 |
|
|
|||||
Canada’s next prime minister has helped run two Group of Seven economies in crisis before and now will try to steer Canada through a looming trade war brought by U.S. President Donald Trump, a threat of annexation, and an expected federal election.Former central banker Mark Carney will become prime minister after the governing Liberal Party elected him its leader Sunday in a landslide vote with 85.9% support.Carney, 59, replaces Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who announced his resignation in January but remains prime minister until his successor is sworn in in the coming days. Carney is widely expected to trigger an election the coming days or weeks amid Trump’s sweeping tariff threats. Canada ‘didn’t ask for this fight’ “We didn’t ask for this fight. But Canadians are always ready when someone else drops the gloves,” Carney said. “The Americans, they should make no mistake, in trade, as in hockey, Canada will win.”Carney said Canada will keep its initial retaliatory tariffs in place until “the Americans show us respect.”Carney navigated crises when he was the head of the Bank of Canada and when in 2013 he became the first noncitizen to run the Bank of England since it was founded in 1694. His appointment won bipartisan praise in the U.K. after Canada recovered from the 2008 financial crisis faster than many other countries. He helped managed the worst impacts of Brexit in the U.K.The opposition Conservatives hoped to make the election about Trudeau, whose popularity declined as food and housing prices rose and immigration surged.Trump’s trade war and his talk of making Canada the 51st U.S. state have infuriated Canadians, who are booing the American anthem at NHL and NBA games. Some are canceling trips south of the border, and many are avoiding buying American goods when they can. Canadian nationalism surges The surge in Canadian nationalism has bolstered the Liberal Party’s chances in a parliamentary election expected within days or weeks, and Liberal showings have been improving in opinion polls.“The Americans want our resources, our water, our land, our country. Think about it. If they succeed they would destroy our way of life,” Carney said. “In America healthcare is big business. In Canada, it is a right.”Carney said America is “a melting pot. Canada is mosaic,” he said. “America is not Canada. And Canada will never, ever will be a part of America in any way, shape, or form.”After decades of bilateral stability, the vote on Canada’s next leader now is expected to focus on who is best equipped to deal with the United States.“These are dark days, dark days brought on by a country we can no longer trust,” Carney said. “We need to pull together in the tough days ahead.”Trump has postponed 25% tariffs on many goods from Canada and Mexico for a month, amid widespread fears of a broader trade war. But he has threatened other tariffs on steel, aluminum, dairy, and other products.Carney picked up one endorsement after another from Cabinet ministers and members of Parliament since declaring his candidacy in January. He is a highly educated economist with Wall Street experience who has long been interested in entering politics and becoming prime minister, but he lacks political experience.Trudeau previously offered to make him finance minister. Carney has said former Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper also offered to make him finance minister. Former Goldman Sachs executive Carney is a former Goldman Sachs executive. He worked for 13 years in London, Tokyo, New York, and Toronto, before being appointed deputy governor of the Bank of Canada in 2003.In 2020, he began serving as the United Nations’ special envoy for climate action and finance.The other top Liberal leadership candidate was former Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, who received just 8% of the vote. Trudeau told Freeland in December that he no longer wanted her as finance minister, but that she could remain deputy prime minister and the point person for U.S.-Canada relations. Freeland resigned shortly after, releasing a scathing letter about the government that proved to be the last straw for Trudeau.Either Carney will call an election in the coming days or weeks, or the opposition parties in Parliament could force one with a no-confidence vote later this month.Trudeau urged Liberals supporters to get involved.“This is a nation-defining moment. Democracy is not a given. Freedom is not a given. Even Canada is not a given,” Trudeau said. Rob Gillies Associated Press
Category:
E-Commerce
