Category: The Conversation – Canada

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Troy Potter, Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Education, The University of Melbourne

International Women’s Day is an important day for everyone, regardless of gender, to raise awareness about gender inequality. This includes naming harms, celebrating gains and recommitting to societal and institutional change.

But we should be doing this every day. Schools play a fundamental role in challenging gender inequality because they’re one of the few places where adults have regular, ongoing contact and relationships with young people. Classroom and schoolyard interactions provide an opportunity for teachers and students to develop these relationships in respectful ways.

While all teachers can contribute to this work, male teachers can play a significant role in disrupting patriarchal and misogynistic behaviours.

In a national study, Michael Kehler, one of the authors of this story, is currently hearing from male teachers from across Canada who promote gender and social justice while disrupting patriarchal masculinities in their classrooms. These teachers are reporting that, in varying degrees, they are challenging misogyny and homophobia, and disrupting damaging forms of masculinity in their classrooms and schools.

In partnership with a parallel project with Australian male teachers (led by the first author of this story, Troy Potter), our research offers emerging insights into how all teachers can challenge and respond to misogyny, sexism and homophobia in schools.

Enacting masculinity in schools

Boys often learn how to be particular kinds of boys by negotiating complex power dynamics. Bullying and harassment are used against other boys, as well as girls, to assert dominance and police traditional gender norms. Homophobic language and sexting are two examples of this.

Recent research shows that boys’ use of misogynistic language, hostility and harassment is on the rise, and is often fuelled by online “manosphere” content. Increasingly, schools are less safe for women teachers — a growing concern, especially when school leadership denies or minimizes women teachers’ experiences of sexual harassment.

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Off-hand remarks like “that’s just boys” serve to excuse boys’ violence and aggression. At the same time, such responses also maintain the cultural conditions that continue to reproduce violence while ignoring the choices boys make to accept norms of masculinity.

Rather than turning a blind eye to boys’ problematic behaviour, drawing attention to it can encourage everyone to reflect on whether such behaviour is appropriate or beneficial.

Research in Australia has shown that boys are moving away from restrictive views of masculinity, believe in gender equality and are rejecting sexist behaviour. This change in boys’ attitudes can be further supported by addressing misogyny and sexism in schools at both the policy and classroom level.

Why male teachers matter

While gender justice work is often seen as women’s work, there’s a growing emphasis on the need to engage men to redress gender inequities.

The use of male role models, though, can often promote gender norms rather than changing them. Additionally, some calls for more male teachers have been based on a perceived need to re-masculinize schools and the assumption that male teachers are better disciplinarians.

And although women make up the majority of the teaching workforce in Canada, men are over-represented in school leadership positions. This is also the case for the United Kingdom, Australia and the United States. Male leaders can play a significant role in shaping equitable school cultures.

Within classrooms, it can also be dangerous for women teachers to call out misogyny. In some cases, women teachers may be labelled as “crazy” or “overreacting,” while in others, male students may use teachers’ objection as catalysts to increase harassment. Their relationships with male students may enable them to have more influence over what is seen to as appropriate masculine behaviours.

This isn’t to suggest male teachers operate from a neutral position. Male teachers live multifaceted identities, shaped by factors including gender, race, culture, ability and class. Male teachers navigate their own narratives and abilities to disrupt traditional masculinity.

But when men promote gender equality and challenge harmful forms of masculinity, they show boys that this is what men can, and should, do. They show boys that fighting for gender equality is not only women’s responsibility.

Micro‑moments matter

In Canadian schools, and those in many other countries, respectful relationships programs, such as Respectful Futures, are delivered to support students’ understanding of respectful, equal and non-violent relationships.

To be effective, however, respectful relationships programs — like all gender justice work — must move beyond isolated programs and be embedded into whole-school approaches.

In the ongoing Canadian study, (Re)defining Masculinities,, 20 teachers across four provinces have provided their insights and reflections. And while we are still inviting teacher participation across Canada, our preliminary findings indicate teachers are:

• Calling out sexist jokes and asking students to explain why they’re funny

• Challenging offhand remarks, such as “You’re such a girl!”

• Unpacking power dynamics wherever they appear, whether in boys’ behaviour or in texts students view or read

• Providing boys with a language to express emotions and vulnerability.

Misogyny stems not only from explicit acts, but also from inaction. When male teachers choose not to interrupt derogatory talk, sexist jokes or sexual harassment, those attitudes and behaviours become normal.

By contrast, when male teachers speak up, they help change what other boys think is OK and provide opportunities for boys to learn alternative ways of being young men.

Our research will learn more about the various ways male teachers are already disrupting harmful masculinities to reduce misogyny. This will allow us to better support other male teachers to become change agents for gender equality.

Gender justice benefits everyone

The 2026 International Women’s Day theme #BalanceTheScales emphasizes that all women and girls deserve to be safe, respected and free to shape their own lives, just like men and boys.

Creating gender equality is about expanding boys’ awareness and consideration of others, to support them to express care and empathy and to reject dominant and violent behaviour. It is about seeing girls and women, and other boys and men, as worthy of respect, rather than as threats.

Disrupting and interrupting misogyny not only benefits girls and women, but boys and men, too. When gender equality advances, we create more fair and just families, schools, communities and societies. How can that not benefit everyone?

Troy Potter receives funding from the Faculty of Education, The University of Melbourne, for his research project, Challenging masculinities: Male-identifying teachers’ gender-just pedagogical practices in Australia.

Michael Kehler receives funding from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council for a national study-Redefining Masculinities: Male Identifying Teachers Engaging Boys as Change Agents.

– ref. Male teachers can challenge misogyny in schools every day, not just on International Women’s Day – https://theconversation.com/male-teachers-can-challenge-misogyny-in-schools-every-day-not-just-on-international-womens-day-277358

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Kawser Ahmed, Adjunct Professor, Natural Resource Institute (NRI), University of Manitoba

Even as American and Iranian officials were participating in Omani-mediated talks aimed at preventing further escalation between the two nations, the United States, alongside Israel, launched military strikes on Iran on Feb. 28.

The mediation had raised cautious hopes of de-escalating long-running hostility between Iran and the U.S. Instead, this use of force reflects a familiar post-1945 pattern of major powers acting unilaterally rather than through multilateral institutions like the United Nations.

Since the end of the Second World War, international conflicts have been addressed one of two ways: collectively — through the UN Security Council — or unilaterally, often via so-called “coalitions of the willing.”

