Alcohol policies reflect conflicting ideological, social, health, and commercial agendas. Sober Reflections describes the development of alcohol policies at the national level and in Alberta, Quebec, and Ontario between 1980 and 2000. Using qualitative research methods, the essays examine the roles of key players, including governments, NGOs, public health advocates, and representatives of the alcohol industry. The contributors base their incisive papers on interviews with representatives from public health and the government, lobbyists, researchers, media, and those in the alcohol industries, as well as on an analysis of government documents, newspaper accounts, and official statistics.

The television spectacles of Oka and the Rodney King affair served to focus public disaffection with the police, a disaffection that has been growing for several years. In Canada, confidence in the police is at an all-time low. At the same time crime rates continue to rise. Canada now has the dubious distinction of having the second highest crime rate in the Western world. How did this state of affairs come about? What do we want from our police? How do we achieve policing that is consistent with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms? The essays in this volume set out to explore these questions. In their introduction, the editors point out that constitutional order is tied to the exercise of power by law enforcement agencies, and that if relations between the police and civil society continue to erode, the exercise of force will rise - a dangerous prospect for democratic societies.