian Health Care Budgetary Process and Financial Structure Fiona Wang The Combined Influences of a Feeling and an Idea in Policy-Making: The Case of French Management of Influenza A Adrien Hugerot Assessment of Progressive s Dilemma, Islamophobia, and Immigrant Integration with Regard to Canada Michael Cestnik Commonwealth Lunenberg Maritime 4:00 BREAK 3

5 4:15 PANEL: ETHICS IN HEALTH CARE AND COMMUNITY PLANNING Moderator: William Lahey, Director, Dalhousie Health Law Institute Panelists: Dr. Robert Strang, Chief Public Health Officer, Department of Health and Wellness Nova Scotia Dr. Christy Simpson, Head of the Department of Bioethics at Dalhousie University Pam Cooley, Founder, CarShareHFX Austin French, Manager of Planning, Halifax Department of Planning and Infrastructure Commonwealth 5:15 NETWORKING RECEPTION Atlantic Mezzanine 6:00 DINNER AND EVENING KEYNOTE Kelliann Dean, Nova Scotia Public Service Commissioner and Deputy Minister of Seniors YOUNG PROFESSIONALS PANEL Moderators: Katie Olthuis, Candidate, MPA/MLIS 2013; Peter Carr, Candidate, MPA 2013 Panelists: Natalia Chenier, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada Daniel Adams, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada Anna Crouse, Nova Scotia Department of Community Services Gabryel Joseph, Municipality of East Hants Atlantic Ballroom 4

6 Welcoming Address Dr. Kevin Quigley, Acting Director, School of Public Administration, Dalhousie University On behalf of the School of Public Administration, I would like to take this opportunity to thank sponsors and participants in the 12th Atlantic Conference on Public Administration. This year s conference once again will provide the unique opportunity for public servants, academics and students to gather in a forum for learning through expert insights, workshops and discussions. We are honoured to have such an outstanding and distinguished group of presenters who agreed to share their knowledge and points of view on a range of important topics in public sector management. The theme of this year s conference - Ethics: Speaking Truth to Power allows participants the opportunity to expand their understanding of this public sector topic, which continues to prompt debate and controversy. We would like to thank the many students of the conference committee, Dalhousie s School of Public Administration faculty and the public servants who worked extremely hard to make this event a reality. We could not have put a conference of this level together without the collective efforts of everyone involved. In particular, Bob Moody deserves a special word of thanks for providing excellent leadership as Faculty Advisor. As well, we would like to thank the organizations that financially supported this year s conference as duly noted in your program. We hope you will enjoy the opportunity to listen, discuss and engage in the events throughout the day. Welcome and thank you! Sincerely, Kevin Quigley,Ph.D. Acting Director, School of Public Administration, Dalhousie University Opening Keynote Mr. Douglas Keefe, QC Former Deputy Minister of Justice and Deputy Attorney General of Nova Scotia In his keynote presentation Mr. Keefe began his speech by discussing the concept of truth. As mentioned by Mr. Keefe, it is impossible to know the entire truth as a public servant, and often there is no single truth, but multiple truths, some which are contradictory. He also discussed that there four type of knowns: known knowns, known unknowns, unknown unknowns, and unknown knowns. This is why in the public service it is necessary to bring everything together for discussion to create good public policy. 5