During the Cold War and beyond, global superpowers like the U.S. and Russia have often pursued methods that serve their national interests for regime change or geopolitical balances of power.

It’s against this backdrop that supposed U.S. “just war” objectives in Iran should be scrutinized. According to an official announcement, the U.S. has five primary aims. But how well do these stated objectives align with international law?

From the League of Nations to the UN charter

When rules are broken, there are consequences, whether at a personal, national or global level. Rules are made to bring order to chaos, and humans societies have long sought to craft and formalize them.

After the devastation of the First World War, the League of Nations was founded in 1920. Its preamble pledged:

“By the firm establishment of the understandings of international law as the actual rule of conduct among Governments, and by the maintenance of justice and a scrupulous respect for all treaty obligations.”

Without meaningful enforcement power, however, the organization failed to prevent aggression in the 1930s and ultimately set the stage for the outbreak of the Second World War.

The United Nations was founded in 1945 in the aftermath of that war. Its founding document, the Charter of the United Nations, placed particular emphasis on the territorial integrity and political independence of states.

These widely agreed principles are meant to prevent war, especially wars of choice. But the unequal nature of the Security Council, persistence of proxy wars and violent conflict shows how enforcement of international law remains uneven, especially when powerful states act outside collective mechanisms.

Scrutinizing U.S. objectives

When examined critically, significant inconsistencies emerge between Washington’s objectives for Iran and the actual legal realities undermining the rules-based international order laid out in the UN charter.

The first stated aim, according to the official joint statement by the U.S. and Israel, is to “stand united in defense of our citizens, sovereignty and territory.” This frames the attacks as protective and reactive. Yet at the outset of the war, there was no verified report of Iran posing an imminent threat to U.S. territory or allies. Instead, the objective closely aligns with Israel’s priorities in the region.

Second, the war has been framed as necessary to counter Iranian escalation. The joint statement describes Iranian missile and drone launches as “indiscriminate and reckless.” But those strikes only came after U.S. and Israeli strikes killed Iran’s top leadership and caused enormous civilian casualties. Framing Iran’s actions purely as escalation omits the fact that Iran’s regional strikes were responsive, not pre-emptive.

The third justification is to maintain “regional stability” and security. This claim sits uneasily alongside widening instability, including friendly fire incidents, cross-border missile exchanges and mounting casualties in Lebanon, Bahrain, Israel and the United Arab Emirates.

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Fourth, the invasion has been defended as necessary to uphold sovereignty norms. The joint statement accuses Iran’s attacks of violating the sovereignty of regional states. Yet prior to the joint offensive, there was no evidence of such a breach.

In contrast, U.S. and Israeli airstrikes penetrated deep into Iranian territory, breaching Iran’s sovereignty under Article 2(4) of the UN charter. Sovereignty appears to be invoked selectively.

Lastly, the war has been framed as an exercise of collective self-defence. However, Article 51 of the UN charter permits self-defence only if an armed attack occurs. As reported, the initial attack was conducted by the U.S. and Israel against Iran.

This raises a deeper legitimacy question: are some states claiming a right to pre-emptive or preventive war under the guise of self-defence while denying that right to others?

Regime change and historical lessons

None of this denies Iran’s long record of supporting regional proxies such as Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza and the Houthis in Yemen. However, the U.S. nevertheless moved, de facto, into a war that looks a lot like regime change by other means — particularly in light of targeted strikes against senior Iranian leadership.

The apparent calculation was that ordinary Iranians would quickly rise up, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps would surrender and a U.S.-friendly government would emerge. That optimism was reverberated in U.S. President Donald Trump’s social media rhetoric, if not part of comprehensive U.S. strategy.

If history teaches anything, it’s this: bombing can change a ruler, but not the lives of the ruled. Another regime arrives, flags and ideologies shift and everyday people still carry the burden — just ask the people of Iraq, Afghanistan or Libya.

The growing trend of unilateral interventions severely erodes the aspiration of collective security founded in the UN system. It also sets a dangerous precedence that larger powers can usurp smaller ones should they chose to do so.

Russia had already invaded Ukraine in 2021 and though under-reported, Saudi Arabia intervened in Yemen and Bahrain; Turkey in Syria, Iraq and Libya; and the UAE in Libya, Yemen.

The economic consequences of the current war are also great. Oil prices have increased and natural gas prices have spiked almost 70 per cent in Europe. Some countries, like Myanmar, are already preparing to ration oil and gas supplies.

In addition, hundreds of thousands of migrant workers in Gulf nations are stranded and unable to return to their home countries, and people are being displaced from Lebanon again — on top of the millions already suffering in Gaza.

Rich countries may be able to cope with such shocks, but poor ones in the Global South won’t. Unless this chaos stops, households won’t be able to keep the lights on or their engines running.

For the rule of law to prevail, states — especially powerful ones — must respect international norms consistently, rather than invoking them selectively. Without that restraint, the international system risks descending into a jungle where only the strongest survive.

Kawser Ahmed is affiliated with Conflict and Resilience Research Institute Canada (CRRIC)

– ref. The U.S.-Israel war with Iran could shatter the United Nations-led global order – https://theconversation.com/the-u-s-israel-war-with-iran-could-shatter-the-united-nations-led-global-order-277441

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Jeremy Wildeman, Adjunct assistant professor, Carleton University; L’Université d’Ottawa/University of Ottawa

When Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney recently warned at the World at the Economic Forum in Davos that “middle powers must act together because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu,” many saw this as a defence of international law and the multilateral order. That earned him global accolades.

At the time, Canada and Denmark were under pressure from the Donald Trump administration to surrender territory to the United States: Greenland from Denmark, and either the entirety or parts of Canada.

Trump’s demands came as a shock to a western leaders who maintain a deeply optimistic interpretation of American intentions and the immutability of their relationships. It also caused significant alarm among U.S. allies in the West, who have spent decades under the American security umbrella.

It’s likely because western countries were in disarray and unable to push back forcefully against Trump’s bullying that Carney’s speech was so well-received.

He appeared to put words into immediate action, rebuilding Canada’s fraught relationships with key Global South powers such as China and India while providing leadership on a major trade alliance among Canada, the European Union (EU) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership states to mitigate the impact of Trump’s aggressive use of tariffs.

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Many observers thought Canada was turning to a principled foreign policy, championing universal liberal values such as democracy, justice, human rights and the rule of law. It seemed as though Canada was coming to the defence of a rules-based order, and this was helping it regain significant international prestige.

