Massey is Missing COP26 – Part V: The Role of the Arts and Culture In Building Public Momentum for Ambitious and Critical Policies at COP26

This series is free and open to all. Advance registration is required to attend this event.

The first 60 minutes will be a conversation about the role of artists and cultural institutions in the climate crisis. What can they do that lawyers, scientists and politicians have failed to do? Can their radical creativity and radical collaboration inspire and empower the public and create support for collective action? What does the Royal Ontario Museum expect to achieve with its first Shiff Curator of Climate Change?

Our guests are Steven Guilbeault – Canada’s Heritage Minister and noted climate activist, Josh Basseches – CEO and Director of the Royal Ontario Museum, singer Ron Hawkins, poet Alice Major, and singer Sarah Harmer. The conversation will be moderated by Massey College Senior Fellow Dr. Dianne Saxe – SaxeFacts.com

The last 30 minutes will be a call to action, with a mini “Dragon’s Den”-style pitch sprint of opportunities for participants to get involved. Join us to learn about these organizations:

ShiftAction – Protecting your pension and the climate

CleanAir Partnership – Home energy retrofits

Guelph Tool Library – Sharing stuff, not buying

Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment – Active transportation for health

Climate Action Network – Being an active climate citizen

David Suzuki Foundation – Think global, act on local government

Nourish Healthcare – Plant-based diets

Join us for these invigorating discussions, to reduce your own carbon footprint, and then ask your political representatives to act on what you have learned. Stay tuned and check back for more details about this event!

To register for this event in our series, The Role of the Arts and Culture In Building Public Momentum for Ambitious and Critical Policies at COP26, please click here. This series is free and open to all.

The Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Canadian Heritage, was elected the Member of Parliament for Laurier—Sainte-Marie in 2019. Minister Guilbeault is a prominent advocate in the fight against the climate crisis, and has been leading the charge from Laurier—Sainte-Marie for years.

Minister Guilbeault’s commitment to environmental issues started at the age of five, when he climbed a tree to protect it from real estate developers who were about to cut down the woods behind his home in La Tuque. Twenty-five years later, he scaled the CN Tower in Toronto to call for Canada to ratify the Kyoto Protocol.

In 1993, Minister Guilbeault co-founded Équiterre, the largest environmental organization in Quebec, and served as its Senior Director from 2008 to 2018. He also worked as a Director and Campaign Manager for Greenpeace, and was a Strategic Advisor for more than 10 years at Cycle Capital Management, a Canadian fund dedicated to the development of clean technologies. Minister Guilbeault also worked for Deloitte & Touche as well as Copticom, a consulting firm specializing in the green and social economy, and transportation.

As an activist and strategic advisor for dozens of governments and businesses in Canada and abroad, Minister Guilbeault is a pragmatist who works to make a difference by building bridges and relationships. An avid cyclist and sportsman, he has been riding his bike 12 months a year for the last 30 years.

Minister Guilbeault is a father of four and stepfather of two.

Thank you for your interest in Massey’s five-part virtual climate series, Massey is #MissingCOP26. These online events are free and open to all. To learn about other events in the series and for more information, we invite you to visit our main page: https://www.masseycollege.ca/programs-and-events/massey-missing-cop26/