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Picture of Dr. P. Whitney Lackenbauer

Dr. P. Whitney Lackenbauer

Network Lead, Canada Research Chair (Tier 1) in the Study of the Canadian North, and Professor, School for the Study of Canada, Trent University

Dr. Lackenbauer is one of Canada’s leading experts on Arctic security, history, and contemporary policy. He has received a long list of honours, awards, and grants for his scholarship. He has (co-)written or (co-)edited more than sixty books and more than one hundred academic articles and book chapters. His recent books include Canadian Arctic Defence and Foreign Policy: Recent Developments (2025); Canadian Arctic Sovereignty and Security, Volume 2: Historical and Legal Perspectives (2024); People, Politics, and Purpose: Biography and Canadian Political History (2023); The Joint Arctic Weather Stations: Science and Sovereignty in the High Arctic, 1946-72 (2022); Lines in the Snow: Thoughts on the Past and Future of Northern Canadian Policy Issues (2021); On Thin Ice? Perspectives on Arctic Security (2021); Breaking Through? Understanding Sovereignty and Security in the Circumpolar Arctic (2021); and Canada and the Maritime Arctic: Boundaries, Shelves, and Waters (2020). Recent policy reports include the NAADSN Canadian Arctic Climate Change and Security Impact Assessment (2024); Arctic Narratives and Political Values: Arctic States, China, EU, and NATO (2024); Selling the ‘Near Arctic’ State: China’s Information and Influence Operations in the Arctic (2024); The State of Search and Rescue in Nunavut (2024); Canadian Inuit and North American Defence Modernization: Background Considerations (2023); Situating the Northwest Territories in Canadian Defence and Security (2023); and Transformative Infrastructure Investments in Canada’s Arctic Territories (2022). Dr. Lackenbauer was the 2017-18 Killam Visiting Scholar at the University of Calgary, a Fulbright Fellow at the School for Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University in 2010, and a Canadian International Council Research Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation in 2008-09. He co-led the Emerging Arctic Security Environment project through ArcticNet (2010-15) and was co-chair of the Munk School-Gordon Foundation Arctic Peoples and Security program (2011-13). He was 2018 Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Centre for National Security Studies (CNSS) at Canadian Forces College, and became Canada Research Chair (Tier 1) in the Study of the Canadian North at Trent University in July 2018.

Lackenbauer has a distinguished record of university and national service that has provided him with the requisite experience to coordinate and manage our collaborative network and engage with the Defence Team at many levels. In recognition of his work with Indigenous peoples and the military in Canada’s North, he was made the Honorary Lieutenant-Colonel of the 1st Canadian Ranger Patrol Group in fall 2014. Lackenbauer also has extensive experience consulting to governments and non-government organizations on governance, sovereignty, security, and other policy issues.

For a detailed list of his extensive service in academic, government, and community circles, please see his website at www.lackenbauer.ca.