7 Mr. Keefe also provided advice for future and current public servants. He noted that managers and future managers in the public service should pick one thing for someone to improve on, and not attempt to tell someone the whole truth at once. He noted that this is better strategy in order to improve a person's skills, as opposed to 'fixing' them all at once. Additionally, Mr. Keefe mentioned that telling the truth can hurt your credibility, if it doesn't fit into the dominant narrative, the truth isn't always persuasive. He also spoke about situations when public servants need to deal with a crisis. His approach to crisis is to ask three important questions: what, so what, and now what. Step one, the what identifies what is going on. Step two, the so what identifies what it means and the significance. Finally, step three, the now what determines where to go from here? Finally, Mr. Keefe discussed the conference s theme of speaking truth to power. He specifically noted that throughout his career he has aimed to always follow this value and that it has in fact helped his career. He noted that as a public servant the point is not to have the truth it is to figure out the best, or least bad, thing to do, and convince powerful people to do that. Faculty-led Sessions Dr. Paul Brown: Public Service as True North Public services at all levels in Canada are in the midst of what might be called the great recruitment, as many senior public servants retire, and a younger generation is brought in to replace them. This process of renewal is taking place against a similar trend in other organizations, including the private and not-for-profit sectors. To date, the emphasis has been on demand, as the public sector competes, or feels a need to compete, for the brightest and best. This presentation views the great recruitment from the supply side, represented by those who profess to find in public service a calling on, or true north for, their lives. The nature of this call has been little discussed in the literature, and almost not at all in Canada, yet has profound implications for both the individuals and public services involved. This presentation delves into the nature of the calling to public service, drawing on recent insights from psychology and other disciplines. It identifies the pushes and pulls that those trying to live out their calling will find in the crucible of public service bureaucracies, particularly in the Westminster model, and reflects on the challenges and opportunities that they present to public services, in terms of both achieving both effectiveness and high integrity. Dr. Robert Moody, Dr. Mark Gilbert and Dr. Robert Blunden: Municipal Government and Engaging with the Private Sector Using the recent cash for concerts experiences within the Halifax Regional Municipality as the context, several faculty members of Dalhousie s Faculty of Management are undertaking team research to develop one of more case studies for the benefit of students at Dalhousie and beyond. Representing the various schools of management with the Faculty of Management, this 6

8 interdisciplinary work will explore, via the case study method, such topics as good business and good municipal government processes and practices, information management, partnerships with the private sector and ethics. The presentation focused on the process being undertaken and the areas of interest of the faculty undertaking this research project. As this project is a work in progress, no findings were available as part of the presentation. Dr. Marguerite Cassin s class (Karyn Hemsworth, Shangqing Wang, Allison Fraser, and Shira Babins): Diversity and Inclusion at Work Welcome: Karyn introduced the members of the class who were present and gave an overview of some of the requirements of the class and the activities. Some of the requirements included: participating in five activities that push you outside of your comfort zone and reporting back to the group on these experiences; reading a novel related to diversity or the idea of difference; and preparing a research paper based on a topic suggested by the professor. Karyn then read an introduction by Dr Cassin. Canadian Citizenship test: Shangqing presented the group with an actual Canadian Citizenship test. She asked them to answer as many questions as they could on their own and then she went over each answer with the group. The participants eagerly shouted out answers to questions, but found that they were not as familiar with Canada as they had expected. There was some good-natured teasing and the test was well received. Experiences activity: Allison led the group in an interesting thought experiment. She had the participants break into three groups and gave them an envelope with bookmarks. These bookmarks each had suggestions such as What if I went skydiving? What if I asked a stranger for money? The participants were directed to imagine that they were going to do the activity and were given prompting questions such as: What is your initial impression from the activity listed on the card? Under what circumstances would you try the activity on the card? Would you try it by yourself? The goal of this exercise was to make the audience realize the importance of diversity, and guide them out of their comfort zones. Members of the class who were present facilitated discussion and provided insight to the conversations through their own experiences and those that had been shared with the class in the fall. Spaces Discussion: Shira spoke about how buildings and public spaces communicate inclusive or exclusive messages and meanings. She introduced a framework for analysis of the built environment. She then engaged the participants in a discussion and analysis of the Westin compared to the Halifax Brewery Farmer s the Seaport Farmer s markets. 7