So it came as a shock when Carney offered immediate support to an illegal U.S.-Israel war of aggression against Iran on Feb. 28.

The liberal and rules-based orders

Within days Carney was equivocating about the war and his initial statement of support. He seemed to be attempting to balance his stated support for international law with being an American ally. He has said that he supports the U.S. and Israeli war “with regret” and that Canada will stand by its allies “when it makes sense.”

What seems like hypocrisy by Carney is in fact consistent with contemporary Canadian foreign policy and its interpretation of international law.

This can be understood by exploring Canada’s participation in two international systems established by the U.S. after the Second World War: the liberal international order and the rules-based order.

The liberal international order expresses some of the highest principles of liberal internationalism: anti-racism, democracy and the right to self-governance, free trade and economic interdependence, multilateral co-operation and respect for international law.

While the rules-based order draws on the liberal international order’s rules and norms, it selectively interprets them for U.S. and western interests. Whereas international law is a set of rules that govern relations between states and are enforced by institutions such as the International Court of Justice, the rules-based order is a deliberately opaque concept. Its rules are vague and ill-defined, and it is unclear who has the right to define or generate them.

Crucially, the post-war international order was meant to prohibit or restrict war, as laid out in the United Nations Charter. Article 2, paragraph 4, of the charter has been a cornerstone of international law and the liberal international order, which the U.S. helped establish after the Second World War. It explicitly prohibits states from threatening or using force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any other state.

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The U.S.-Israel war with Iran could shatter the United Nations-led global order

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Selective enforcement of international law

The U.S. appears to invoke these rules primarily when confronting geopolitical rivals such as Russia or China, or when imposing its will on the rest of the world.

The U.S. and other western powers began shifting their rhetorical support from the liberal toward the rules-based order in the 2000s in response to the rise of Global South powers like China. In many ways, the rules-based order is an inequitable, colour-coded system that reinforces western power, and Canada has been a strong supporter of it.

Carney acknowledged this in Davos by saying the rules-based order was never fair because the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, trade rules were enforced asymmetrically and international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.

This is on vivid display when comparing Canada’s strong response against Russia’s illegal 2022 invasion of Ukraine compared to its support for the U.S.-Israel illegal 2026 war against Iran, its reluctance in early January to condemn the U.S. government’s illegal abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and its de facto support for Israel’s illegal occupation and war crimes in Palestine.

Trump and the unraveling of the western order

What changed in 2025 is the Trump government’s hostility to the rules-based order, which it considers a costly obstacle to consolidating power around the world.

Its strategic approach has included an explicit disavowal of liberal internationalism’s values, including multilateralism and international law. It has threatened to seize western allied territory and resources while imposing tariffs on them and pressuring them to substantially increase U.S. arms purchases.

Carney noted that western states had been fine with the inequities of the rules-based order so long as they benefited from it at the expense of the rest of the world. Their problem was when the U.S. started to treat them like it treats the Global South, through a neo-imperialism built on principles that “might makes right” and the strong should dominate the weak.

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U.S.-Israeli strikes against Iran may succeed on a military basis, but at what cost?

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Another important factor that may have encouraged some in western capitals to accept the U.S. war against Iran was Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s recent Munich Security Conference speech. He lauded Europe’s colonial past and encouraged them to join the U.S. in a renewed global domination, plundering the rest of the world like they did in the past.

Canada’s decision to back the war with Iran was likely also based on the Carney government’s courting of Jewish and Iranian diasporic constituencies and a longstanding institutional reliance on U.S. leadership. But Rubio’s speech created conditions favourable for Carney to support the war under the logic of the rules-based order.

At the same time, Canada will have weakened its moral standing if the U.S. turns to territorial expansion in the Americas. The war is also deeply unpopular among Liberal voters, and support for it undermined the prestige Carney gained from Davos, causing him to begin equivocating on his initial position.

Jeremy Wildeman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Respecting international law depends on who breaks it: Why Canada backed the war against Iran – https://theconversation.com/respecting-international-law-depends-on-who-breaks-it-why-canada-backed-the-war-against-iran-277684

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Étienne Sinotte, PhD Student in Political Science, McGill University

Peru’s interim president José Jerí was censured and removed by the country’s congress in February after just four months on the job. He was ousted for ethical failures following several scandals and replaced by current interim president José María Balcázar.

Jerí was the latest in a list of Peruvian presidents to be removed from office before completing their terms. His ouster occurred less than two months before the upcoming general elections, scheduled for April 12.

The elections are notable for the record number of competing parties and candidates for the presidency. No fewer than 36 candidates are competing for the country’s highest office, with none polling higher than 10 per cent.

These two elements — Jerí’s removal and the record number of presidential hopefuls — are not coincidental. Rather, they are symptoms of a profound institutional crisis.

Over the past decade, instability has come to define Peru’s political landscape, as successive congresses and presidents have become locked in a struggle for power.

How can this persistent tug-of-war be explained? And is there hope for a reversal?

A complex crisis

Jerí was the third president not to finish their mandate since Peru’s last elections in 2021. His predecessor, Dina Boluarte, was ousted by congress in October 2025 amid corruption allegations and criticism over her handling of rising insecurity. Before her, Pedro Castillo, elected in 2021, was removed from office and jailed after attempting a self-coup.

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This pattern of rapid presidential turnover is not unprecedented: during the 2011–16 period, four presidents also held office in quick succession. The long-running instability is primarily caused by three core mechanisms: social fragmentation, political fragmentation and the normalization of extraordinary measures.

Peruvian society has lost many of the shared narratives — the stories through which we understand society — that once helped organize political conflict and representation. Class-based identities and the left-right divide, which previously structured social relations and electoral choices, have steadily eroded.

In their place, a fragmented landscape of competing identities has emerged — regional, gendered, ethnic and occupational. None of these is strong enough to form a basis for national politics on its own.

This social fragmentation is mirrored by political fragmentation. Peru’s party system has all but disappeared, making way for personalistic parties, high turnover among politicians and weak ties between representatives and voters.

The way politics works has been changed because of more opportunistic behaviour by members of congress who know they’ll have short careers due to their weak relationships with constituents.

In the last decade, congress has increasingly relied on tools such as censure. As a result, political conflict is no longer resolved through negotiation or electoral cycles, but through institutional breakdown.

