Grant Neufeld

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Grant Neufeld in a campaign photo from 2004.

Grant Neufeld is a social justice and media activist, a politician and noted knitter in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. He also works in the field of community economic development on a local currency project at the Calgary-based "Arusha Centre". He was raised in Calgary.

1 Politics
2 Activism
3 Independent media
4 Publications
5 Awards received
6 References
7 External links

[edit] Politics

In October 2, 2004, Neufeld was elected to a two-year term as President of the Green Party of Alberta. He did not seek reelection in 2006, and was replaced by Susan Stratton.^[1]

In the November 2004 Alberta general election, he ran, unsuccessfully, as the Green Party of Alberta candidate in the provincial riding of Calgary Buffalo. He placed third out of seven candidates, with about 8.5% of the vote.

[edit] Activism

Neufeld has been involved with activist causes, projects and organizations including social justice issues, feminism, the Peace movement, Environmentalism and anti-poverty work.

He founded the "Calgary Activist Network"^[2], a largely internet-based project in August 1999, and served as Director and primary programmer of the project until the end of December 2003. The Network serves as a clearing house for a diverse range of social justice and environmental activism efforts. In identifying the intended diversity of the project, Neufeld stated "Everyone should be able to find something on the Network that offends them. If that's the case, then it's diverse enough."

He founded the "Revolutionary Knitting Circle" in 2000, which has attracted interest and media interviews from across Canada, the United States and Europe.^[3] He is the circle's global co-ordinator, and local coordinator for the Calgary group.

Opposed to Canadian oil company Talisman Energy, Inc.'s operations in Sudan, Neufeld and a small group of Calgary-based activists founded "Project Sudan" in February 2001. Working in coalition with other social justice groups, they were eventually successful in getting the company to withdraw from Sudan.

After the July 21, 2001, announcement that the G8 Summit would be held in Kananaskis, Alberta, Neufeld and other local activsts co-founded "Calgary G8 ACT", a group established to coordinate protests against the summit.

In early 2003, with the emergence of mass global resistance to the then-impending invasion of Iraq by U.S.-led forces, activist groups in Calgary working on peace related issues came together to form a loose coalition that came to be known as "Peace Calgary". Since its founding, Neufeld has served as a co-ordinator.

Beginning in the summer of 2004, he served as a co-chair and co-ordinator of the "Alberta Social Forum" which was held February, 2005, in Calgary.

[edit] Independent media

Neufeld has worked on, and contributed to, a number of independent and alternative media projects, publications and internet based independent news services.

In the first half of 2000, he published the short lived independent newspaper The Independent Reporter.^[4]

Neufeld joined with other local independent media activists to establish "Calgary Indymedia". in anticipation of significant protests being held at the World Petroleum Congress in Calgary in June 2000. In 2001, he participated in the expansion of the project to become "Alberta Indymedia", and continued to work with and support the project through 2004.