Much of Canada’s modern identity emerged from the innovative social policies and ambitious foreign policy of Louis St-Laurent’s Liberal government. His extraordinarily creative administration made decisions that still resonate today: on health care, pensions, and housing; on infrastructure and intergovernmental issues; and, further afield, in developing Canada’s global middle-power role in global affairs and resolving the Suez Crisis. Yet St-Laurent remains an enigmatic figure.

Contributors to The Unexpected Louis St-Laurent assess the degree to which he set the policy agenda. They explore the features of his personality that made him effective (or sometimes less so), the changes he wrought on the state apparatus and federal-provincial relations, and the substance of his government’s policies.

This wide-ranging collection fills a great void in Canadian political history, bringing together seasoned professionals and new scholars to investigate the far-reaching influence of a politician whose astute policies and bold resolve moved Canada into the modern era.

PATRICE DUTIL is the author or editor of a dozen books, a frequent commentator on political and policy issues, and the host of over 100 podcasts in the Canadian history series “Witness to Yesterday.” He is a professor in the department of politics and public administration at Toronto Metropolitan University. He founded and for five years edited the Literary Review of Canada and served as president of the Champlain Society for seven years. He is a senior fellow at the Bill Graham Centre for Contemporary International History at the University of Toronto and a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. Among his books are Ballots and Brawls: The 1867 Canadian General Election, Prime Ministerial Power in Canada: Its Origins under Macdonald, Laurier and Borden and Macdonald at 200: New Perspectives and Legacies (edited with Roger Hall).

Patrice Dutil's profile page

The Unexpected Louis St-Laurent span[s] a wide range of issues surrounding St-Laurent’s time as prime minister, making clear his importance as well as that of this oft overlooked period.

British Journal of Canadian Studies

The Unexpected Louis St-Laurent is a fine volume, one of the few recent edited collections held together by more than the binding.

Literary Review of Canada

With this superbly-executed, comprehensive book, [St-Laurent] now gets the tribute he would not have asked for — but nonetheless deserves.

Policy Magazine