A series on issues that beg the question. 

Jodi Bruhn|  June 6, 2024

The arc of a viral panic: a book review

Christine Van Geyn and Joanna Baron: Pandemic Panic (Ottawa: Optimum Publishing International, 2023).  Barry Cooper and Marco Navarro-Génie, Canada''s COVID (Calgary: Haultain Research Institute, 2023).

This review first appeared on Jan 17, 2024 in Law and Liberty.

This month, January 2024, marks the anniversary of a watershed in Canada. Two years ago, in the depths of a politically dark winter, thousands of trucks made their way to Ottawa to protest federal COVID vaccine mandates. As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau retreated to his cottage, truckers and protesters dug in for over two weeks. The response, when it came, was a hammer. The declaration of a public order emergency on Valentine’s Day, the freezing of almost three hundred bank accounts, the arrest and detention of the Freedom Convoy organizers, and the kettling of protestors in Ottawa’s downtown stood at odds with most people’s idea of Canada.

What happened? Every Western democracy has its COVID story. In Canada, two books appearing in 2023—one by litigators, the other by political theorists—document ours. Taken together, they establish that the federal invocation of the Emergencies Act in 2022 was the culmination of a two-year holiday for democracy and the rule of law in Canada—supported by a large swath of the Canadian population. Both books analyse a period they call a “panic,” offering both documentation and the outlines of a map to navigate a bewildering new style of governance. Where both expect it to return again, we find insights on that all-important question: What now? 

Executive Emergency Powers

Joanna Baron and Christine Van Geyn are lawyers and executives with the Canadian Constitution Foundation (CCF), a legal charity that defends Canadians’ rights and freedoms through litigation. It became active in COVID court battles soon after the “surreal, sometimes inane, often unprecedented, and unusual public health measures” began in mid-March 2020.

Pandemic Panic: How Canadian Government Responses to COVID-19 Changed Civil Liberties Forever appeared in November 2023. “From the outset of the pandemic,” it argues, “Canadians witnessed an extraordinary—and mainly uncontested—outgrowth of governmental powers and assaults on individual liberties.” The CCF itself litigated many of the cases the book raises.

The bid for executive emergency power began early. In March 2020, the Liberal government prepared a sweeping bill that would grant cabinet the power to raise taxes and allocate billions without consulting Parliament. Provincial governments also passed bills providing extraordinary powers to cabinet executives—and wasted no time in using them.

An eleven-chapter tour of the COVID period details how the measures imposed by Canada’s federal and provincial governments violated guarantees of both the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and the Constitution Act, 1867. The tour reveals mounting policy horrors inflicted on—yet often welcomed by—an increasingly panicked public. In case after case, the courts upheld government COVID measures, determining that they either did not violate individual civil rights Canadians had long taken for granted or restricted those rights on reasonable grounds. . . .

Full review in Law & Liberty, January 17, 2024.

Posts in the Series

June 2024
The arc of a viral panic: a book review

May 2020
Indigenous women to the barricades: a book review

September 2017
​Indigenous rights are human rights: a reminder from Argentina

March 2017
On surfing and strawberry tea: how your spring break could promote reconciliation

September 2016
The right guy at the right time: Gord Downie's contribution to reconciliation

Janvier 2016
Encore une Commission... 

June 2015​
Munich, 1933: The good bureaucrat, Josef Hartinger

November 2014
Addressing the language of the Aboriginal/settler relationship

June 2014
From big to better data through indigenous data governance

January 2014
Toast to those who showed courage in public life

October 2013
Excellence is everywhere: Blueprint 2020 and the future of the public service

April 2013
Time to investigate options for resource revenue sharing

December 2012
Speaking of accountability: examining the relationship of First Nation voters to their governments

About the Author

Jodi Bruhn is the director of Stratéjuste Canada.