9 Closing: Karyn thanked the participants for attending and asked them to challenge themselves to push their comfort level to help them to develop a deeper understanding and appreciation of difference first their own and then the differences of others. Participants were invited to take one of the bookmarks as a reminder of their experience and were encouraged to read one of the books on display (from class reading list). The session seemed well received by everyone present. Participants were deeply engaged in conversation during the experience activity and the conversation was reciprocal between facilitators and presenters throughout the session. Session A: Municipal Speaker Anna Allen, Deputy Mayor, Town of Bridgetown Anna Allen, the Deputy Mayor of Bridgetown began by giving an overview of the town. She noted the following items: The town is responsible for: municipal services, recreation, population, and other general statistics. The population is in decline. An Integrated Sustainability Community Plan has been developed. She then discussed the recent resignation of the Bridgetown Council. Ms Allen noted, that this was the first time in municipal history that a full council has resigned, and possibly the first time in Canada. She then highlighted what went wrong in Bridgetown, including: Misappropriation of funds dating back 6 years. 79K write-off in misappropriated funds, $118K in interest, $24K in miscellaneous. Cash flow issues due to unpaid accounts. Hand-written receipts and adjustments to accounts. Since then new internal controls have been put in place, which include segregation of duties and more transparent methods of accounting. The town is now on a five-year repayment plan of $58K/year. There will also be a $0.16 tax rate hike. In order to stay connected to the individuals of Bridgetown Council has been encouraging citizen participation in all meetings. There has also been strong local media attends as well, to keep public informed. Ms. Allen used the rest of her time to answer questions from the group. This question and answer period facilitated questions on citizen engagement and education, the mayoral recruitment process, new financial procedures and safeguards, what qualities would you look for in a MPA or MPA (M) candidate, and her personal experience as a municipal public servant. Session B: Federal Speaker Dr. Jean-François Tremblay, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister, Policy & 8

10 Strategic Direction, Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada Dr. Tremblay discussed the theme of fearless advice. He noted that it s often a buxom match between public servants and the government. If you are the public servant you think you are the little guy. But if you are the government and the minister they think the opposite, that you are the big guy trying to stop them. He noted that this situation isn t necessarily true, and that his vision is that it is often public servants and the government are going the same direction, but not the same way or maybe even to the same place. Dr. Tremblay also noted that there is always competition for advice, and ministers and politicians are more exposed than anyone to that advice. As current and future public servants individuals need to ask themselves how they fit into this competition of advice, and how you position yourself accordingly. He then discussed what constitutes fearless advice. He defined this as talking someone out of a course of action they ve already begun or been set on, or talking someone into a course of action that they are already averse or resistant to. As part of this process he noted it is important for public servants to focus on the value added. There is nothing worse than going to minister with exactly what they can get elsewhere. Public servants have to come with something more. He encouraged the room to unveil their hidden agenda. Everyone believes that the public service has a hidden agenda so public servants need to be open in terms of what they want, and be careful. Additional advice provided by Dr. Tremblay included: Shape your advice. Don t dictate solutions. Offer options. The option of not having the minister s preferred option in your list of options is not an option. If you think it is not preferred you have to bring additional options. Provide policy advice that is politically sensitive, and expect the politicians to bring political advice that is policy sensitive. Don t overwhelm them be clear. If your minister is new don t give them everything. Only come with what is important, what needs a political discussion, and what is essential for them to focus on. Be a travel agent. Find out why they want to go somewhere and what are the reasons for it. In this way you can better guide them to their destination, and give the appropriate advice. Be opportunistic. You only have so many no cards you can use. When it is too big, go small. Approach problems piecemeal if they are too large. Be modest. At the end if they don t follow your advice, you know what? It s democracy. 9

11 He then opened the floor for questions. Questions included: how do you balance loyalty as a public servant, and what innovations have developed out of mistakes. Thematic Discussion Daphne Meredith, Chief Human Resources Officer, Treasury Broad Secretariat of Canada Ms. Meredith began her address by noting that government is currently in a process of dramatic change and transformation. Due to this current climate, public servants need to be agile in their responses to change, and new public servants need to be a positive creative force. As part of this discussion, she noted that values and ethics are not just about good intentions, but they are principles needed to create a good framework. She discussed that when creating a new values and ethics code it was important to consult heavily with public (who we serve) and public servants. It was important to have the code that would be relevant and alive rather than a piece of paper that is discarded. Through this process the team tried to focus on the behaviors they wanted which included: respect for democracy, respect for people, integrity, and stewardship. Finally, she stated that moving to a value and ethics regime changes everything for government. The old values and ethics process was rules based and often held over managers by human resources professionals. The new method removes these rules and lets public servants make their own decisions using common sense through common values. Panel: Engaging Ethically with the Private Sector Panelists for this session included Wadih Fares, President and CEO, WM Fares Group, Thelma Costello: Partner, Costello Fitt Limited, Gordon Stewart: Executive Director, Restaurant Association of Nova Scotia, and Larry E. Munroe: Auditor General, Halifax Regional Municipality. Dr. Peggy Cunningham, Dean of the Faculty of Management, Dalhousie University, moderated this panel. Panelists drew upon their varied experiences and perspectives in a discussion of ethical issues relevant in collaboration and coordination among various sectors. Topics discussed included land/building zoning, timing of response to RFP applications and heritage preservation vs. business/economic development. 10

