Energy Mix
Thirty years after Canada helped shape global human rights and sustainability commitments at the 1995 World Summit for Social Development, the country is still repeating the same policy mistakes—now under far more urgent climate and social pressures, say two longtime advocates.
For Sheila Regehr, chair of the Basic Income Canada Network and a former Canadian negotiator at the Summit, the problem is rooted in an economic model that has barely shifted since the 1990s.
“The GDP problem is that what we don’t count, we don’t protect,” Regehr told The Energy Mix. “Unpaid work wasn’t counted. Environmental degradation wasn’t counted. That foundation is why we’re here now—and the planet is in jeopardy.”
[Sheila Regehr is a member of the Energy Mix Productions Board of Directors, and the Basic Income Canada Network is a lead partner in Energy Mix’s Green Resilience Project (GRP).]
Canada once led international efforts to measure unpaid work, but policy-makers never translated those insights into action. Instead, Regehr said governments have doubled down on tunnel-vision economic thinking that prioritizes profit and growth while ignoring the care work, community bonds, and environmental stewardship essential to resilience.
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