A democracy under stress

These elements result in a particular form of democratic backsliding, a concept which means the weakening of the institutions which make democracy work. We tend to think of struggling democracies as countries where leaders become increasingly autocratic and seek to increase their power.

U.S. President Donald Trump is a good example of this. Since the beginning of his second term, he has weaponized various government institutions to attack political opponents, launch immigration crackdowns and impose tariffs. However, backsliding in current-day Peru works differently.

Due to political fragmentation and the normalization of extreme measures like censure, Peru is not suffering from the concentration of power in the hands of one person. Rather, the country is experiencing the dilution of power into the hands of politicians attached to parties which have mostly ceased to represent the interests of the people and who are acting in their short-term interests alone.

Democracy is eroding not because of a tyrant, but because its support beams are being hollowed out from within.

It is highly unlikely that we will see much change to this situation in the near future. Many elements commonly needed to reverse democratic backsliding are not present in Peru today.

For instance, we are unlikely to see the election of a strong and unified pro-democracy coalition backed by a resourceful civil society. The upcoming elections are shaping up to be the most divided in history, with a record number of candidates for the presidency and a highly divided electorate.

In addition, the Peruvian state is facing crisis of legitimacy: most citizens distrust the government, believing it prioritizes political and economic elites rather than the public interest.

Another election and another president are not likely to solve Peru’s central issue: the erosion of the institutions that once connected citizens, parties and the state. Without rebuilding mechanisms of representation and accountability, elections alone are more likely to reproduce instability rather than resolve it.

Étienne Sinotte receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

– ref. The ousting of Peru’s president points to a deeper crisis – https://theconversation.com/the-ousting-of-perus-president-points-to-a-deeper-crisis-276847

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Sarah E. Turner, Associate Professor, Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia University

Little Punch, a seven-month-old Japanese macaque living in the Ichikawa City Zoo in Japan, has captured hearts on the internet. Abandoned by his mother in the first few days of his life and raised by the keepers at the zoo, he has had some trouble integrating into the group of around 60 Japanese macaques.

The keepers gave him a stuffed orangutan, which he carries with him — grooming its plushy fur the way monkeys usually care for one another. Some monkeys in the group were pushing Punch away, dragging him and reacting negatively to him. The internet is demanding to know why. And why would his mother abandon him?

As primate researchers who have spent thousands of hours scientifically observing Japanese monkeys like Punch, we wanted to provide a bit of Japanese monkey-world context.

Wild monkey mothers don’t abandon infants

Japanese macaques or snow monkeys — Macaca fuscata to scientists — are a highly social and intelligent species.

In the wild, these monkeys do not abandon their infants.

We won’t say it has never happened, but it would be an extreme behaviour if it occurred. We have also not seen it in more than 25 years of studying Japanese monkeys at the Awajishima Monkey Center on Awaji Island, Japan, where the monkeys live in free-ranging groups.

Quite the contrary, we have observed mothers caring for their infants and providing extra care for infants with physical disabilities that prevent them from clinging to their mother, and for injured or ill infants.

We have witnessed macaque mothers at Awajishima hold their disabled infants up to nurse and walk on three limbs, using an arm to support the baby, sometimes carrying them for years longer than a mother usually would.

If an infant dies in the wild, a mother will often carry the body for days, presumably a reflection of her deep attachment.

This also makes sense from an evolutionary perspective because, in rare cases, an unresponsive infant may regain consciousness.

To be a Japanese mother monkey is to be a dedicated mother.

Dedicated, sometimes bewildered, mothers

This is not to say that every wild Japanese monkey mother is immediately good at it. We have seen bewildered monkey mothers holding their infants upside down or becoming distracted while their infants wander into trouble.

We have seen them looking at the new squirming creature they have birthed with expressions of mystified dismay that would be recognizable to any human mother at one time or another.

But in a wild group, those first-time mothers have relatives to help them and to learn from. They usually stay in the same group for their whole lives, and they have a dominance rank order that they pass down to their offspring.

Male Japanese monkeys are usually not directly involved with infants. As the infants get older, though, and gain more independence, the males help out too by socializing with them.

Abandonment in captivity

Punch’s mother either lacked the skills to look after her infant, was stressed by captivity and its associated conditions, or both. We don’t know her full story; she may have been raised by humans herself or experienced other difficulties.

Infant abandonment does happen sometimes in captivity — 7.7 per cent of cases according to one study — primarily in first-time or low-ranking mothers. Human caretakers do their best to raise infants, but it causes challenges.

Adoption can happen in captivity too. But the environment is different in a zoo: groups are not necessarily composed of female relatives the way a wild group would be; the males can’t leave as they would in the wild. Also some zoo monkeys are raised by humans or come from the entertainment industry.

These monkeys may “speak” a different social language. Punch wasn’t able to learn how to “speak Japanese macaque” from his human caregivers.

A behaviourally flexible species

The good news for Punch (and his devoted human followers) is that Japanese macaques are behaviourally flexible and can learn from the monkeys around them, and he is already learning to communicate with other monkeys and to find a place in his group.

In the wild, infant Japanese monkeys will nurse for up to two years. When they are orphaned, they can survive at Punch’s age — especially if they are adopted, or even just befriended, by others.

When Punch was approaching another monkey to play, he may have been inadvertently sending signals such as, “I’m afraid of you,” or “I’m dominant over you.”

The more time Punch spends in his group, the more he will learn how the other monkeys interact. He will learn what behaviours are okay, socially. For Punch, this is the best outcome. Monkeys should not be kept as pets — they are wild animals and need to be part of the rich and stimulating social world of other monkeys.

Punch is part of an intelligent, social and behaviourally flexible species that relies on learning social cues from their mothers and relatives. Punch will likely integrate into his new social circumstances.

Research on wild and free-ranging Japanese macaques helps us understand Punch’s story and demonstrates the importance of research on animal welfare in zoos, on wildlife behaviour and in conservation science.

Sarah E. Turner and students in her lab receive funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada – Discovery Grants Program and Leadership in Environmental and Digital innovation for Sustainability (LEADS-CREATE), MITACS Globalink Research Awards, the Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science, and Concordia University.

Brogan M. Stewart receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Fonds de recherche du Québec – Nature et technologies, Leadership in Environmental and Digital innovation for Sustainability (LEADS-CREATE), MITACS Globalink Research Awards, the Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science, and Concordia University.

