Eugene Lang

Eugene Lang is Assistant Professor in the School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University, where he teaches in the Master of Public Administration (MPA) and Professional (mid-career) Master of Public Administration programs.

A Senior Fellow with the Bill Graham Centre for Contemporary International History, Trinity College, University of Toronto, Lang was previously Visiting Fellow, Munk School of International Studies, University of Toronto and BMO Visiting Fellow, Glendon School of Public and International Affairs, Glendon College, York University, where he taught in the M.A. program and was Interim Co-Director of the School.

Lang has published over two hundred journal articles, op eds, and book chapters on national defence and security, foreign affairs and economic policy. His book The Unexpected War: Canada in Kandahar (co-authored with Janice Stein), was a national best-seller that won the Writer’s Trust Cohen Prize for political writing and was short-listed for the Donner Prize for the Best Book on Canadian Public Policy. A regular commentator in broadcast and print media, Lang has written for The Globe and Mail, The Toronto Star, The National Post, The Ottawa Citizen, The Montreal Gazette, Walrus, and many other newspapers.

Lang worked for many years in the Canadian government, notably as Chief of Staff to two Ministers of National Defence (John McCallum and Bill Graham). He was heavily involved in the government’s policies on the conflict in Afghanistan; Ballistic Missile Defence; NORAD renewal; The Defence Policy Statement: A Role of Pride and Influence in the World; and the 2005 federal Budget, which delivered the largest increase in funding in a generation to the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces.

He has testified as an expert witness before federal review panels and commissions, including The Independent Panel on Canada’s Future Role in Afghanistan (“The Manley Panel”, 2008), and the Independent Comprehensive Review of the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces (“The Arbour Review”, 2021-22”).

Educated at the University of Western Ontario (B.A., M.A. in political science), Queen’s University (M.P.A.) and the London School of Economics (M.Sc. International Political Economy), where he studied as a Chevening Scholar, Lang lives in Ottawa with his wife and children.