BIOGRAPHY

After earning his Master's degree and Ph.D. in political science at McGill University, Guy Laforest worked two years at the University of Calgary as a lecturer and post-doctoral fellow, before teaching for 29 years (1988-2017) at Université Laval. From 2017 to 2022, he held the position of Director General of the École nationale d'administration publique. He is widely recognized as a leading expert on constitutional and referendum issues in Canada. One of his main focuses has been to offer a critical interpretation of Canadian federalism and Quebec's place in this government system, from the standpoint of political philosophy and intellectual history. Professor Laforest also conducted extensive research on two major political-intellectual figures, Pierre-Elliot Trudeau and Charles Taylor.

Multilingual, he has taught in Belgium, Spain, Austria and the United States. He is also deeply committed to the advancement of research, and has helped organize some thirty symposia while directing the Prisme collection at Presses de l'Université Laval, publishing 50 titles between 1998 and 2023.

Professor Laforest is also known for his long-standing involvement with organizations aimed at promoting and advancing academic research. For example, he has held positions of responsibility at the Association internationale des études québécoises, in addition to having served as President of the Scientific Committee for the annual conferences of the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences in 2001 and of the association Acfas in 2013. At the time of his retirement from the Université Laval in 2017, he had recently been appointed President of the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences and was a member of Acfas’ Board of Directors.

He joined the Royal Society of Canada's Academy of Social Sciences in 2014, where he served as a member of the Expert Reports Committee for two years, and subsequently as a member of the Working Group on the Future of Higher Education in Canada and of the International Committee.