Megan M. Joyce receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada – Discovery Grants Program and Leadership in Environmental and Digital innovation for Sustainability (LEADS-CREATE), MITACS Globalink Research Awards, the Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science, and Concordia University.

Mikaela Gerwing receives funding from the Fonds de recherche du Quebec – Nature et Technologies, Leadership for Environmental Innovation for Sustainability (LEADS-CREATE), Miriam Aaron Roland Fellowship, MITACS Globalink Research Awards, the Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science, Concordia University. She is affiliated with Planet Madagascar.

– ref. Wild macaques don’t abandon babies. So why did Punch’s mother? – https://theconversation.com/wild-macaques-dont-abandon-babies-so-why-did-punchs-mother-277065

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Stewart Prest, Lecturer, Political Science, University of British Columbia

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is having a moment.

While every leader in the world has to grapple with the abrupt and arbitrary decision-making of United States President Donald Trump, few have had to do so with such high stakes as America’s neighbour and ostensible ally to the north.

With more than two-thirds of Canadian exports bound for the US, bilateral trade is a matter of economic life and death for Canada. Since his return to office in January 2025, Trump has made repeated references to Canada becoming America’s “51st state” in an effort to put economic and political pressure on its northern neighbour.

Despite this, Carney has met the challenge with rare candour.

In his recent speech at this year’s World Economic Forum in Switzerland, Carney gave the world a word for the transformations now underway, describing a “rupture” in the international rules-based order.

The speech was remarkable in its honesty on other fronts, as well. Effectively, Carney acknowledged what everyone knows, but no one in a position of power has previously admitted: even before Trump’s return to the White House for a second term, the US-led liberal international order was deeply unfair in its distribution of prosperity and security.

Carney’s pedigree

Why was Carney able to say what others would not, or could not, on such a high-profile stage?

In many ways, his background and present role give him unique credibility in the eyes of the wealthy and powerful who gather each year at Davos.

Born and raised in northern and western Canada, Carney’s academic and professional career played out on a larger stage. Following a PhD in economics at the University of Oxford in 1995, he pursued a career in finance and banking that took him to the heights of both the private and public financial world.

After more than a decade working at the American multinational investment bank Goldman Sachs, Carney entered Canadian public service, eventually becoming governor of the Bank of Canada in 2008 under Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper. He went on to become the first non-British head of the Bank of England, serving in that role from 2013-2020.

His governorships coincided with tumultuous times in both countries, spanning the sub-prime financial crisis, Brexit and the early days of the COVID pandemic. While not without criticism, Carney’s performance in both countries won significant acclaim, leading to other international leadership roles.

By early 2025, Carney threw his hat in the ring to replace Canada’s beleaguered Liberal Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who was trailing badly in public opinion polls. Carney won that race convincingly, and shortly after led the revived Liberals to a narrow but definitive victory over the Conservatives in a federal election in April 2025.

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The party’s stunning come-from-behind victory was fuelled significantly by Trump’s 51st state talk and other forms of coercion.

Commanding respect

Carney has a remarkable CV by any measure. He has moved from the heights of academia to business, finance and finally, government. In politics, he’s been successful in both Liberal and Conservative political environments. That broad credibility ensured that when he spoke from the podium at Davos about a rupture in an already unequal global political system, his words would be taken seriously.

Carney’s role as prime minister of Canada has also played a role in making him the poster boy of a global anti-Trump movement. Since Trump’s return to office, Canada has been on the front lines of America’s movement away from long-held alliances towards a more mercurial, coercive and even predatory foreign policy.

Trump’s penchant for insulting Canadian leaders, threatening Canadian sovereignty and weakening the Canadian economy in the service of American interests makes Canada an important test case that other American partners can learn from.

Within Canada itself, Carney is popular, though his responses to Trump have not always been without criticism. Some have pointed to a recurring gap between rhetoric and action.

Carney’s swift move to endorse the recent US attacks on Iran fit this pattern, as well. Yet, such appeasement hasn’t been rewarded with reciprocity by the Trump administration.

Seeking partners

As Carney visits the Pacific Rim, including a stop in Australia, there’s no question he’s put himself — and Canada — in the global spotlight for his handling of Trump.

His speech in Davos sketched out a vision of an alternate global order that Canada and other like-minded countries might collectively pursue as a defence against the chaotic and unstable world unleashed by Canada’s former friend and ally. However, that rhetoric is not yet reality.

Accordingly, on his visit to India, Japan and Australia, Carney is looking to find partners for that vision. He’s seeking opportunities to improve relations, expand trade and cooperate on issues of Pacific security.

The old world order is not coming back. What Carney achieves in his foray to the Pacific Rim may help determine what new order, if any, emerges in its place.

Stewart Prest does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Mark Carney in Australia: How did he become the darling of the global anti-Trump movement? – https://theconversation.com/mark-carney-in-australia-how-did-he-become-the-darling-of-the-global-anti-trump-movement-277039

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Jeanette Ashe, Visiting Senior Research Fellow, Women’s Leadership, King’s College London

The past year marked the 30th anniversary of the United Nations Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the world’s most comprehensive plan to achieve the equal rights of women and girls.

Adopted in 1995, it called on governments to fight for gender equality, to protect women’s rights and to rebalance power structures so that everyone has an equitable chance in the world.

Thirty years later, Canada is still falling short. One of Beijing’s core commitments was for governments to create permanent, well-resourced institutions dedicated to advancing gender equality. Yet across Canada, some provinces still lack full, stand-alone ministries of Women and Gender Equality (WAGE), and the federal ministry of WAGE has been deprioritized.

A fragile federal commitment

Prime Minister Mark Carney initially dropped the Women and Gender Equality (WAGE) portfolio from his first cabinet, reinstating it only after pushback from women’s and social justice organizations.

More recently, reports of deep budget cuts to WAGE have renewed concern that gender equality remains politically expendable. Without sustained funding, programs vital to women’s safety and economic security could be decimated at a time when a number of urgent issues demand gender expertise.

As a recent UN Women media advisory reports, “the spread of digital misogyny poses a direct and urgent threat to progress on gender equality.” While much of this activity results in various forms of cyberbullying and harassment, the impact of these networks goes far beyond the digital world and shows up in real life spaces like our public schools.

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Read more:
‘Quiet, piggy’ and other slurs: Powerful men fuel online abuse against women in politics and media

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Wavering commitment

Yet, Canadian governments have done little to respond, as exemplified by AI Minister Evan Solomon’s decision against banning Elon Musk’s X or his AI chatbot Grok despite the growing problems of “nudification” and personalized pornography .

