As the world shut down five years ago, Dal's MacEachen Institute for Public Policy and Governance flung its doors open, figuratively speaking inviting epidemiologists, health officers, economists, ethicists, and other experts in to discuss the COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts.
For Dr. Kevin Quigley, the institute's director and a renowned expert in risk governance and 'big bang' events, it was just the sort of crisis the national, non-partisan policy hub he leads was well-positioned to help navigate.
"We knew it was a big deal. We knew this wasn't just going to be a health problem it was going to be an economics problem, a security problem, a supply chain problem, a legal problem. There were so many dimensions to it," he says.
The institute established in 2015 with a $2.25 million donation in honour of Allan J. MacEachen, a prominent Cape Breton-born federal politician and architect of modern Canadian social policy had already built a reputation for sparking insightful cross-sector policy conversations. Its best-known efforts included its popular Policy Matters speaker series from 2017-2019, which drew standing-room only crowds and TV cameras to its on-campus talks featuring high-profile subject-matter experts.
But the pandemic galvanized the institute's work in new ways. Its events looked different, with smaller roundtables and more virtual panels, yet the discussions grew more frequent and proved more urgent than ever. When Dr. Quigley decided to launch a book project about the pandemic with a few of his student researchers, it was the start of a five-year odyssey that culminated in celebration this year when the publication was short-listed for the Donner Prize one of Canada's most prestigious book awards.
Seized by Uncertainty: The Markets, Media, and Special Interests That Shaped Canada's Response to COVID-19, co-authored by Dr. Quigley together with Kaitlynne Lowe, Sarah Moore and Brianna Wolfe all of whom are now Dal alumni explores how Canadian governments at various levels responded to the pandemic: gathering information, setting standards, and changing behaviours.
A distinctive achievement
Dalhousie has a strong history with the Donner Prize, awarded by jury to the top public policy book in Canada each year. Past Dal winners include Political Science's Brian Bow (2009) and the team of Lori Turnbull, Mark Jarvis and the late Peter Aucoin (2011). Frank Harvey, another political scientist, was also shortlisted for the prize (2005). But winners and finalists are typically publications with single authors or teams of well-established academics. Recognition of a scholarly work coauthored with students constitutes a distinctive collaborative achievement.
The Donner Canadian Foundation, which presents the award, describes the five nominees for its prize as "public policy books that need to be read."
"That's very powerful for me to hear that," says Dr. Quigley, who marshalled new funding during the pandemic to offer full-time positions to his student researchers and bring influential pandemic players together for pressing policy discussions. These events including one of the first pandemic-era panels featuring Atlantic Canada's chief public health officers in September 2020 helped shape the team's approach to the project.
Students have been crucial to the work of the institute from its launch a decade ago, serving in several capacities as researchers, event planners, communications managers, and more. Two other students (now alumni) co-authored Dr. Quigley 2017's book Too Critical to Fail: How Canada Manages Threats to Critical Infrastructure, also a Donner finalist.
Kaitlynne Lowe, one of the researchers on the pandemic book, has been involved with the institute since it was just an idea on paper. She was one of the students on the committee that approved its creation a decade ago, there as an undergraduate representing the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences alongside peers from the institute's other founding Faculties, Management and Law. (Health and Science joined later). She went on to become a part-time research assistant, eventually moving to full time during COVID.
She says an "immense amount of data" was gathered for the COVID book, to which she contributed information and analysis in sections on masking, vaccines, and other topics.
"Everything was constantly evolving and changing," she says. "I got to be involved from the ideas and information-gathering stage all the way to the fruition of a publication."
I got to be involved from the ideas and information-gathering stage all the way to the fruition of a publication
Lowe, now working primarily as a research manager on a project at Mount Saint Vincent University, says her time with the MacEachen Institute has been "immensely" helpful to her growth as a researcher.
"That interdisciplinary lens has really helped me in developing a big-picture approach to some really complex issues," she says.
Training the next generation
As with most university institutes, the MacEachen group's mission centres around both research and educational goals. Training the next generation of policymakers is a priority that Dr. Quigley and the institute's other guiding lights take seriously.
Darrell Dexter, vice-chair of the government relations and communications firm Global Public Affairs and former premier of Nova Scotia, joined the institute in 2017 as honourary distinguished fellow. He has played an integral role in several of the institute's initiatives over the years from helping facilitate the Policy Matters series to contributing his own personal policy experiences in courses specially designed by the institute for Dal's Masters of Public Administration program.
Dexter says good public policy should improve people's quality of life and be forward thinking, sitting above the more reactive day-to-day machinations of governments yet remaining adaptable.
"Public policy is not necessarily static. It's not like a fly stuck in amber," he says. "It's got to be able to change even if the core kind of policy stays intact."
He notes how MacEachen alumni have gone on to work in a vast range of roles in federal and provincial governments and beyond.
We're providing a really valuable foundation for these future policymakers
"We've always sought to maximize the impact that we can have for the students," says Dexter, who will be joining Dr. Quigley and the co-authors at the Donner awards ceremony this Thursday. "I think we're providing a really valuable foundation for these future policymakers so that they're literally going out into the world and able to fit kind of right into these very important positions."
"I think the success of that speaks for itself," he adds.
Acting fast to add value
In addition to books, Dr. Quigley and his team have been committed from day one to creating actionable information quickly across a wide range of critical policy areas by publishing regular policy briefing notes they distribute widely. They've tackled a huge array of topics, from climate change and emergency management to the way people with disabilities experience tourism and beyond. (You can find all the institute's research reports and briefing notes on its website).
Even much of the research reflected in Seized by Uncertainty was first issued in briefing notes.
"We're not waiting two years to get journal articles reviewed, and we weren't waiting five years for a book to be published," says Dr. Quigley. "I feel that's very important, to be focused outwardly. I say that to my staff all the time: We need to be careful that we're doing things to help people far and wide and off campus. We can't get too insular in the work we do.'"
As the MacEachen Institute caps off its first decade, it does so as a more influential voice than ever. It's not lost on Dr. Quigley how integral students have been to that success.
"It was a monumental task to pull all that together," he says. "I simply couldn't have done it as a single prof working in a department."
