There is an impasse in local policing: more people are beginning to suspect that more policing does not meaningfully reduce crime, but they are also conditioned to fear any reduction in policing because of a belief that lawlessness and chaos would ensue. In this talk, Desmond Cole will explore policing both in terms of the physical and psychological harms it causes, and the tremendous amount of resources it consumes. At a very fundamental level, police operate like a gang that maintains its power through coercion and blackmail. This is the shakedown.

6:00 – 6:45 p.m.:  Social with hors d'oeuvres
7:00 – 8:30 p.m.:  Keynote followed by Question Period

Desmond Cole is a journalist, radio host, and activist. His debut book, The Skin We’re In, won the Toronto Book Award and was a finalist for the Forest of Reading Evergreen Award and the Rakuten Kobo Emerging Writer Prize. It was also named a best book of 2020 by The Globe and Mail, NOW Magazine, CBC, Quill & Quire, and Indigo. Cole’s writing has appeared in the Toronto Star, Toronto Life, The Walrus, and the Ottawa Citizen, among others. He lives in Toronto.

H.T. Reid Lecture Series

The H.T. Reid Lecture Series, a collaboration of the Department of History and Classics and the Department of Politics, was established in 1958 in order to give the opportunity to an “eminent scholar or person of affairs” to publicly address the university community on issues of politics and history.

While the lecture was originally intended to address issues concerning the British Commonwealth, it now also explores contemporary social, economic, and political issues at global, national, regional and local levels. Nova Scotia’s rich and contested history (including Mi’kmaq/Settler relations, the Acadian Expulsion, and the Afro-Nova Scotian experience) offers an important context in which H.T. Reid Lecture awardees are able to explore historical and contemporary political issues.

Learn more about the H.T. Reid Lecture Series, and past keynote speakers.