Stephen Harper

Stephen Joseph Harper (born April 30, 1959) is a Canadian politician who served as the 22nd prime minister of Canada from 2006 to 2015. He is to date the only prime minister to have come from the modern-day Conservative Party of Canada, serving as the party's first leader from 2004 to 2015. Since 2018, he has also been the chairman of the International Democracy Union.

Harper studied economics, earning a bachelor's degree in 1985 and a master's degree in 1991 at the University of Calgary. He was one of the founders of the Reform Party of Canada and was first elected to Parliament in 1993 in the riding of Calgary West. He did not seek re-election in the 1997 federal election, instead joining and later leading the National Citizens Coalition, a conservative lobbyist group. In 2002, he succeeded Stockwell Day as leader of the Canadian Alliance, the successor to the Reform Party, and returned to Parliament as leader of the Official Opposition. In 2003, Harper negotiated the merger of the Canadian Alliance with the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada to form the Conservative Party of Canada and was elected as the party's first leader in 2004. In the 2004 federal election, the new party lost to the Liberal Party led by Paul Martin.

The 2006 federal election resulted in a minority government led by the Conservative Party, with Harper becoming prime minister of Canada. He faced the "In and Out" scandal, reduced the goods and services tax (GST) to five percent, and passed the Federal Accountability Act, the Québécois nation motion, and the Veterans' Bill of Rights. After the Conservatives won a larger minority in the 2008 federal election, Harper prorogued Parliament to avoid defeat by a proposed coalition of opposition parties, passed the Economic Action Plan of major personal income tax cuts and infrastructure investments in response to the Great Recession, introduced the tax-free savings account, and ordered military intervention during the First Libyan Civil War. In March 2011, a no-confidence vote found his government to be in contempt of Parliament, triggering a federal election in which the Conservatives won a majority government. Harper subsequently withdrew Canada from the Kyoto Protocol, repealed the long-gun registry, and privatized the Canadian Wheat Board. His government launched Canada's Global Markets Action Plan, pursued trade negotiations including the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) with the European Union, initiated military operations abroad against ISIL and in response to the Russo-Ukrainian War, and passed the Anti-terrorism Act, 2015. The Conservatives were also implicated in the Robocall scandal and the Canadian Senate expenses scandal.

In the 2015 federal election, the Conservative Party lost power to the Liberal Party led by Justin Trudeau. Harper officially stepped down as party leader on October 19, 2015, and resigned his seat on August 26, 2016. Since then, he has taken on a number of international business and leadership roles, including founding a global consulting firm, appearing in U.S. and British media, and being elected as chairman of the International Democracy Union.

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