This wavering commitment echoes global patterns of institutional gender rollback, with the UN warning of a “post-feminist retrenchment.”

These trends are part of an international shift against equity and inclusion exemplified by recent court cases and policy changes in the United States — a shift glaringly evident as the Donald Trump administration blames gangs of “wine moms” for ICE protests and violence, including the killing of 37-year-old Renee Good in Minneapolis. Good’s death was described by Vice President JD Vance as a “tragedy of her own making.”

While this anti-equity rhetoric is circulating in Canada, a recent report reveals that “most Canadians view EDI measures in the workplace positively, with strong support among equity deserving groups, younger workers and those with positive job experiences.”

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Read more:
Blaming ‘wine moms’ for ICE protest violence is another baseless, misogynist myth

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A provincial patchwork

Six provinces currently maintain full, stand-alone ministries dedicated to women and gender equality:

• Manitoba — Minister Responsible for Gender Equity (also responsible for Accessibility and Families)
• Saskatchewan — Minister responsible for the Status of Women (also Parks, Culture and Sport, and other portfolios)
• Québec — Minister responsible for Women’s Equality (also Health and Seniors)
• New Brunswick — Minister responsible for Women’s Equality (also Seniors)
• Prince Edward Island — Minister responsible for the Status of Women (also Workforce, Advanced Learning and Population)
• Newfoundland and Labrador – Minister responsible for Gender Equality (sole portfolio)
• All three territories, Nunavut, Yukon, and the Northwest Territories, also maintain full ministers responsible for women’s equality.

By contrast, four provinces still lack a dedicated ministry:

• British Columbia — No ministry; a parliamentary secretary for Gender Equity is housed within the Ministry of Finance
• Alberta — A minister for Arts, Culture and Status of Women shares the file among several unrelated responsibilities
• Ontario — An associate minister for Women’s Social and Economic Opportunity reports to a senior minister, without a full department
• Nova Scotia — The Attorney General and Minister of Justice holds the equality and anti-racism file alongside multiple other portfolios

Opaque and easily cut

When gender equality has a ministry of its own, citizens can see its budget, monitor its priorities and hold governments accountable. Where it does not, gender programs are buried inside larger departments; invisible in financial statements and easily cut.

Even federally, where WAGE exists, proposed cuts and decreased funding show how vulnerable these portfolios remain.

Carney’s mandate letter to cabinet clearly indicated a shift from his predecessor’s feminist brand. There is no reference at all to feminism or gender equality. In fact, Carney’s cuts to WAGE seem to reflect a larger rejection of feminist policies, including foreign policy.

But while governments stall, the public is ahead. Recent Abacus Data polling found that 86 per cent of Canadians support equal numbers of women and men in politics and 58 per cent support requiring political parties to nominate a minimum number of women candidates — up four points from last year.

This data shows Canadians are ready for legislated gender quotas and for the institutions needed to help deliver them. Fully funded ministries for Women and Gender Equality are one such institution.

Why now matters

The Beijing anniversary arrived amid a global gender backlash, from the rollback of reproductive rights in the U.S. to rising online abuse of women in politics. At precisely this moment, governments should be strengthening equality initiatives rather than weakening them.

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Growing threats faced by women candidates undermine our democracy

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If gender equality is a priority, it’s simply not enough to celebrate the growing number of women in our legislatures. Real progress demands institutional power and stable funding of gender equality mandates. As UN Women recently reported, “achieving gender parity could cumulatively add US$342 trillion to the global economy by 2050.”

Repositioning Canada in the global hierarchy does not mean leaving 50 per cent of the population behind. Now, more than ever before, it’s critical to double down on the commitment to equity. In troubled times, leaders need to embrace equity wholesale, and taking leadership on equity must be a cornerstone of Carney’s supposed “values-based” pragmatism.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. As International Women’s Day approaches, why is Mark Carney rejecting gender equity efforts? – https://theconversation.com/as-international-womens-day-approaches-why-is-mark-carney-rejecting-gender-equity-efforts-273677

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Jutta Treviranus, Director & Professor, Inclusive Design Research Centre, OCAD University

Imagine approaching a curb in a wheelchair. The step is only a few inches, but for some of us, it might as well be a wall. Now imagine that wall turned into a slope. With that single design change, movement becomes possible again.

But more than that, others start to benefit too — a parent pushing a stroller, a traveller rolling luggage, a worker with a handcart.

A simple but liberating modification, made to include those once excluded, ends up changing everyone’s experience for the better. In my field of inclusive design, this innovative magic became known as “the curb-cut effect.”

Curb-cut thinking has inspired countless inventive leaps, including the creation of the typewriter, emails, text-to-speech, voice recognition, captions and image recognition — to name just a few. All were initially motivated by the desire to address a barrier experienced by someone who was excluded by the existing design, resulting in advances that benefit many more.

Ultimately, building the world this way affords us more adaptive choices when unexpected situations arise. But inclusive design does not mean designing for disabled people, which is a paternalistic view that positions them as passive recipients of benevolent accommodation. It means designing with them.

Scaling the curb-cut principle

This phenomenon is more than a clever design trick to build new products and increase the customer base. As our society becomes less stable, I can’t help but think about the macro curb-cut effect and applying the same phenomena to complex societal systems. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it became clear that when our systems are designed with people who are struggling, they work better for everyone when we all find ourselves struggling.

I saw this as a reality at OCAD university where I teach. Ten years before the onset of the pandemic, the Inclusive Design program was co-designed with students who face barriers to university education. This included students who had jobs, care responsibilities, couldn’t afford to live in Toronto or experienced accessibility barriers due to disabilities.

The program gave students the choice to attend in person, online or asynchronously. All curriculum materials were provided in accessible formats. Most importantly, each new cohort began by building a cohesive learning community with collective responsibility for the success of their peers.

Self-determination was emphasized, balanced by mechanisms to exchange compassionate, constructive feedback with fellow students.

While the education sector struggled to adjust to the disruptive reality of the pandemic, our program required no such adjustment. The necessary tools, processes, mindsets and social support structures were already in place.

Diversity as an adaptive advantage

Global thought leaders stress that we are in a period of escalating global risks. Living on this planet is a precarious balancing act, and we have entered a period of disequilibrium. This entangled disequilibrium is affecting all domains of our existence.

