Jonathan Rose

Research Interests

Canadian Politics, mass media, political communication, political advertising, propaganda. More recently he has been interested in the practice of deliberative democracy and the demands such experiments make on citizens and governments.

Jonathan Rose would be interested in supervising graduate students in the areas of deliberative democracy, citizens’ assemblies, citizen engagement, public interest and regulatory bodies.

Jonathan Rose's CV

Brief Biography

Jonathan studied at University of Toronto and Queen's where he received his Ph.D. He has taught at a number of places including the International Studies Centre (Herstmonceux, UK), Charles University in Prague, Bratislava, Slovakia and Kwansei Gakuin University in Osaka, Japan where he was the Visiting Professor of Canadian Studies. In 2008, Jonathan was a Visiting Research Fellow in the School of Political Science and International Relations at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand.

Jonathan is the author or co-author of several books.  His first book Making Pictures in our Heads, Government Advertising in Canada (New York: Praeger Press, 2000) was the first book-length treatment of how governments advertise.  He is the co-editor (with Douglas Brown) of Canada: the State of the Federation 1998.  He is the lead author of The Art of Negotiation, a simulation exercise about federal-provincial diplomacy published by Broadview Press and translated into three languages.  Along with colleagues André Blais, Patrick Fournier, Henk Van der Kolk and R. Kenneth Carty, When Citizens Decide: Lessons from Citizens' Assemblies on Electoral Reform (Oxford, 2011) was the beginning of a new research strand on citizens' assemblies.  This book was the recipient of Seymour Martin Lipset Best Book Award, Canadian Politics Section of American Political Science Association.  In 2021, Jonathan and a group of international colleagues wrote a book called Deliberative Mini-Publics: Core Design Features (Bristol:  Bristol University Press, 2021).  This was to enumerate the elements of these sorts of bodies and how they might fit into the policy process.

Jonathan's teaching is varied. He has taught graduate and undergraduate courses in Canadian politics, political communication, federalism, the mass media, electoral systems, intergovernmental relations and public policy. In 2010, he received the Frank Knox Certificate of Commendation for Excellence in Teaching. In 2011, Jonathan was the recipient of W.J. Barnes Teaching Excellence Award.  

Throughout his time as an academic, he has engaged with governments on a wide range of public policies. He has provided advice several times to the Auditor General of Canada on government advertising and sponsorship. For ten years, Jonathan was a member of the Advertising Review Board for the Auditor General of Ontario, a board that enforces legislation regulating government advertising in Ontario. In 2016, he co-authored a report for Elections Nova Scotia called A Question of Fairness: Regulating Government Communications and Advertising in Nova Scotia.

His interest in citizen engagement has led him in 2016 to be one of two expert panelists for the Bank of Canada’s Advisory Council on the new $10 Viola Desmond bill. In 2018, the Department of Fisheries & Oceans asked him to help guide a national citizens’ panel that was to make recommendations around Marine Protected Areas. Prior to that, he had the privilege of being the Academic Director of the Ontario Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform.  

Teaching

For detailed information about political studies courses and instructors, please refer to the Undergraduate and Graduate pages. 

Service (2024/2025)

• Head, Department of Political Studies
• Budget Advisory Committee (Faculty of Arts & Science)
• Adjunct Appointments Committee (Chair)
• Appointments Committee (Chair)
• Departmental Committee