Stephen Lewis
had a higher purpose of public service—to work tirelessly to build a better society
for those who were not members of society’s elite class.
By Fareed Khan
A version of this can be found on Substack.
With the
death of Stephen Lewis on March 31,
2026, Canada has lost a political, moral, and intellectual giant. At 88, Lewis
departed this life just days after his son Avi’s election as federal New
Democratic Party leader, closing a chapter of extraordinary public service
while opening another. Few figures in our history combined such fierce
intelligence, unyielding moral clarity, and oratorical power. In an era when
politics too often feels small, transactional, and beholden to the wealthy,
Lewis stood apart—a voice that elevated debate, challenged power, and reminded
us that public life could be a noble calling.
No
political leader of recent memory possessed the intellectual and moral strength
of Stephen Lewis. As Ontario NDP leader from 1970 to 1978, he brought a
razor-sharp mind and passionate eloquence to the legislature and the hustings.
His speeches were not mere sound bites, they were rigorous, evidence-based
arguments wrapped in moral urgency. He could dissect economic inequality with
the precision of a scholar while stirring the conscience of ordinary Canadians
with the fire of a prophet.
Later, as Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations and special envoy on HIV/AIDS, he confronted global indifference with the same combination of intellectual rigour and ethical conviction. Where others offered platitudes, Lewis demanded action. Where others courted donors and pollsters, he spoke truth to power. In the decades since he left provincial politics, no federal or provincial leader—Conservative, Liberal, or even New Democrat—has matched that rare fusion of brilliance and principle. Lewis did not merely participate in politics, he ennobled it.
It is regrettable that we rarely see political figures of his calibre any more in Canadian politics. Today’s leaders too often default to scripted talking points, focus-grouped slogans, and carefully managed social-media moments. The grand rhetorical tradition that once animated Canada’s political culture and public squares has been diminished by the demands of 24-hour news cycles and social media algorithms. Lewis’s ability to hold audiences spellbound with his words, to weave complex policy into vivid human narratives, and to inspire collective action feels like a relic of a more courageous age. In the era of performative politics and corporate and billionaire influence, the absence of voices like his leaves a void that needs to be filled. Public discourse has suffered, because unlike Lewis, today’s leaders fear bold ideas because it may mean losing power.
Yet even as many mourn Lewis’s passing, there is reason for hope. With the recent election of his son Avi as leader of the federal NDP, we may witness a rebirth of the sort of the sort of progressive politics that gave Canada its most cherished social programs. The NDP and its predecessor, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, have long been the engine of social democratic advance in this country. It was that tradition—fiercely championed by figures like Tommy Douglas—that delivered Canada’s public health care system, a single-payer model , however flawed, that Canadians value as a critical part what it is to be Canadian.
The Canada Pension Plan, which provides retirement security to millions, owes its existence to the determined advocacy of NDP parliamentarians who refused to let Lester Pearson’s minority government settle for less. The 40-hour work week, once a distant dream of labour activists, became reality through decades of union and political pressure rooted in the same progressive ethos. More recently, public dental care and publicly funded day care have moved from aspiration to policy, thanks in no small part to NDP insistence during minority Parliaments.
These are not abstract achievements. They are the concrete expressions of a politics that puts people before profits. Canadians take them for granted precisely because they have become woven into the fabric of our national identity. Avi Lewis’s leadership, taking from what his father taught him, offers the chance to revive that tradition at the federal level, to remind us that bold social policy is not radical—it is Canadian.
What Canada needs today is political leaders cast in the mould of Stephen Lewis—men and women who do not serve the rich and powerful but represent the interests of the 99% of Canadians who are not part of the millionaire and billionaire class. Too many in our current political class have internalized the notion that economic policy must first appease Bay Street, corporate boardrooms, and the ultra-wealthy. The result is a new Gilded Age in Canada, where a tiny elite grows obscenely richer while wages stagnate, housing becomes unaffordable, and essential services strain under chronic under funding. The super-rich are not merely benefiting from the system, they are shaping it—through lobbying, political donations, and media influence—to ensure policies flow upward.
