Corporatizing Canada
Making Business out of Public Service
From schools to hospitals, from utilities to food banks, over the past thirty years corporatization has transformed the public sector in Canada. Economic elites take control of public institutions and use business metrics to evaluate their performance, transforming public programs into corporate revenue streams.
Senior managers use corporate methodology to set priorities in social services and create “market-friendly” public sector cultures. Even social activist organizations increasingly look and act like multinational corporations while non-governmental organizations pursue partnerships with the same corporations they ostensibly oppose.
Corporatizing Canada critically examines how corporatization has been implemented in different ways across the Canadian public sector and warns us of the threat that neoliberal corporatization poses to democratic decision-making and the public at large.
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Praise
This collection brings together the work of activist and academics to chart the increasing domination of business logic to the detriment of access, affordability, accountability, and quality. An excellent read—and a strong call to action.
– Janet Siltanen, professor of sociology and political economy, Carleton University
This exceptional collection reveals the profound influence of neoliberal corporatization on the management, mission, and delivery of public services in contemporary Canada. The essays clearly demonstrate the many subtle ways in which the boundaries between the public and private have become progressively blurred, narrowing the scope of democratic decision-making, and the very idea of the public itself.
– Janine Brodie, Distinguished University Professor and Canada Research Chair, Political Economy and Social Governance, University of Alberta
Corporatization is commonly misunderstood as a dimension of monolithic global forces associated with neoliberalism, advancing marketization while eroding state autonomy and welfare state capacity. Corporatizing Canada highlights several contemporary examples, often framed in a broader historical context, that demonstrate the multifaceted nature of corporatization, while providing insight into alternative approaches that may maintain or revive collective interests, commitments to public oversight of essential services, and approaches oriented to equity and social justice. This is an indispensable offering for anyone seeking to understand the nature of the Canadian state, offering deep insights into the complex, changing dynamics of the intersections between public and private interests.
– Terry Wotherspoon, Department of Sociology,University of Saskatchewan
Contents
| Introduction | Jamie Brownlee, Chris Hurl, and Kevin Walby |
| Chapter 1 | Healthy Profit: Private Finance and Public Hospitals Heather Whiteside |
| Chapter 2 | Three Waves of Health Care Corporatization in Ontario Hospitals Natalie Mehra |
| Chapter 3 | The Rise of the Corporate Cashroom: Corporatization and the Neoliberal Canadian School Erika Shaker |
| Chapter 4 | Carbon Capital and Corporate Influence: Mapping Elite Networks of Corporations, Universities, and Research Institutes William K. Carroll , Nicolas Graham, and Zoë Yunker |
| Chapter 5 | International Students as a Market in Canadian Public Education Larry Kuehn |
| Chapter 6 | How and Why to Change the Ways We Try to Change the Corporatization of Canada's Universities Claire Polster |
| Chapter 7 | Police Foundations and the Corporatization of Criminal Justice in Canada Kevin Walby and Randy K. Lippert |
| Chapter 8 | Do Construction Companies Create Criminal Justice Policy? Reflections on the Nature of Corporate Power in the Canadian State Greg McElligott |
| Chapter 9 | Corporatizing Therapeutic Justice: The Case of the Winnipeg Drug Treatment Court Kelly S. Gorkoff |
| Chapter 10 | Corporatization and Federal-Provincial Relations Peter Graefe |
| Chapter 11 | Corporatizing Urban Policy-Making: Management Consultants , Service Reviews , and Municipal Restructuring Chris Hurl |
| Chapter 12 | Managerialism and Outsourcing: Corporatizing Social Services in Canada’s Non-Profit Sector Donna Baines |
| Chapter 13 | The Corporatization of Food Charity in Canada: Implications for Domestic Hunger, Poverty Reduction, and Public Policy Graham Riches |
| Chapter 14 | Pipelines, Regulatory Capture, and Canada’s National Energy Board Jamie Brownlee |
| Chapter 15 | Murky Waters: When Governments Turn Water Management into a Business Emma Lui |
| Chapter 16 | Learning from Corporatization: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly David A. McDonald |
| Contributors’ Biographies |
