Motto: Giving Voice
The Environics Institute for Survey Research was established in 2006 to sponsor relevant and original public opinion, attitude and social values research related to issues of public policy and social change. We wish to survey those not usually heard from, using questions not usually asked.
The Institute was also charged with disseminating its research into the public domain to stimulate discourse and the development of informed responses to social and political challenges.
The Institute will achieve its objectives by: (1) sponsoring survey research on issues of socio-political import which are being ignored or insufficiently addressed by mainstream polling organizations, media, foundations, governments, corporations and academic bodies in Canada and abroad; (2) partnering with media organizations to responsibly disseminate Institute-sponsored research; (3) encouraging informed public discourse on issues related to Institute-sponsored research; (4) funding programs, such as those at Queen’s University in Kingston, that extend access to the Environics data archive to academics, think tanks, and journalists; and (5) funding research on the conduct and public dissemination of public opinion polling in Canada.
The first project of the Institute was to conduct surveys of representative samples of the Canadian public and Canadian Muslims on the relationship between Canadian Muslims and Canadian society at large. This research was partly intended to replicate and build upon a Pew Center poll conducted in 13 countries in 2006, including Muslim oversamples in Britain, France, Germany and Spain. The Environics Institute-sponsored survey was conducted by Environics Research Group, and is the first study of its kind to put the attitudes of Canadians, including Canadian Muslims, in comparative perspective. The Institute is fortunate to have partnered with CBC television for public release of the results of this important research in early 2007.
In addition to its media partners, the Institute intends to build relationships with foundations and other groups that share its objectives.
Initially, the Environics Institute will design its own activities but eventually will welcome research proposals from other individuals and organizations. Three projects were initiated in 2007.
The first was a $5,000 grant to political scientist Stuart Soroka (Queen’s University) to fund two sessions at the Canadian Political Science Association’s annual conference. One session will show long-term trends in Canadian public opinion, and examine the links between survey data and electoral outcomes. The second session will seek to familiarize assembled scholars with the resources available in the Canadian Opinion Research Archive.
The second Environics Institute initiative of 2007 was a $25,000 grant to a team of social scientists to study the effects of public opinion polls on voting behaviour. The study, led by Fred Cutler of the University of British Columbia, used the October Ontario provincial election as a case study through which to examine the influence of polls in the election process. The Institute’s intention is that the results of this research will be presented to public opinion pollsters and journalists in 2008 through the Marketing Research and Intelligence Association and the Canadian Journalism Foundation.
The third initiative was the first-ever Canadian-initiated survey of the people of Afghanistan on issues related to quality of life, reconstruction, and Canadian military presence in the country. This project was undertaken in partnership with the CBC, the Globe and Mail, La Presse and the Centre for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies and the Munk Centre for International Studies, both at the University of Toronto. The survey was conducted by Environics Research and the Afghan Centre for Survey and Opinion Research (ACSOR) and was released in mid October 2007.
Also, in 2008, the Institute is co-sponsored a survey of Canadians’ interest, engagement and involvement in the world outside our borders as part of the Canada’s World initiative. Conducted in January, 2008, this groundbreaking survey of 2,000 Canadians (including oversamples of youth and immigrants) sought to measure not just Canadians’ opinions about the federal government’s activities on the world stage, but Canadian citizens’ own personal engagement with the world as individuals, members of families, students, citizen activists, members of NGOs, and entrepreneurs. The major sponsor for this research was the Simons Foundation and the media partners for this project were the CBC/Radio-Canada, the Globe and Mail and Le Devoir. Results were released by these outlets on February 4 and 5, 2008.
Looking to the future, the Institute also aspires to help advance national thought and dialogue regarding Canada’s First Nations: their standard of living, quality of life, and future in this country. The Institute’s Aboriginal initiative is in its early stages; discussions with progressive Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal leaders, as well as a literature review, are underway. The Institute’s planned approach is to focus on the growing number of aboriginals who are choosing to live in Canada’s large urban centres.
Also on the agenda in 2008 is the possibility of the Institute cofunding a groundbreaking survey of Canadian attitudes towards environmental pricing reform on behalf of the Sustainable Prosperity project, a unique multidisciplinary and multistakeholder initiative. The goal of this research is to go beyond the usual public opinion polls on Canadians' environmental concerns and good intentions to explore the kinds of market based and regulatory initiatives, cap and trade mechanisms, carbon capture technologies, carbon taxes, tax shifting and trade-offs the public is willing to support, a number of which are already enacted in other jurisdictions and are supported by environmental economists in this country. This project is in the early stages of seeking the support of a coalition of funders and media partners.
The Institute will initially be funded by Michael Adams, who co-founded the Environics group of research and communications consulting companies in 1970 and is author of several bestselling books including Sex in the Snow, Fire and Ice: The United States, Canada and the Myth of Converging Values and Unlikely Utopia: The Surprising Triumph of Canadian Pluralism to be published in November 2007. Mr. Adams sees a role for survey research in Canada that would not otherwise be undertaken by government, media, or private business.
The board of directors of the Institute will initially number three: Michael Adams, Alan Broadbent, the chairman of Avana Capital Corporation and the Maytree Foundation and Mark Sarner, the president of Manifest Communications. Others committed to the Institute’s work are Amy Langstaff who has worked with Michael Adams on four of his five books, May Wong who worked with Michael Adams when she was employed with the Toronto Community Foundation and David Eaves, a mediation consultant and policy advisor working out of Vancouver.
The Institute will consult widely with appropriate experts on topics for possible exploration. To help shape the Institute's body of work, an advisory panel will be assembled incrementally over time. Projects that meet the guidelines for charitable contributions will be funded through the Tides Foundation.
February 20, 2008
Michael Adams
President
Environics Institute
michael.adams@environics.ca
