The government of Alberta has imposed unprecedented censorship on all public libraries in the province – a first in Canadian history. In May, the government pushed through Bill 28, giving the Minister of Municipal Affairs virtually unlimited authority over almost all aspects of all Alberta public libraries – an extreme and unwarranted attack on the province’s public library boards, staff, and administration that a recent poll found were trusted by 82% of Albertans.
With the precipitous decline of democracy in the United States, it is all too easy to ignore that Canada’s democracy is in decline as well. We ignore the signs at our peril.
