Edward Broadbent is ex-Member of Parliament for Ottawa Centre, and
ex-Visiting Fellow in the Arthur Kroeger College of Public Affairs
at Carleton University, Ottawa, and ex-co-chair of the Canadian
Democracy and Corporate Accountability Commission.
From 1990-1996 he was the first President of the International Centre
for Human Rights and Democratic Development, Montreal. Edward Broadbent
was a Member of Canadian Parliament for 21 years, and Leader of
the New Democratic Party from 1975 to 1989. He served as chairman
of a national inquiry on Governance and Accountability in Canadaís
Voluntary Sector, which submitted its report in 1999.
After graduating first in his class in philosophy at the University
of Toronto, Mr. Broadbent obtained an M.A. He then did postgraduate
studies at the London School of Economics and subsequently obtained
his doctorate in political science from the University of Toronto.
He taught at York University for three years before being elected
to Parliament as NDP Member for Oshawa in 1968.
Throughout his period of leadership of the New Democratic Party,
he was known for his work for an equitable tax system, equality
for women, and the constitutional entrenchment of aboriginal rights.
Frequently during the 1980ís, as reflected in national opinion polls,
Mr. Broadbent was the leader most Canadians preferred to see as
Prime Minister. In his final speech in Parliament, in December 1989,
he moved a motion, which was unanimously adopted, which committed
the government of Canada to end poverty for Canada's children by
the year 2000.
Mr. Broadbent was a Vice-President of Socialist International between
1979 and 1990. During his time as President for the International
Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development, he worked with
those involved in the struggle for democracy in Haiti and Burma.
In 1993 he was one of the four international judges to sit on the
Tribunal on Violations of Womenís Human Rights at the United Nations
Conference on Human Rights in Vienna. In 1994 he served as a member
of the panel of experts on the International Tribunal on Rights
in Haiti.
Mr. Broadbent is a member of the boards of the Canadian Civil Liberties'
Association, the North-South Institute and the Institute for Media,
Policy and Civil Society.
Since returning to university life in 1996, as a Visiting Fellow
at All Souls College, Oxford University, Mr. Broadbent has published
Democratic Equality: What Went Wrong? University of Toronto Press,
2001) and a number of articles and chapters of books in academic
publications in Canada and Britain. He has been a guest lecturer
at several Canadian universities as well as at Oxford and Edinburgh
in Britain; Brown, Harvard and the University of Texas in the United
States; and, Calcutta and New Delhi in India. He has received honorary
degrees from a number of Canadian universities.
Mr. Broadbent was made a member of the Privy Council in 1982, an
Officer of the Order of Canada in 1993 and a Companion of the Order
of Canada in 2002.