12 Student Presentations G8 Legacy Fund: Ethical Considerations for Public Administration - Keira Hanrahan, Meaghan McClurg, Siobhan Shears, Laura Swain The group provided an overview of the G8 summit, including its history in Canada, security and infrastructure concerns. This presentation also addressed the controversy over site locations and infrastructure developed in some questionable areas. As a result, of G8 spending concerns developed that there were some unethical arrangements for spending authority. As noted by the group, this speculation resulted in an intervention by Auditor General. The Auditor General found that the G8 fund was inappropriately managed, both in the location of the funds within the budget and the approvals process. The Auditor General also found that departments were involved too late in the process or not at all, so there was no bureaucratic screening of spending. Ministers involved claimed that there was no intent to mislead the bureaucracy, but rather to streamline process to ensure projects on time and on budget. The group s research question was how and why were accountability structures breached? Findings by the group included: Appropriations - Information in the supplementary estimates was inaccurately given so this did not provide the standard month to review. Elected / Unelected Officials there was a lack of public consultation, and decisions were made through Minister Clement s constituency office rather than his bureaucratic office, which contravenes policy. Treasury Board Accountability Measures - Supplementary estimates failed to break down the spending which contravened the aim of the public reporting of financial documents. Standing Committee There was a move to implement more detailed screening. However, the committee was tasked with specifically investigating the improper supplementary estimates, but voted against doing so despite the recommendations of the Auditor General. Transfer Payments - The lack of paper work does not meet standards for distributing transfer payments, particularly in terms of the lack of transparency in it s spending. Recommendations presented by the group included: Re-evaluate the power of a committee majority on relevant standing committees. Provide orientation for new and returning MPs on creation of estimates and roles and responsibilities. Enforce the consequences outlined in existing policies. 11

13 Democratizing the Constitution: Evaluating the Proposal to Allow Caucus to Remove a Party Leader - Brett Taylor Mr. Talyor s presentation began by providing a brief overview of the book written by Dr. Peter Aucoin, Dr. Lori Turnbull, and Dr. Mark Jarvis Democratizing the Constitution, of which is paper is partly based on. As part of their book the authors provide a number of proposals including should caucus be allowed to remove a party leader? As described by Mr. Taylor the current practice positions the Prime Minister as first among equals and does not allow this individual to be held to account by the House of Commons. He further noted that this undermines responsible government. However, as part of his research Mr. Taylor rejects the recommendation by Aucoin et al. which states that reforming the political party structure to allow caucus to remove party leader would return accountability to Members of Parliament and restrain the executive powers of the Prime Minister. As part of his evaluation, Mr. Taylor applied four tests to evaluate this proposal: unambiguous objective, not reliant on good faith by the Prime Minister, clear mechanism, and does this work in a majority and minority situation. Based on his evaluation the proposal fails in each of these situations. He also noted other issues related to this proposal including that is could further legitimization of political parties, which are extra-constitutional, and that it will not make the Prime Minister accountable to House of Commons, but rather to caucus. He concluded by starting that the problem of inflated Prime Minister power is real and severe, but the proposed reform does not effectively address it. Based on his research he reiterated that it wouldn t enhance robust democracy and would rely on public opinion for enforcement. Finally, he praised the book for bringing the idea to the forefront and stated that several of the other proposals are more useful. Managing Current Complexity: Critical Energy Infrastructure Failures in North America - Colin MacDonald, Melissa Oldreive, Eric Pegolo As stated by the group, energy is part of the Golden Triangle of services interconnected with other essential areas like water. Their paper looked at the 2003 blackout and the 1998 ice storm. Both of these events identified issues with transmission systems that can be caused by many factors that are controllable or not (human error, terrorism, etc.). In addition, the group defined High Reliability Organization (HRO) versus Normal Accident Theory (NAT). HRO redundancy is a safety method, we learn more from our failures, and has an optimistic point of view. NAT redundancy makes a system more complex and thus more vulnerable, failure is inevitable, and has a pessimistic (or realistic) point of view. In the situation of the 1998 Ice Storm there was both a grid failure and a major infrastructure failure. The HRO model found that failures stemmed from insufficient planning and were preventable. The NAT Model found that failures were from complex interdependencies and tight coupling. 12