Before leaving office, former President Joe Biden declared the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) the law of the land. The 28th Amendment, which declares that Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex, is operative, according to ERA advocates. Now that Biden acknowledged the ERA, the next steps are celebration and implementation, says Kati Hornung, cofounder and executive director of VoteEquality!, a nonpartisan group promoting equal rights for all. The American Bar Association passed a resolution in October 2024 affirming the 28th Amendment achieved every requirement for ratification under Article V of the Constitution. ABAs resolution urges federal, state, local, territorial, and tribal governments to support implementation of the Equal Rights Amendment and urges all bar associations and the legal community as a whole to support implementation of the ERA. However, there are skeptics. When Congress proposed the ERA in 1972, they made it a conditional proposal to add language to the Constitution, if and only if, it was ratified within seven years, says Stephen E. Sachs, the Antonin Scalia Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. The original deadline for ratification was 1979 but Congress voted to extend that to 1982. Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the ERA in January 2020. If people are supportive of it, they need to go back to the beginning, they should propose it again and we’ll see if the country wants to ratify it, Sachs says. Despite skepticism by opponents, ERA advocates say they are moving forward with implementation. Federal, state, and local jurisdictions should begin reviewing their laws for sexism and sexist language because any statute contrary to the ERA would be unconstitutional. Meanwhile, plaintiffs can cite the 28th Amendment in discrimination cases. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), an outspoken advocate for the ERA, is working on a bill that would require a review of federal laws to eliminate any sexism or sexist language. “If this administration wants to go after womens rights, well see you in court, says Sen. Gillibrand. State ERAs could provide more protection Yet, for there to be broad-based acceptance of the ERA, advocates will need politicians and judges to endorse this idea, says Ting Ting Cheng, director of the ERA project at Columbia Law School Center for Gender and Sexuality Law. Given all the upheaval happening in Washington, D.C., Cheng admits the ERA might not gain any additional political champions at the moment. But, Cheng says, that doesnt mean the ERA isnt the 28th Amendment. No executive order will undo the ratification of 38 states, she says. Executive orders cannot override the United States Constitution, federal statutes, or established legal precedent. Instead, Cheng believes there may be more opportunity for success in the current political climate at the state level because 28 states have their own ERAs with language that is more inclusive and expansive than the language in the 28th Amendment. Most state ERAs include a broader definition of sex to include sexual orientation, gender identity, or expression, she says. For instance, New York State recently passed an ERA that states, No person shall, because of race, color, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, creed [or], religion, or sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, pregnancy, pregnancy outcomes, and reproductive healthcare and autonomy, be subjected to any discrimination in [his or her] their civil rights by any other person or by any firm, corporation, or institution, or by the state or any agency or subdivision of the state, pursuant to law. State ERAs have been used to challenge and overturn abortion restrictions. In Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and New Mexico, state ERAs were used to protect public funding for abortion. In addition to protecting women, state ERAs can be used to push against federal policies targeting trans youth healthcare and immigration, Cheng says. People are not thinking creatively about state ERAs, Cheng says. The passage of these state ERAs are not under dispute and, in many cases, they can provide more protections than the federal ERA, she says. States could become gender justice laboratories, she adds. States are finding their statues are biased against women Several states without ERAs, including Arizona and North Carolina, have completed reviews of their state statutes to find potentially outdated or discriminatory language in anticipation of the 28th Amendments enactment. ERA Task Force AZ issued a 652-page report Equality for All that proposes changes to state statutes to comply with the federal ERA. Many suggested changes include adopting neutral terms such as person instead of masculine terms such as men or chairman, says Dianne Post, cochair of ERA Task Force AZ. The most serious problems we found were in criminal law, in healthcare related to abortion, and family law, she says. A copy of the report was sent to every state legislator but, so far, none of the proposed changes have been made, Post says. She anticipates several bills will be introduced this legislative session. Meanwhile in North Carolina, the ERA-NC Alliance conducted a review of its state statutes and found more than 21,000 gender specific terms that needed further review, according to Audrey Muck, the alliances copresident. One of the most concerning is the term femme coverture, which means a married woman has no independent legal rights and cannot enter contracts or own property without her husbands permission, and is still in the states code of law. The Alliance brought that issue to the North Carolina General Statutes Commission and the Commission is seeking a technical correction. With or without the ERA, any state would want to make sure their statutes apply equally to men and women, says Greg McConnell, chief pro bono officer at Winston & Strawn LLP, the law firm that helped the ERA-NC Alliance review its state statutes.