Stephen Lewis never accepted this arrangement. His higher purpose of public service was to work tirelessly to build a better society for those who were not members of society’s elite class—the working families, the poor, the marginalized, the vast majority who labour every day without the cushion of inherited wealth or corporate connections. He understood that governments too often pursue policies that benefit the rich and powerful at the expense of the bottom 99%. Lewis rejected that approach to governing. He believed public office existed to restrain excess, expand opportunity, and guarantee dignity for all, not just those of wealth and privilege.
If given a chance, Stephen Lewis’s son Avi, as the new leader of the NDP, could be the political leader who begins the process of ending this new Gilded Age. The current Liberal government under Prime Minister Mark Carney has adopted fiscal and economic policies that often resemble those of past Conservative administrations—cautious on taxation of extreme wealth, deferential to market orthodoxy, and slow to confront the structural inequalities that define our time.
Carney, a former Bank of Canada governor and Goldman Sachs executive, brings formidable expertise to the role of prime minister but also a worldview shaped by elite financial circles. His minority government has shown flashes of progressive instinct, yet more often it has prioritized fiscal conservatism and investor confidence over the transformative change Canadians need to reduce extreme wealth inequality and raise the wages of the vast majority.
Avi Lewis has the platform, the pedigree, and the passion to push the Carney government—and the broader political spectrum—back toward the left of the political centre by demanding universal pharmacare, stronger labour rights, meaningful wealth taxes, and aggressive action on housing and climate justice. An emboldened NDP, echoing the legacy of the elder Lewis, could force the Liberals to choose between the status quo and the bold social democracy that once defined Canadian politics in the 1960s and 70s.
As Canadians mourn the passing of Stephen Lewis, let the example of his life—in politics and beyond—serve as a guiding light for the future of our public life. His intellectual honesty, moral courage, and unwavering commitment to the common good should not slip into mere nostalgic memory. Instead, they must inspire a new generation of leaders who understand that the true measure of a nation lies not in the height of its stock market, but in the depth of its compassion and the breadth of its opportunity.
Avi Lewis now carries that torch. As he works to restore the federal NDP to the principled, fighting spirit that once made it the conscience of the nation, Canadians have a chance to reclaim the progressive legacy that built our greatest public institutions. Stephen Lewis showed us what politics at its best can achieve. His son now has the opportunity to prove it can happen again.
The passing of a giant leaves a huge silence, but in that silence echoes a clear challenge, to reject complacency, to demand better, and to build the fairer Canada that Lewis always believed was possible. If we seize this moment, perhaps we can achieve in our lifetime what Stephen Lewis could not fully realize in his.
© 2026 The View From Here. © 2025 Fareed Khan. All Rights Reserved.
Later, as Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations and special envoy on HIV/AIDS, he confronted global indifference with the same combination of intellectual rigour and ethical conviction. Where others offered platitudes, Lewis demanded action. Where others courted donors and pollsters, he spoke truth to power. In the decades since he left provincial politics, no federal or provincial leader—Conservative, Liberal, or even New Democrat—has matched that rare fusion of brilliance and principle. Lewis did not merely participate in politics, he ennobled it.
It is regrettable that we rarely see political figures of his calibre any more in Canadian politics. Today’s leaders too often default to scripted talking points, focus-grouped slogans, and carefully managed social-media moments. The grand rhetorical tradition that once animated Canada’s political culture and public squares has been diminished by the demands of 24-hour news cycles and social media algorithms. Lewis’s ability to hold audiences spellbound with his words, to weave complex policy into vivid human narratives, and to inspire collective action feels like a relic of a more courageous age. In the era of performative politics and corporate and billionaire influence, the absence of voices like his leaves a void that needs to be filled. Public discourse has suffered, because unlike Lewis, today’s leaders fear bold ideas because it may mean losing power.
Yet even as many mourn Lewis’s passing, there is reason for hope. With the recent election of his son Avi as leader of the federal NDP, we may witness a rebirth of the sort of the sort of progressive politics that gave Canada its most cherished social programs. The NDP and its predecessor, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation, have long been the engine of social democratic advance in this country. It was that tradition—fiercely championed by figures like Tommy Douglas—that delivered Canada’s public health care system, a single-payer model , however flawed, that Canadians value as a critical part what it is to be Canadian.
