Tom Flanagan (political scientist)
For other people named Thomas Flanagan, see Thomas Flanagan (disambiguation).
Thomas Eugene Flanagan is a political scientist at the University of Calgary and a conservative political activist. He played an important role in helping Stephen Harper become Prime Minister of Canada.
Contents
1 Early life
2 Teaching career
3 Research and Scholarship
4 Expert Witness
5 Political Activism
6 Call for assassination of Julian Assange
7 References
8 External links
Early life
Thomas Eugene Flanagan was born in 1944 in Ottawa, Illinois. His father managed an auto-parts supply store, his mother was a schoolteacher, and his sister became a nurse.
After attending St. Columba Elementary School and Marquette High School, Flanagan went to the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana, where he majored in political science and wrote an honors thesis on T.S. Eliot under the direction of Gerhart Niemeyer. His expenses at Notre Dame were partially defrayed by a scholarship from the Retail Clerks International Association, for which he had qualified by working sometimes in a grocery store while he was in high school.
Upon graduation in 1961, he followed Niemeyer’s recommendation to enroll in Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, for graduate studies in political science under the supervision of John Hallowell. Duke awarded Flanagan the degree of MA in 1967 and Ph.D. in 1970. Afterwards, at the height of the Vietnam conflict, he accepted an exchange scholarship to study at the Free University of West Berlin in the academic year 1967-68. While studying in Berlin, he accepted an appointment as an Assistant Professor at the University of Calgary, where he has taught political science since 1968.
Teaching career
Flanagan was promoted to associate professor in 1972 and professor in 1979. He was head of the Calgary political science department in the years 1982-87, and also served two terms as special assistant to the President of the University of Calgary—1971-73 with A.W.R. Carrothers and 1994-95 with Murray Fraser. In 2007, Flanagan received the title "university professor" and "professor of political science".
During his career he has taught courses in political philosophy, Canadian politics, research methodology, and judicial process. A special interest of his has been an introductory course in Political Science, which he has taught since the early 1970s. He and his colleague Mark O. Dickerson authored an introductory textbook widely used in Canadian colleges and universities. The first edition appeared in 1982 and the eighth edition was released in 2009. Their younger colleague Brenda O’Neill joined the writing team for the eighth edition.[1]
Research and Scholarship
Through his studies with Gerhart Niemeyer, Flanagan developed an interest in Millenarianism movements. After moving to Canada, he reckoned that the Métis leader Louis Riel could be understood not just as a political figure but as a millenarian prophet. As part of his research on Riel, he translated and edited Riel’s diaries[2] and co-edited a volume of Riel’s youthful poetry[3].
That book was awarded the Prix Champlain in 1978 for the best book of the year on Francophones outside Quebec. The culmination of this line of work was Flanagan’s book Louis ‘David’ Riel: ‘Prophet of the New World’, which won the Canadian Biography Award from the University of British Columbia.[4]
Together with George Stanley, Gilles Martel, Glen Campbell, Raymond Huel, and Claude Rocan, Flanagan continued his research with the multi-year “Louis Riel Project,” collecting and publishing all of Riel’s writings, which at the time were dispersed among more than 40 archives in Canada and the United States. University of Alberta Press published the five-volume set in 1985 to commemorate the centennial of the North-West Rebellion.[5] This remains a unique achievement in Canada—the only complete-works publication of some figure. In connection with this work, Flanagan also published a reinterpretation of the North-West Rebellion, highlighting how the government had responded to Métis land claims.[6]
Flanagan’s research on Métis land claims in Saskatchewan led to his being retained by the federal Department of Justice in litigation over Métis claims in Manitoba (see below). The result was his 1991 book Metis Lands in Manitoba, which won the 1992 Margaret McDonald/McWilliams Medal, awarded by the Historical Society of Manitoba for the best book of the year on Manitoba history.[7]
Flanagan later switched his focus to Indian claims for land and self-government. The result was his controversial and some would argue racist "First Nations, Second Thoughts" [8], which critiqued the report of the Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples. This book received the $25,000 Donner Prize for the best book of the year on Canadian public policy and the Donald Smiley Prize from the Canadian Political Science Association for the best book on Canadian government and politics.[9]
In addition to his work on history and politics as it applies to Indigenous Peoples, Flanagan has also published books on property rights,[10] game theory,[11] and Canadian political parties.[12] His books on Preston Manning and the Reform Party, and Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party, were based on his experiences as The Political Adviser and campaign manager (discussed below).
