A pattern has emerged on the federal election campaign trail: Party leaders and local candidates announce what they’re going to do for “you and your family.” In so doing, they encourage us to think small and to focus on ourselves.
But we are interconnected with earth and each other. And here’s the tension we must hold. On the one hand, the crises which affect our lives (pandemic, colonialism, racism and other forms of bias, poverty, climate change, loss of biodiversity, pollution, and the deterioration of public dialogue, to name some of the key issues) affect us as a whole society (and indeed as a whole world), interacting with each other in ways which exacerbate their impacts. On the other hand, we are all affected differently, with harsher impacts on people who are socially or economically marginalized.
This means it’s not enough to consider how ‘we’ are affected, be it individually or as a social grouping. If we are to address these crises, we need to identify who is most impacted and start there. We elect governments to facilitate our efforts to do so.
Here are two different election bulletins that reflect on the current social, environmental, and economic context in ways that acknowledge our interconnectedness with earth and each other, identify key justice concerns, and offer questions for candidates. The first is from Citizens for Public Justice and the second from KAIROS Canada.
-Sister Sue Wilson, CSJ