John Horgan '79 : A Legacy of Activism
Interview Highlights with the former Premier
January 20, 2023
Alumnus John Horgan '79 has retired from his position as Premier of British Columbia.
After completing his undergraduate studies in History and Canadian Studies at Trent, John received his Master’s degree in History in Australia. Upon returning to Canada, he eventually settled in Langford, British Columbia.
Shortly after, he entered politics, rising to chief of staff for interim premier Dan Miller. He has been an MLA since 2005 and became the leader of the BC New Democratic Party in 2014. After his first election as leader, John was sworn in as Premier of British Columbia on July 18, 2017.
TRENT Magazine and the Trent Voices podcast caught up with the newly retired former Premier for a wide-ranging conversation that included thoughts on his legacy, a lifetime of activism, the impact of Trent University on his career, and on what's coming next as his political career winds down.
Alma Matters is excited to share some highlights of this interview, which will be presented in full in the spring edition of TRENT.
TRENT Magazine: You have had so many successes as a Premier. And you're a premier that's going out with a continued high level of popularity. Some of your successes include eliminating medical services premiums, your work with the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia leading to no-fault insurance, and leading BC to adopt the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous people. But what do you see as your legacy as Premier?
John Horgan: It was a very activist government, without any doubt, including other Trent grads. Nathan Cullen, Sheila Malcolmson, both Trent alum who were in my cabinet, continue to serve as cabinet ministers here in BC. And so, the items that you mentioned are all important. And there were many, many more: re-balancing labor laws, environmental policies that were making sense, looking at the forest industry, the foundational industry in British Columbia. How we can continue to create jobs and wealth, while protecting and preserving these last vital stands, in some cases, of diverse forests across the province?
All of those things were really important and exciting to be part of. The Declaration would be the pinnacle – of ensuring that indigenous rights and title, which has been an issue in British Columbia since European expansion, and had not been resolved -- as it had been in other provinces -- over time. To make progress on social and economic justice for first peoples in BC was very important to me.
But I'd have to say, and people have been asking me this question, I think the thing I'm most proud of is that we were able to (I think, and of course we'll be judged by history, but if polls and people at the grocery store are any indication) change the debate in British Columbia about left and right, and linear politics, broadly speaking.
I'm a social democrat. That goes back to attending a lecture by Tommy Douglas in the Wenjack Theater a million years ago (and only because my roommate from Peter Robinson College promised me a beer if I went with him). I didn't know who Tommy Douglas was. I was studying psychology. I wanted to be a social worker, and, after just a couple of hours with this little man, with his booming voice, with a powerful message, I became fixed on his message: the way to solve problems for individuals is to have solutions for collective problems. And so, I shifted from psych to history and Canadian studies and never looked back…
And so I was able, and my colleagues were able over the past five years, to change the story in British Columbia -- which was [told by] the right of center parties. The current opposition is called the BC Liberal Party. I think they're in the process of changing their name to BC United, which no, is not a soccer team; it's apparently going to be a political party. But, in reality, what [BC United] is, is the right of center voters west of the Rocky Mountains (they use Liberal now, they were Conservative in the past), with the NDP as the left of center voters within British Columbia. This schism, this polarization, has been characterized across the country as “wacky” politics in BC.
I believe our legacy is that British Colombians now know that they can change government without catastrophic consequences. The decade of the 1990s… the NDP years, are characterized as this awful time because the right of center parties have been so effective at that branding exercise. I think what we've been able to do is break that brand. And this is so important at this time in our history.
I would urge anyone who's listening in other parts of the country, we've got to start looking at our politics differently, not as left and right, but as progress and no progress. And that doesn't mean instinctively progressive either. I think there's space in government to make good choices, left and right (if we have to be linear). But at the end of the day, we have to look at our circumstances and provide the services that people need in order to meet the challenges of modernity.
TRENT Magazine: Trent University has long been known as an activist university. How did that Trent activism, and Trent life in general, inform you and continue to inform you?
John Horgan: I had a picture in my office: it's a picture of [my wife] Ellie and I in front of Peter Robinson College with our homemade protest signs, saying "Stop the Cuts!" If I hadn't missed the bus, I would've been in an occupation of the President's office in my time at Trent. It was part and parcel of the awakening of my political awareness. And I carried that, joining a political party that was founded on dissent, the CCF/NDP, coming from a thing called the League for Social Reconstruction, which predated both of those political institutions.
And so, I've been enamored by protests my entire life. And the importance of minority voices speaking out to inform the majority that they may not have all the information they need to make sound decisions. I am very much part and parcel of protest, but I also came to a conclusion early on that the better way to realize the change was to not just stand on the grass outside of the building and yell at it, but to actually get inside the building and affect the changes that I wanted to see.
Look for the full interview with John Horgan in the Spring edition of TRENT Magazine.