Parties pitch Canadians on foreign policy ideas, but a grander strategy still missing

This week, Turkey launched an offensive on a Kurdish militia in Syria that has been instrumental in the fight against ISIS. Tens of thousands of people are reportedly fleeing their homes, and several people have been killed. In The New York Times, Megan Specia has an explainer on Turkey’s relationship with the Kurds, how the US fits in, and what this attack could mean for an ISIS resurgence.

Ahead of the federal election, Globe and Mail correspondents in various continents spoke to politicians, business leaders and others to paint a picture of how Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland is perceived around the world. “She’s either one of the last, best hopes of the liberal world order,” they write, “or she’s an out-of-touch idealist who is risking trade by starting diplomatic fights that Canada can’t hope to win.”

In this essay for The Walrus, Sarmishta Subramanian asks big questions around the causes of polarization and whether Canada is immune to the deeper divisions tearing societies apart elsewhere: "Does our society simply feel more divided because there is space for voices that were always there but not heard widely in the past? Are opinions really polarizing? Is intolerance growing?" Such questions are key to understanding what's at stake this election.

"For every youngster there are potentially two parents and four grandparents. So for every million students, there could be six million adults behind them. And this means that while it may be a children’s movement, its influence is massive." In this multi-authored feature from El Pais, we meet youth in Spain, Switzerland, Mexico and beyond who are leading the way on climate action. "There has possibly never been a mass movement that has spread this fast."