The origins of this project, The Puzzle of Discretion, trace back to 2018 when we met as facilitators in an Indigenous-led, anti-racist training program that focused on anti-Indigenous racism in the Canadian public sector.
In that work, we were witnessing the direct links between workplace narratives rooted in colonial and racist myths described by participants, and the often catastrophic impacts of those narratives on Indigenous Peoples and Nations across sectors. Bearing witness in these training, and being implicated ourselves in white settler colonial institutions, we started a project in 2020 to investigate how colonial violence gets institutionalized - and for some normalized in the public sector through everyday work. The impacts are harmful, systemic and sometimes fatal, and they are often met with no state accountability. Critically, we also wanted to understand how some public sector workers try to intervene to interrupt settler colonial violence.
Through that research, PPSWs revealed the puzzle of discretion, a phrase engaged by Anna Pratt and Lorne Sossin in 2009 to study the context of law. In our work, we engage the puzzle of discretion to describe how patterns of decision-making that contradict government commitments to EDI, reconciliation and decolonization, often come down to discretion-most notably of PPSW leaders, and often don’t result in accountability. PPSWs also recounted trying to use their power in anti-oppressive ways.
About the project
In this project, funded through a SSHRC-Insight grant, we’ve committed to following discretion as a political question. We’re doing so because the stakes of discretion are high, especially in sectors of health, education and child & family services that deeply impact people’s lives. Moreover, the negative impacts of discretionary power weigh disproportionately on communities that experience systemic inequity, and public sector employees themselves experience different forms of inequity. In this project, we’re especially interested in speaking with Indigenous, Black and racialized current and former public sector workers given that they are often directly affected by discretionary choices, both as recipients of public services or as public sector employees themselves.
Working alongside student researchers and guided by the advisory group, our ultimate aim is to create applied resources for learning, connecting and mobilizing (i.e., strategies, activities, tools). We also aim to connect with more people through this work, so please reach out to us!