Tenure, the Canadian tar sands and 'Ethical Oil'

Abstract

Canada, despite its long democratic tradition, has a record of attempts to suppress inconvenient scientific findings. This has intensified since 2006, when the new conservative government of Canada began its systematic and well-documented assault on the functioning, independence and integrity of the environmental science performed in federal governmental lab- oratories, which is largely attributed to its focus on developing Canada's tar sands and Arctic off- shore oil, while denying the reality of global warming. Academic tenure, still a major feature of Canada's research universities, appears to be one of the few obstacles to this strategy of silencing environmental scientists concerned about this course of action.