The DREAM Lab
The DREAM (Defence Resources Exploring Alternatives to Militarism) Lab, led by Dr. Megan Mackenzie, is an intensive week-long lab that trains students from Simon Fraser University to rethink Canada’s military and defence spending in response to complex security threats.
Students receive training in policy analysis, take part in conceptual discussions about security and military spending, receive insight from guest speakers and collaborate with their peers to produce a report on alternative spending options. At the end of the lab, they present their findings to an academic and policy audience.
What is the DREAM Lab about?
The DREAM lab builds from a critical understanding of security, asking students to consider what spending might look like if we consider everyday threats to Canadians livelihoods, often as a result of structural inequalities, as security threats. This requires looking at the issue from a human security lens as opposed to the conventional, state-centred, perspective. This exercise allows students to view the crises they see happening across Canada - including, but not excluded to, climate breakdown, opioid addiction, diabetes care, the rising cost of living, Indigenous rights, and sexual violence - as security threats that those in power have a responsibility to address.
Please direct any questions about the lab towards m_mackenzie@sfu.ca or imogen.fraser@mail.mcgill.ca
The Dream Lab is supported by the Research Network on Women, Peace and Security, the Simons Chair for International Law and Human Security and SFU School for International Studies.