Maude Barlow


Maude Victoria Barlow is a Canadian author and activist. She is a founding member and former board chair of The Council of Canadians, a citizens' advocacy organization with members and chapters across Canada. She is also the co-founder of the Blue Planet Project, which works internationally for the human right to water. Barlow chairs the board of Washington-based Food & Water Watch, serves on the Board of Advisors to the Global Alliance on the Rights of Nature, was a founding member of the San Francisco–based International Forum on Globalization, and was a Councillor with the Hamburg-based World Future Council. She is the Chancellor of Brescia University College at Western University. In 2008/2009, was Senior Advisor on Water to the 63rd President of the United Nations General Assembly.
She has authored and co-authored 20 books, including Whose Water is it Anyway? Taking water protection into public hands and Still Hopeful, Lessons From a Lifetime of Activism.

Water policy

Barlow proposes the remunicipalization of the water and sanitation services because "the public and communities lose control as local government officials abdicate control over a vital public service, private water companies are accountable to their shareholders, not to the people they serve and often restrict public access to information about their operations. Because they have to make a profit, they have to cut corners, raise water rates or lay off workers - often all three."

Film

Barlow is in the feature documentary film Blue Gold: World Water Wars by Sam Bozzo.
Barlow is featured in two other recent documentaries about water rights issues: Irena Salina's documentary Flow: For Love of Water, and Liz Marshall's Water on the Table. Barlow also contributes to a blog associated with Water on the Table.
Barlow is the subject of a National Film Board of Canada documentary Democracy à la Maude as well as a CBC TV Life and Times biography.

Published works

Books: Principal author or co-author

  • Parcel of Rogues: How Free Trade Is Failing Canada – Key Porter Books, Toronto
  • Take Back the Nation – Key Porter Books, Toronto
  • Take Back the Nation 2 – Key Porter Books, Toronto
  • Class Warfare: The Assault on Canada's Schools – Key Porter Books, Toronto .
  • Straight through the Heart: How the Liberals Abandoned the Just Society – HarperCollins, Toronto .
  • The Big Black Book: The Essential Views of Conrad and Barbara Amiel Black – Stoddart, Toronto .
  • MAI: The Multilateral Agreement on Investment and the Threat to Canadian Sovereignty – Stoddart .
  • MAI: The Multilateral Agreement on Investment and the Threat to American Freedom – Stoddart, Toronto
  • The Fight of My Life: Confessions of an Unrepentant Canadian – HarperCollins, Toronto .
  • MAI: The Multilateral Agreement on Investment Round 2; New Global and Internal Threats to Canadian Sovereignty – Stoddart, Toronto
  • Frederick Street: Life and Death on Canada's Love Canal – HarperCollins, Toronto
  • Global Showdown: How the New Activists Are Fighting Global Corporate Rule – Stoddart, Toronto .
  • Blue Gold: The Battle Against Corporate Theft of the World's Water – Stoddart, Toronto .
  • Profit Is Not the Cure: A Citizen's Guide to Saving Medicare – McCelland & Stewart, Toronto .
  • Too Close For Comfort; Canada's Future Within Fortress North America – McClelland & Stewart, Toronto .
  • Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis and the Fight for the Right to Water – McClelland & Stewart, Toronto . Also available in French, Arabic, Japanese, Portuguese, Korean, Greek, Turkish, and Spanish.
  • Blue Future: Protecting Water for People and the Planet Forever - House of Anansi, Inc., Toronto, 978-1-7708-9407-5.
  • Boiling Point: Government Neglect, Corporate Abuse, and Canada's Water Crisis - ECW Press, Toronto .
  • Whose Water is it Anyway? Taking water protection into public hands. - ECW Press, Toronto .
  • Still Hopeful: Lessons from a Lifetime of Activism - ECW Press, Toronto .

Books: contributing author

  • Trading Freedom: How Free Trade Affect our Lives, Work, and Environment – Institute for Policy Studies, Washington
  • The American Review of Canadian Studies – Twentieth Anniversary Issue of The Association for Canadian Studies in the United States, Washington
  • Crossing the Line: Canada and Free Trade With Mexico- New Star Publications, Vancouver
  • The Charlottetown Accord, the Referendum, and the Future of Canada – University of Toronto Press, Toronto
  • The Trojan Horse: Alberta and the Future of Canada – Black Rose Books, Edmonton
  • The Case Against the Global Economy – Sierra Club Books, New York
  • Globalization and the Live Performing Arts, Conference Papers – Monash University, Melbourne
  • Alternatives to Economic Globalization, a Report of the International Forum on Globalization – Berrett-Koehler Publishers, San Francisco
  • Whose Water Is It? The Unquenchable Thirst of a Water-Hungry World – Edited by Bernadette McDonald and Douglas Jehl, National Geographic, Washington
  • Meeting the Global Challenge: Competitive Position and Strategic Response – BMA Program, Edited by Tom Wesson, York University Press, Toronto
  • Globalization, Human Rights & Citizenship, An Anthology From the Gannett Lecture Series – Rochester Institute of Technology, Edited by Robert Manning – trade paperback

Reports

  • – International Forum on Globalization, San Francisco
  • The Free Trade Area of the Americas, The Threat to Social Programs, Environmental Sustainability and Social Justice – International Forum on Globalization, San Francisco
  • The World Trade Organization and the Threat to Canada's Social Programs – The Council of Canadians, Ottawa
  • Profit is not the Cure: A Call to Action on the Future of Health Care in Canada – The Council of Canadians, Ottawa
  • Making the Links, A Citizen's Guide to the World Trade Organization and the Free Trade Area of the Americas – The Council of Canadians, Ottawa
  • The Global Fight Against Privatization of Water – Annual Report, The World Forum on Alternatives, Geneva
  • The Canada We Want, A Citizen's Alternative to Deep Integration – The Council of Canadians, Ottawa