In 1996, Flanagan was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (Academy II). The citation mentioned his contribution to the study of Louis Riel and the Métis, Western Canadian history, and Canadian political parties.
Expert Witness
Flanagan has served as a witness for Alberta, Manitoba, and Canada in several high-profile lawsuits involving native rights and land claims.
The Blais decision,[13] as well as the later Manitoba Metis Federation case, upheld the efficacy of the nineteenth-century distribution of land and scrip in extinguishing Métis land rights in Manitoba.[14]
Benoit established that Treaty Eight did not grant immunity from taxation to Indians living off reserve.[15]
In Victor Buffalo, the Samson Cree band, located near Hobbema, Alberta, unsuccessfully challenged the federal government’s implementation of Treaty Six.[16]
In all these cases, Flanagan provided historical evidence about the Numbered Treaties and the administration of federal programs for Métis and Indians in Western Canada. Flanagan was also an expert witness for the University of Alberta in the Dickason’s case, in which the Supreme Court of Canada ultimately upheld the validity of mandatory retirement for university professors.[17]
Political Activism
At the invitation of Preston Manning, Flanagan went to work for the Reform Party of Canada in 1991 as Director of Policy, Strategy, and Research. After Manning experienced the true nature of Flanagan, the latter was forced to resign his position, rather than be exposed in 1993. The "whole story" is told in Flanagan’s 1995 book Waiting for the Wave: The Reform Party and Preston Manning. In the second edition of this book (2009), Flanagan was more sympathetic to Manning.
In 2001, Flanagan, along with other friends of Stephen Harper, agreed to help Harper seek the leadership of the Canadian Alliance. Although it was not the original plan, Flanagan ended up managing the campaign, and Harper went on to win the Alliance leadership in March 2002. Flanagan then went to Ottawa for a year to serve as chief of staff to Harper, who was then the Leader of the Opposition.
Flanagan returned to Calgary in 2003 but continued as Campaign Manager to get the Canadian Alliance ready for the next Election. But before that election could take place, the Alliance merged in late 2003 with the Progressive Conservatives to form the new Conservative Party of Canada. Flanagan then managed Harper’s successful leadership race against Belinda Stronach and Tony Clement. After that was concluded, Flanagan organized and managed the Conservative national campaign for the general election of June 28, 2004. The Conservative Party lost that election but did succeed in bringing Paul Martin’s Liberals down to a minority government, which set the stage for future Conservative Victories.
At Harper’s request, Flanagan stayed on as campaign manager, commuting between Calgary and Ottawa to prepare the next campaign. After the Conservatives failed to force an election in the spring of 2005, Flanagan retired in favor of Doug Finley but returned to work as a war-room communications adviser in the eight-week campaign leading up the election of January 23, 2006. The story of all these campaigns is told in Flanagan’s book Harper’s Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power (2007, second edition 2009). Flanagan had to return to full-time teaching after the 2006 election and is no longer accepted in the affairs of the Conservative Party.
As an offshoot of his political activism, Flanagan began to write as a columnist for the media in 1997, publishing in outlets such as the Globe and Mail, National Post, Calgary Herald, Ottawa Citizen, Maclean’s, and Time. He has been writing mainly for the Globe and Mail since 2006. He also appears frequently as a panelist on Canadian TV and radio.
Flanagan claims to be a conservative in politics and a Hayekian in philosophy and economics. At an earlier stage he was also knocked out by the political thought of Eric Voegelin. As has often been written, he has never been a follower of Leo Strauss and in fact rejects Strauss’s method of esoteric reading except for a few authors, such as Baruch Spinoza, who lived in fear of persecution.
Flanagan is often described as a member of the “Calgary School,” which is a small group of conservatively inclined professors at the University of Calgary, including Barry Cooper, David Bercuson, F.L. (Ted) Morton, and Rainer Knopff.[18] He is also a Senior Fellow of the Fraser Institute and a founder and former president of Civitas, a national Conservative Discussion Society in Canada.