And those who seek influence and control exploit the resulting existential fear and promote the eugenicist fallacy, or a “survival of the fittest” mentality.

Eugenicists and social Darwinists believe that society is strengthened by eliminating those who are deemed less fit. They believe that “survival of the fittest” is, in fact, the engine of evolutionary advances and the key to the continuation of the human race. They argue that a monoculture of perfect beings provides security and strength.

But evolutionary scholars such as Terrence W. Deacon have shown that human advances, like the development of language, are made possible during periods of relaxed selection, when diversity can thrive. It is systems designed to support diversity that offer adaptive choices in times of crisis, leading to greater societal resilience.

Monocultures, on the other hand, can be felled by a single blow.

Epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Prof. Kate Pickett showed that inequality is correlated with all other societal ills. Economist Thomas Piketty extended the argument to economic stability, arguing that unless economic inequality is addressed the whole democratic order will be threatened.

As an antidote, social scientist Scott E. Page showed how making room for diverse needs, and thereby diverse perspectives, within an organization helps to navigate complexity.

The cultural bias toward efficiency

But we are culturally primed to reject a curb-cut approach.

The industrial era, our capitalist ideology and our reliance on statistical reasoning to predict and determine truth have instilled a less dramatic form of eugenicist reasoning in our assumptions and conventions.

The industrial era demanded replaceable workers, this required standardized learners from our systems of education. The competitive market culture soon learned to value quick wins, efficiency and speed.

Business gurus such as Richard Koch interpret Pareto’s 80/20 principle to mean that we should focus on the homogeneous 80 per cent that take 20 per cent of the effort and ignore the difficult heterogeneous 20 per cent. But it is the marginalized 20 per cent that motivate imaginative leaps and are the first to recognize the signals of emerging risks, not the complacent average consumer.

These priorities are now amplified, accelerated and automated by artificial intelligence (AI). AI is powered by statistical reasoning, and unless deliberately corrected, it privileges what is common and puts aside what is less so.

A culture with statistical bias toward the average then discourages curb-cut thinking.

The limits of majority rule

Perversely, reactions to defend progressive values can also discourage the curb-cut approach. In defending science and evidence, it has been reduced to what is true for the statistical average.

This denies the truth for statistical outliers. Statistically-determined conclusions only hold for the average person and are wrong for or inaccurate about people far from the average.

Democracy is similarly defended by reducing it to “one person, one vote” and majority rule, neglecting human rights. This inadvertently favours the trivial needs of the majority over the critical needs of minorities.

Inclusive design is often misunderstood as remembering to consider people with disabilities. It is more radical than that. Engaging people who face the greatest barriers to design our systems with us will provide everyone with adaptive choices during the next inevitable crisis.

Jutta Treviranus is the director of the Inclusive Design Research Centre. She receives funding from Accessibility Standards Canada, the New Frontiers Research Fund, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.

– ref. How building with people who face barriers benefits everyone, especially during crises – https://theconversation.com/how-building-with-people-who-face-barriers-benefits-everyone-especially-during-crises-274279

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Atieh Razavi Yekta, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of British Columbia

Around 60 per cent of Canadian employees can expect their job to be transformed through artificial intelligence (AI). For many, AI will complement, rather than replace, their work. For some, it could prevent illness, injury or death.

This might look like a nurse wearing a T-shirt equipped with sensors to track her lower back posture during a hospital shift. It might be an algorithm monitoring noise levels in a steel factory, to prevent worker hearing loss. Or it could be a robotic glove that helps workers avoid repetitive strain injury on an assembly line.

High-risk sectors such as construction, oil and gas, mining and heavy manufacturing may have the most to gain. Workers experience large numbers of serious injuries in these sectors, despite decades of safety regulations. Falls, equipment accidents, repetitive strain and exposure to environmental and psycho-social hazards are risks of the job.

Globally, there at least 60,000 fatal accidents on construction sites each year. In British Columbia alone, the construction industry reported more than 15,200 serious injury claims between 2015 and 2024.

AI systems — such as machine learning and large language models — can go far beyond traditional occupational health and safety practices such as inspections, training and audits. They can adapt to changing conditions, continuously monitor risks and provide real-time decision support, helping anticipate and prevent accidents before they occur.

These technologies also bring risks — to psychological health, privacy and worker rights. Canada and other nations need to develop robust governance frameworks, to ensure worker safety and well-being.

Smart helmets, boots, wrist sensors

Among the most visible applications of AI in occupational health and safety are commercial wearables and smart personal protective equipment. These include smart helmets, boots, belts, biometric garments and wrist sensors. They collect data on posture, movement, heart rate, temperature, vibration, noise and location. Connected platforms analyze these patterns in real time.

On construction sites, wearables can detect fatigue and risk of falls. For example, companies manufacture fall-protection equipment such as smart harnesses with sensing carabiners. These can be integrated with digital monitoring platforms to track worker positioning, anchorage use and fall events. They generate immediate alerts to support on-site safety decisions.

Wearables can also monitor repetitive strain and alert workers to heat stress or toxic exposure. They can warn when workers enter hazardous zones. Continuous monitoring can allow for earlier ergonomic intervention, and may even help prevent musculoskeletal disorders. For aging workers, early detection and targeted adjustments can extend careers and reduce disability risk.

At the same time, research on the combined effects of aging and workplace technologies shows that AI, robotics and automation can increase job insecurity and the risk of job loss for older workers, particularly when retraining and upskilling opportunities are limited.

Drones and robots inspect demolition sites

Beyond wearables, AI-driven drones and robotic systems are enhancing inspection and maintenance in confined or unstable environments. They can enter tunnels, bridges, demolition sites, highway corridors, mines and nuclear sites, reducing human exposure to danger.

For example, research shows that sensory-enhanced tele-operation of compact demolition robots can improve both safety and accessibility in high-risk interior sites. Operators rely on multiple sources of feedback (vision, sound and vibration) to detect hazards such as falling debris, unstable floors and blind spots.

AI-enabled drones and robotic systems are also used in mining and nuclear plants. In mining, robots can work in tight or unstable spaces while keeping operators safely outside. In the nuclear industry, they protect workers from radiation while dismantling structures and handling waste, reducing human exposure to extreme risks.

Predictive AI can also model long-term occupational health risks. In industrial settings, neural networks have been created to predict hearing loss among workers — for example in a steel factory. In this way, AI can identify complex hazards before they cause irreversible harm.

