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Or sign-in if you have an account.Photo by Getty Images/iStockphotoRemember that time Stephen Harper was given an honorary degree by a Canadian university?Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.Exclusive articles by Conrad Black, Barbara Kay and others. Plus, special edition NP Platformed and First Reading newsletters and virtual events.Unlimited online access to National Post.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.Support local journalism.Enjoy the latest local, national and international news.Exclusive articles by Conrad Black, Barbara Kay and others. Plus, special edition NP Platformed and First Reading newsletters and virtual events.Unlimited online access to National Post.National Post ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition to view on any device, share and comment on.Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword.Support local journalism.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one account.Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments.Enjoy additional articles per month.Get email updates from your favourite authors.Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience.Access articles from across Canada with one accountShare your thoughts and join the conversation in the commentsEnjoy additional articles per monthGet email updates from your favourite authorsSign In or Create an AccountorOf course you don’t. Because it never happened.Despite leaving office more than a decade ago, no Canadian university has offered this long-serving prime minister an honorary degree. Compare this to Jean Chrétien, who received honorary degrees from six Canadian universities before he became prime minister, three more while in office, and at least three more since. Paul Martin, who served only three years as prime minister, received two while still a cabinet minister and at least 19 more after he retired.Who we honour tells us a lot about what we value.This newsletter from NP Comment tackles the topics you care about. (Subscriber-exclusive edition on Fridays)By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc.We encountered an issue signing you up. Please try againBefore they get the chance to watch their child walk across the stage, relatives at convocation ceremonies must sit through speeches from the honorary recipients. You expect platitudes, maybe some inspiration. The main goal is to not put grandma to sleep.Sometimes these speeches are incredible — go online and watch Will Ferrell’s commencement address at the University of Southern California for the best-case scenario. More likely, the audience at a Canadian graduation will be forced to listen to someone talk about social justice.Looking through the list of honorary degree recipients at Canadian universities is a reminder of how ideologically homogeneous these institutions are. There are, to be sure, many outstanding in their field. This year we have Sir David MacMillan at UBC, a Nobel Prize winner in Chemistry, and the remarkable novelist Guy Gavriel Kay at the University of Manitoba.But you don’t have to go far before politics starts to seep in. Desmond Cole, the activist-journalist who left the Toronto Star in 2017 after choosing activism over journalism, is receiving two honorary degrees this year — one from Ontario Tech and another from Trent University. Judy Rebick, the outspoken feminist activist, is also receiving a degree from Trent. Marion Buller, who led the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls inquiry and was responsible for its outrageous claim that the phenomenon constituted “genocide,” is being honoured by the University of Toronto. Concordia is giving a degree to Gina McCarthy, former National Climate Advisor in the Biden White House.Many other recipients who have accomplishments in other areas of their lives are specifically recognized for their commitments to reconciliation and DEI. At most universities, a Senate committee receives nominations from across the institution and selects the candidates. Over the last decade, these committees have been explicitly instructed to embed DEI principles into their criteria — not merely seeking diverse candidates, which might be reasonable, but singling out support for progressive conceptions of DEI as a reason to choose a recipient. This is because the committees must align their choices with university values and with strategic plans, all of which center DEI as a governing philosophy.There’s nothing wrong, in principle, with honouring activists. You can contribute to Canadian public life by pursuing political goals.The problem is that it only goes one way. Looking across all honorary degree recipients this year, the only recognizably right-of-centre figure is former Finnish president Sauli Niinistö, a centre-right politician being honoured at the University of Calgary. No Canadian conservative appears anywhere on the list. Not one university, conferring dozens of degrees between them, thought to honour a single obviously conservative Canadian. That is their idea of diversity.Is this a conspiracy? Probably not. But it is a textbook case of systemic bias. Universities are populated overwhelmingly by people who share a homogeneous worldview. They are the ones nominating candidates. Those nominations are then filtered through committees explicitly instructed to favour recipients who embody progressive DEI values.Imagine the reverse. If universities leaned right and committees were instructed to favour those who champion conservative conceptions of social order, Stephen Harper would top the list. Former Saskatchewan premier Brad Wall and former cabinet minister Rona Ambrose would follow. But the more revealing cases come further down. If Desmond Cole can receive an honorary degree, why not Jonathan Kay — journalist, former editor of the Walrus, and a genuine contributor to Canadian public debate? Why not Brian Lee Crowley, founder of the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, or Mark Milke, founder of the Aristotle Foundation? These are precisely the kinds of public intellectuals — fighters for their conception of a just society — that universities celebrate on the left. Why not the right?To be more provocative, but no more so than in the cases of Cole or Rebick: why not former Harper advisor and academic Tom Flanagan? Or John Carpay, whose legal challenges to COVID-19 restrictions represent exactly the kind of principled dissent that universities seem to admire — at least when it comes from the left.All of these figures are at least as accomplished as many being honoured this year. Many believe deeply in social justice — just with different assumptions about what “just” means.When Zak Patterson and I published research showing the political composition of Canadian universities some years ago, one of the most striking responses came from those who insisted our numbers were wrong and our surveys flawed. A clearer case of motivated reasoning would be hard to find.But if hard data on the political beliefs of university faculty isn’t convincing enough, just attend a convocation ceremony this spring. The ideological skew will be on full display — one last kick in the teeth for any non-leftist student or parent. You thought tuition was too high? Here’s one more insult on your way out the door.National Post Join the Conversation This website uses cookies to personalize your content (including ads), and allows us to analyze our traffic. Read more about cookies here. By continuing to use our site, you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.