Category:
E-Commerce
Harvard Business Publishing Corporate Learning recently surveyed leaders and L&D professionals about what theyre looking for in a leadership development program. At the top of the list? Scalability. One of my passionsand one of the reasons my company developed our own learning platformis expanding access to leadership development, so its exciting to see companies recognizing how important scalability is. At the same time; however, I know that making scalability work at your organization can be a tall order. For a long time, scalability and quality have seemed at odds in leadership development. An organization could spend its budget on highly effective, but expensive options like coaching for fewer people. Or it could bring leadership development to more employees, but settle for cookie-cutter programs. But that conundrum is becoming a thing of the past. Scalability and quality can go together in leadership developmentno matter the size of your training budget. To get both, though, you have to embrace an approach thats both high-tech and high-touch. Why is scalability so important? Before we get into the nuts and bolts of scaling quality leadership development, lets talk about why its such a big deal right now. For starters, theres a real gap in leadership pipelines. Only 20% of companies feel confident that they have strong future leaders lined up, and this is something we hear from clients all the time. At the same time, companies are starting to recognize the power of informal leadersthe people who dont have a leadership title but still play a huge role in driving teams forward. A recent Harvard Business Publishing report highlights how organizations are shifting toward flatter structures and more cross-functional collaboration. That means people who used to simply carry out tasks are now expected to influence stakeholders, make strategic decisions, and communicate business impactin other words, to lead, even without a formal title. With leadership expectations evolving, the challenge isnt just developing leadersits making sure leadership skills reach everyone who needs them. With tech, think beyond AI That brings us back to the question of how to make leadership development more scalable while maintaining quality. With just about any issue in business, people seem to rush to AI as the answer. While exciting things are going on, AI isnt a magic-bullet solution for leadership development yet. The lingering problem is getting people (and teams) to actually use and benefit from them. But AI can be part of your scalability solution. In the Harvard survey, 60% of respondents said theyre incorporating AI into their development programs. (As my own company trains an AI coach, were focusing on making sure that using the coach will fit into peoples busy schedules.) However, dont let AI overshadow other useful technologies. Micro-learning platforms are another huge trend right now, with nine out of 10 L&D professionals saying that the employees they serve prefer them. Ive seen firsthand with our own platform how busy professionals embrace using snackable content to get leadership insights when and where they need them. Technology can also extend the reach of other leadership development tools. If youre used to thinking in terms of using a single leadership development program at your organization, this may require a shift in mindset. But theres lots of potential. For example, my company is very excited right now about the potential of combining our learning platform with our coaching services to help companies stretch their budgets farther. Enlist your current leaders for development As I touched on earlier, technology is only part of the story when it comes to scaling leadership development. Leaders will always need to learn from other leaders, no matter how advanced AI and other high-tech tools become. Ive also found that most organizations havent fully tapped into the knowledge their own people have. Unleashing this knowledge makes it a whole lot easier to scale leadership development. One strategy I always recommend is teaching your current leaders (including the informal ones) how they can help develop others. Ensure that the development they receive includes both coaching and delegation skills. Employees whose managers are adept coaches are eight times more engaged. And delegation gives employees a chance to grow in the flow of workIve seen firsthand that this approach amplifies engagement, innovation, and customer satisfaction. Another way to enlist current leaders in scaling development is creating a mentoring program or updating your current one. Some of your employees may already have mentors or mentees, but formalizing mentorship programs makes them more powerful. Mentorship doesnt just impart the information your people need to develop as leaders. It also ensures that information is relevantthe touchstone of an effective leadership development programand it helps build the relationships your future leaders need. Whats next? Im optimistic about scalable leadership development and the possibilities it holds. Making leadership development available to more employees will affect productivityand even small shifts in productivity across a large population of employees can lead to big results. So how do you want to get the ball rolling to integrate scalability into your organizations approach?
Category:
E-Commerce
All news |
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||