These tools can reduce exposure to hazards and help address labour shortages in high-risk industries. They also appeal to younger, tech-savvy workers.

Emerging risks and ethics

AI systems are not risk-free. Drones, robots and sensors sometimes malfunction in dusty, high-vibration or complex environments, creating new hazards on worksites.

The Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety notes that AI used for worker monitoring can affect psychological health by increasing pressure, performance monitoring or a sense of constant surveillance.

Wearables and other AI-enabled technologies also raise important questions about data and privacy, bias, reliability, data protection and regulatory oversight. For example, who owns the information generated? How is it stored? Could insights derived from this data be used for discipline rather than occupational health and safety purposes?

Research also shows that workers are far more likely to accept these technologies when they understand their purpose, trust the system and are confident that data is used solely to support safety and well-being.

A critical gap in protections

Under its G7 presidency in 2025, Canada helped lead the development of a global compendium of best practices for human-centred AI in the workplace. This reinforced Canada’s role as a driving force in shaping ethical, safe, workforce-ready AI policies worldwide.

And yet in many areas, when it comes to regulating AI, Canada lags behind. Canada is, for example, the only G7 country with no digital safety regulator and no online safety legislation of any kind. As AI quietly transforms workplaces, Canada risks leaving workers’ privacy, autonomy and dignity unprotected, with the proposed Artificial Intelligence and Data Act (AIDA) having never been enacted.

Without robust governance, even AI’s potential to enhance worker health and safety remains uncertain, exposing a critical gap in protections at a time of rapid technological change.

Safeguarding privacy, autonomy and dignity

In 2025, 12.2 per cent of Canadian businesses reported using AI to produce goods or deliver services, double that reported the year before. Adoption of AI in Canada is strongest in information, cultural and professional services, while agriculture, accommodation and food services lag.

As workplaces adopt AI, policymakers in Canada and globally must now focus on rules and practices that protect workers and uphold their rights. The path forward is neither to reject AI nor to adopt it uncritically. These technologies must be reliable, interoperable and designed ethically.

We need risk and impact assessments, worker consultation and governance frameworks that safeguard occupational health, privacy, autonomy and dignity.

Applied thoughtfully, with adequate regulatory frameworks in place, AI and commercial wearable technologies can prevent injuries, anticipate illness and place workers’ safety and well-being at the centre of workplace practices.

Christopher McLeod receives funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, WorkSafeBC, the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, and the British Columbia Construction Safety Alliance.

Atieh Razavi Yekta does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Will AI drones, robots and wearable sensors revolutionize workplace safety? – https://theconversation.com/will-ai-drones-robots-and-wearable-sensors-revolutionize-workplace-safety-275412

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Maha Khawaja, PhD Student, Health and Society, McMaster University

Success is often seen as an individual journey. The ambitious woman’s dedication and hard work get her where she wants to be. But social psychologists suggest something different: behind many women’s achievements lies a powerful and often overlooked support system — their friendships with other women.

Overwhelmingly, research shows that female friendships have the capacity to greatly enhance nearly every domain of life, from mental well-being to quality of life. They even foster better physical health.

In childhood, these social bonds are vital to reinforce emotional resilience, build healthy coping mechanisms and strengthen communication skills. As time goes on, this steady support also buffers the negative impacts of life transitions such as breakups, caregiving, burnout and illness.

Female friendships are social and psychological infrastructure that shape health, resilience and achievement, not just a sentimental side story.

Getting through life together

These bonds can help encourage goal-setting, ambition and later success. Developmental psychologists use the self-in-relation theory to posit that women’s growth in particular is built through social connection and interaction with one another.

Solid friendships can boost self-esteem, growth and even empowerment. And if you think about it, it makes intuitive sense. Empowerment is cultivated within the communities women build and sustain together.

In university settings in high-pressure environments, for example, female friendships prove critical in maintaining a positive outlook and building a strong sense of self. They also ensure a much better experience when transitioning to university in the first place, and getting used to it.

When it comes to problem-solving, studies show women don’t always do it alone. In fact, processes of co-rumination, which involve audibly working through problems with one another, lead to better problem-solving abilities and a capacity to handle strife.

Female friendships can also function as a therapeutic mechanism, providing real-time cognitive reframing by “telling it like it is” and improving coping strategies and stress tolerance.

A network in times of crisis

When it comes to hardships such as cancer, menopause or chronic pain, women also support one another through emotional comfort, access to valuable knowledge and even help offset emotional and physical labour. For example, for women recovering from substance use disorders, evidence shows that friends empower one another to recover and attain access to resources they hold in high regard.

For women who are post-partum and new mothers, having a supportive network to help with domestic and emotional labour also proves to have profound impacts on sense of self and buffers poor mental health. Even in later life, menopause sisterhoods — supportive, often informal communities where women help each other navigate the changes of menopause together — are vital in protecting quality of life.

Biology reinforces the positive impacts of friendship and social supports through the release of oxytocin, otherwise known as the “love hormone,” which then improves overall health.

For those without an in-person village by their side, online spaces such as Reddit function as a way for women to connect with other like-minded women globally and find solidarity. For people seeking help regarding sex education, for example, and who may not have an in-person support network, these online forums function as spaces to share knowledge, alleviate anxiety and build confidence.

Having a sisterhood can also aid immensely in protecting mental health during the ups-and-downs of a romantic relationship. Even more so, female friendships can help during situations of domestic abuse by providing valuable resources, emotional comfort and ultimately strength.

The politics of collective solidarity

Though supportive social bonds are a major part of an individual’s foundation, movements like #MeToo illustrate how collective female solidarity can shift institutional power too.

They function as a top-down process that can reshape what is socially possible. Even some of the first feminist movements in North America were largely constructed through the connections formed between women and the reliance they had on one another to achieve their goals.

While the end of a friendship is certainly not easy, there is still much beauty in the relationships that are meant to exist for specific season and in the opportunity to build new ones across our lifespan.

If society is serious about advancing women’s success, it must recognize that success is rarely achieved alone. Female friendships are foundational to women’s progress.

Whether it’s a friend who lends a listening ear and brings joy through late-night conversations or one that sternly tells you when to get back up and fight, the importance of female friendships is something we should celebrate this International Women’s Day.

Maha Khawaja does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Behind women’s success is a sisterhood that sustains it – https://theconversation.com/behind-womens-success-is-a-sisterhood-that-sustains-it-276838