March 24, 2011, Ottawa, ON – The Macdonald-Laurier Institute’s first book, The Canadian Century: Moving out of America’s shadow, has won a highly coveted international think tank prize: the Sir Antony Fisher International Memorial Award for 2011, awarded by the Atlas Economic Research Foundation.
Created in honour of Sir Antony Fisher, one of the founders of the Institute for Economic Affairs, a renowned think tank in London, the Fisher Award recognizes excellence in public policy think tank publications and projects. Over 100 think tanks in more than 80 countries are eligible for this prize. This year 66 publications were nominated worldwide.
The Canadian Century, written by Brian Lee Crowley, Jason Clemens and Niels Veldhuis, tells the story of how the “Redemptive Decade” that began with the free trade agreement with the United States and ended with the first balanced budget in a generation, put Canada back on course to pursue the vision Sir Wilfrid Laurier had for Canada. Sir Wilfrid famously proclaimed that the 20th century would belong to Canada. The Canadian Century argues that Laurier was absolutely right to foresee a Canadian century — he was merely off by 100 years. The authors underline, however, that the Canadian century is not a given; Canada must make a conscious decision to follow through on the policies put in place during the Redemptive Decade.
Unusually for a Canadian think tank book, The Canadian Century has sold extremely well: roughly 5,000 copies have been sold to date, making it a Canadian bestseller. MLI is pleased to announce that, in honour of the Fisher Award, the book is now available to an even wider audience as a Kindle download from Amazon.com, a Kobo download from chapters.indigo.ca, and in softcover.
MLI Managing Director and co-author Brian Lee Crowley says, “For our new institute to be honoured with this award in our first year of operation exceeds all our hopes. So often think tanks focus on where things are going wrong, and properly so. But Canadian Century tells an immensely positive story: Canada has shown how fiscal discipline, social programme reform and limited government pay dividends to every part of society, and we wanted to make sure the world had a chance to learn from Canada’s example.”
Find out more about the book and how to purchase it here.