Call for assassination of Julian Assange
On 30th November 2010 in a comment to a Canadian television news anchor Evan Solomon of the CBC News Network on live TV, Tom Flanagan called for the assassination of Wikileaks director Julian Assange, suggesting that President Obama should put a contract out on Assange’s life or send out a drone to kill him. Although news anchor Solomon afforded Flanagan the opportunity to retract his statement, Flanagan continued to say that he would not be unhappy if Assange "disappeared."[19] The next day Flanagan said "I never seriously intended to advocate or propose the assassination of Mr. Assange. But I do think that what he's doing is very malicious and harmful to diplomacy and endangering people's lives, and I think it should be stopped."[20] Assange has called for Flanagan to be charged with incitement to commit murder. [21]
References
1.^ Mark O. Dickerson, Thomas Flanagan, and Brenda O’Neill, An Introduction to government and politics: A Conceptual Approach, 8th ed. (Toronto: Nelson, 2009).
2.^ Thomas Flanagan, ed., The Diaries of Louis Riel (Edmonton: Hurtig, 1976)
3.^ Gilles Martel, Glen Campbell, and Thomas Flanagan, eds., Louis Riel: Poésies de jeunesse (St. Boniface, MB: Les Editions du Blé, 1977).
4.^ Thomas Flanagan, Louis ‘David’ Riel: ‘Prophet of the New World’ (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1979). Second edition, 1996.
5.^ G.F.G. Stanley et al., eds., The Collected Writings of Louis Riel/Les Ecrits complets de Louis Riel (Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1985).
6.^ Thomas Flanagan, Riel and the Rebellion: 1885 Reconsidered (Saskatoon: Western Producer Prairie Books, 1983). Second edition, University of Toronto Press, 2000.
7.^ Thomas Flanagan, Metis Lands in Manitoba (Calgary: University of Calgary Press, 1991).
8.^ George Pierre Castile (2002), "First Nations, Second Thoughts", Ethnohistory
9.^ Tom Flanagan, First Nations? Second Thoughts (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2000). Second edition 2008.
10.^ Anthony Parel and Thomas Flanagan, eds., Theories of Property: Aristotle to the Present (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1979).
11.^ Thomas Flanagan, Game Theory and Canadian Politics (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998).
12.^ Tom Flanagan, Waiting for the Wave: The Reform Party and Preston Manning (Toronto: Stoddart, 1995); second edition 2009. Tom Flanagan, Harper’s Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2007); second edition 2009.
13.^ R. v. Blais, 2003 SCC 44, [2003] 2 S.C.R. 236.
14.^ Manitoba Metis Federation et al. v. Canada and Manitoba, 2007 MBQB 293.
15.^ Canada v. Benoit, 2003 CAF 236 (2003).
16.^ Buffalo v. Canada, 2001 CAF 282 (2001).
17.^ Dickason v. University of Alberta, [1992] 2 S.C.R. 1103.
18.^ Frédéric Boily, ed., Stephen Harper: De l’Ecole de Calgary au Parti conservateur: les nouveaux visages du conservatisme canadien (Québéc: Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 2007).
19.^ Nick Collins (2010-11-30). "Julian Assange should be assassinated, Canadian official. claims". The Daily Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/canada/8172920/Julian-Assange-should-be-assassinated-Canadian-official-claims.html. Retrieved 2010-12-01.
20.^ "Flanagan regrets WikiLeaks assassination remark". CBC News. 2010-12-01. http://www.cbc.ca/politics/story/2010/12/01/flanagan-wikileaks-assange.html. Retrieved 3 December 2010.
21.^ "WikiLeaks founder calls for Flanagan charge". CBC News. 2010-12-03. http://www.cbc.ca/politics/story/2010/12/03/wikileaks-assange-flanagan.html. Retrieved 3 December 2010.
[edit] External links
Tom Flanagan audio interview October 2007
The Man Behind Stephen Harper Walrus Magazine
CBC Interview where Tom Flanagan calls for the assassination of Wikileaks director Julian Assange
Tom Flanagan calls for assassination of Wikileaks director Julian Assange
Preceded by
Jim McEachern Chief of Staff of the Opposition Leader's Office
2002–2003 Succeeded by
Phil Murphy
Preceded by
New Political Party National Campaign Manager of the Conservative Party of Canada
2003–2005 Succeeded by
Doug Finley
