Mark Carney, the former Harvard University hockey goalie who went on to lead central banks in two G7 countries, has a unique perspective on an athletic pursuit that most assume requires a certain degree of madness to perform well. 

“My position on it was that you are the one person on the ice that’s facing outwards at danger,” Carney told economist and writer Tyler Cowen on the “Conversations with Tyler” podcast in 2021. “If you are a defenceman or a forward, you can get hit from behind, you can get hit from the side. Lots of bad things can happen to you, whereas if you are a goalie, you are facing your opponent at all times—or at least you should be.” 

Maybe that’s why Carney looked comfortable handling shots from the parliamentary press gallery in Nanaimo, B.C., this week, after the Liberal Party of Canada announced that he would chair something called the “leader’s task force on economic growth.” For the first time since Carney’s tenure at the Bank of England ended in 2020, he’s decided to get off the sidelines and join the game, in a position that will see him facing outwards at all kinds of danger.

“I have a couple of simple rules,” Carney said. “One, if the prime minister of Canada asks me to do something, I will do it. I will serve.” 

The audience for such noble intentions is smaller than it was when Carney first joined the Bank of Canada as a deputy in 2003. The Conservatives quickly raised questions about whether “Carbon Tax” Carney’s various private sector roles at companies such as Brookfield and Bloomberg represented conflicts of interest. He took nine questions from reporters in Nanaimo, and all but a couple related to his political future. 

None of that really matters. The question this week isn’t whether Carney wants to be an MP, or even Justin Trudeau’s successor, but whether his decision to get involved in politics will make a difference. I think it could, but only if he executes his mission transparently. We desperately need a new economic consensus, and a rethink led by someone of Carney’s unique talents and experience—even if he’s chosen a side of the country’s partisan divide—might be the best we can do in the near term. 

The risks to Carney’s reputation are minor compared with the existential threats of the moment. We’re in the early stages of a period of disruption that has echoes of the 1920s, the 1970s and the IT revolution of the 1990s, making for confusing, chaotic and nervous times. Many of our anchors have become unmoored, including politics, which for decades was a source of stability in Canada because the major parties resisted the pull of extremes. 

No party has won more than 40 per cent of the popular vote since 2000, and more people voted for Conservatives than Liberals in the last two elections. 

Parties have become good at mining narrower veins of potential support, but at the cost of destroying a national consensus that allowed governments to do difficult things such as introduce the GST, embrace free trade and balance the budget. Solving our current troika of crises—climate, housing and productivity—will require policies that will upset many people. The collapse of support for the carbon tax suggests the political class isn’t up for the challenge. 

Earlier this year, Stéphanie Grammond of La presse observed that Trudeau’s father, Pierre, responded to the stagflation of the early 1980s by appointing the Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada, a landmark in economic history more commonly known as the Macdonald Commission, as it was led by former Liberal cabinet minister Donald Macdonald. 

The commission started its work in 1982 and presented its final report to a new prime minister, Brian Mulroney, in 1984. Among the recommendations were a free-trade agreement with the U.S. and a call to get federal spending under control, policies that became hallmarks of Mulroney’s time in power. 

We prefer influencers to commissions these days. Back in 2016, the Trudeau government appointed Dominic Barton, who was then the global managing partner of consulting powerhouse McKinsey and Company, to lead the Advisory Council on Economic Growth. That work has been dated by history and tarnished by subsequent revelations of McKinsey’s appetite for public consulting contracts in Canada and elsewhere. It’s time for something new. 

Carney will be compared to Barton, and he will continue to be compared to Michael Ignatieff, the renowned political thinker who learned there’s a difference between theory and practice when he came home after a long time abroad to lead the Liberals. 

Such comparisons are weak. Carney served Liberal and Conservative governments at the Finance Department, and Conservative governments in Canada and the U.K. appointed him to oversee monetary policy. Those weren’t patronage appointments. They were earned on merit. 

“It seems to me a lot of people trust you. Even British people trust you,” Cowen said to Carney on the podcast. “That’s a skill,” Cowen added, before asking his guest what he did to develop such a talent. 

Carney’s response is noteworthy. He said you earn trust by demonstrating competence, and by “admitting when things go wrong, or when you’ve learned new information and you’ve changed your view.” He also said that to be trusted, the people you are serving need to feel you are on their side. 

The government with which Carney has aligned himself struggles with all of those things. The closest Trudeau has come to acknowledging his government let immigration get out of hand was a cabinet shuffle, and the most common critique of his administration is its inability to execute promises. An electoral strategy that relies on exciting a narrow band of voters can only alienate as many or more. 

It’s possible the public has become too polarized to listen to anyone who isn’t wearing their jersey. I hope not, because I’d rather the next election be a contest of ideas, rather than simply an outlet for anger at an unpopular prime minister. If Carney sticks to his principles, we might get that chance.  

Kevin Carmichael is The Logic’s economics columnist and editor-at-large. He has spent more than two decades covering economics, business and finance for outlets including Bloomberg News, The Globe and Mail and the Financial Post, where he also served as editor-in-chief.