The Canada Pension Plan, which provides retirement security to millions, owes its existence to the determined advocacy of NDP parliamentarians who refused to let Lester Pearson’s minority government settle for less. The 40-hour work week, once a distant dream of labour activists, became reality through decades of union and political pressure rooted in the same progressive ethos. More recently, public dental care and publicly funded day care have moved from aspiration to policy, thanks in no small part to NDP insistence during minority Parliaments.
These are not abstract achievements. They are the concrete expressions of a politics that puts people before profits. Canadians take them for granted precisely because they have become woven into the fabric of our national identity. Avi Lewis’s leadership, taking from what his father taught him, offers the chance to revive that tradition at the federal level, to remind us that bold social policy is not radical—it is Canadian.
What Canada needs today is political leaders cast in the mould of Stephen Lewis—men and women who do not serve the rich and powerful but represent the interests of the 99% of Canadians who are not part of the millionaire and billionaire class. Too many in our current political class have internalized the notion that economic policy must first appease Bay Street, corporate boardrooms, and the ultra-wealthy. The result is a new Gilded Age in Canada, where a tiny elite grows obscenely richer while wages stagnate, housing becomes unaffordable, and essential services strain under chronic under funding. The super-rich are not merely benefiting from the system, they are shaping it—through lobbying, political donations, and media influence—to ensure policies flow upward.
Stephen Lewis never accepted this arrangement. His higher purpose of public service was to work tirelessly to build a better society for those who were not members of society’s elite class—the working families, the poor, the marginalized, the vast majority who labour every day without the cushion of inherited wealth or corporate connections. He understood that governments too often pursue policies that benefit the rich and powerful at the expense of the bottom 99%. Lewis rejected that approach to governing. He believed public office existed to restrain excess, expand opportunity, and guarantee dignity for all, not just those of wealth and privilege.
If given a chance, Stephen Lewis’s son Avi, as the new leader of the NDP, could be the political leader who begins the process of ending this new Gilded Age. The current Liberal government under Prime Minister Mark Carney has adopted fiscal and economic policies that often resemble those of past Conservative administrations—cautious on taxation of extreme wealth, deferential to market orthodoxy, and slow to confront the structural inequalities that define our time.
Carney, a former Bank of Canada governor and Goldman Sachs executive, brings formidable expertise to the role of prime minister but also a worldview shaped by elite financial circles. His minority government has shown flashes of progressive instinct, yet more often it has prioritized fiscal conservatism and investor confidence over the transformative change Canadians need to reduce extreme wealth inequality and raise the wages of the vast majority.
Avi Lewis has the platform, the pedigree, and the passion to push the Carney government—and the broader political spectrum—back toward the left of the political centre by demanding universal pharmacare, stronger labour rights, meaningful wealth taxes, and aggressive action on housing and climate justice. An emboldened NDP, echoing the legacy of the elder Lewis, could force the Liberals to choose between the status quo and the bold social democracy that once defined Canadian politics in the 1960s and 70s.
As Canadians mourn the passing of Stephen Lewis, let the example of his life—in politics and beyond—serve as a guiding light for the future of our public life. His intellectual honesty, moral courage, and unwavering commitment to the common good should not slip into mere nostalgic memory. Instead, they must inspire a new generation of leaders who understand that the true measure of a nation lies not in the height of its stock market, but in the depth of its compassion and the breadth of its opportunity.
Avi Lewis now carries that torch. As he works to restore the federal NDP to the principled, fighting spirit that once made it the conscience of the nation, Canadians have a chance to reclaim the progressive legacy that built our greatest public institutions. Stephen Lewis showed us what politics at its best can achieve. His son now has the opportunity to prove it can happen again.
The passing of a giant leaves a huge silence, but in that silence echoes a clear challenge, to reject complacency, to demand better, and to build the fairer Canada that Lewis always believed was possible. If we seize this moment, perhaps we can achieve in our lifetime what Stephen Lewis could not fully realize in his.
© 2026 The View From Here. © 2025 Fareed Khan. All Rights Reserved.
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