14 In the situation of the 2003 black out (the largest power outage in North America s history) a joint US/Canada Committee was created and found that human/technical error both occurred, a fallen trees in Ohio had a cascade effect, and that new corporate energy policy needed. This situation demonstrates the need for highly regulated environment and effective sharing of information. As examined by the group under NAT the failure was inevitable. Under HRO there was mismanagement of resources was present, need a more reliable grid (achieved through better standards) and better information sharing. Lessons learned as described by the group included: Our power systems are open to systemic risks Ice Storm: uncertain risks (not common to have such a severe storm severity was unpredictable) 2003 Blackout: complex risks hard to identify the real cause (was it really just a tree in Ohio?) Our systems should not be vulnerable when so much societal dependence is placed on them and because of their position in the Golden Triangle Relationship Between NDP Votes and Income, Age, Education, and Immigrants in Nova Scotia Constituencies in Ben Bisset, David Kruch, Katie Mercier, Connor Thompson Through their research the group concluded that income, immigrant status, and median age not correlated to NDP votes. Education was slightly correlated to NDP votes. Based on correlation the independent variables were relatively highly correlated, for example residents with higher income may have attained higher levels of education. This model was valid, but barely. The group also ran a simple linear regression of education versus votes for NDP. This model was found to be significant. There were some limitations identified by the group which include the following: Used riding s median age, proportion of immigrants. The research does not catch outliers extremely wealthy, older, etc Finally, the group conducted a second linear regression model using post-secondary education and proportion of votes valid. Through this model the group found that the factors of how and why people vote is not quantifiable. Individuals don t vote for a party just based on party s merits and for no other factors. Further areas of research proposed by the group included: Increasing sample size. Including more elections to provide information on trends across time, especially considering increased viability of NDP over the years. Including other parties in the analysis. Examining these considerations at a provincial level 13

15 Canadian Health Care: Budgetary Process and Financial Structure Fiona Wang This project was intended to try and determine if the funding pattern for health care is consistent throughout the country. Ms. Wang s research found that the funding patterns are consistent in the provinces but not in the territories for reasons such as geographic distribution. She noted that provinces must follow set principles in order to qualify for health transfers, and that after a province receives federal transfers the majority of money will be allocated to regional health institutions. Ms. Wang used the United Kingdom (UK) health system (England in particular) as a comparison. She found that the UK collects funding from both private and public sources. Furthermore, in the UK for contributions for health care comes from both general taxation and national insurance contribution. Through this comparison she also identified similarities between the UK and Canada. However, a fundamental difference is that in the UK the national government administers the health care system while in Canada each province administers health services, and does so in slightly different ways. The Combined Influences of a Feeling and an Idea in Policy-Making: The Case of French Management of Influenza A Adrien Hugerot The paper examined to what extent can fear change the design and development and implementation of public policy, is rationality absolutely essential in public policy, and is it really possible to develop a satisfactory policy response in the very short term. The paper examined situations in both France and Canada. In Canada, the research found that Canadians expressed little concern regarding Influenza A despite feeling of not being properly prepared. In Canada, there were twenty-five deaths due to Influenza A. In France, individuals were also not worried despite feeling of being well prepared. In France, there were no deaths. As part of the response to Influenza A there was a change in the definition of pandemic crisis, which occurred during the crisis itself. This required it to go to alert level 6 and affected the decisions of numerous countries including France. The research determined that this happened due to a lack of scientific knowledge about the virus, excess zeal in terms of doses, and bypassing of pharmacists and hospital practitioners. Assessment of Progressive s Dilemma, Islamophobia, and Immigrant Integration with regard to Canada Michael Cestnik This presentation focused on the decline of individuals born in Canada and issues surrounding immigration. It specially focused on progressives dilemma which examines the tension between diversity and solidarity. As part of this theory many progressives fear that they face a tradeoff between support for multiculturalism and support for redistribution. 14