More money than brains?

>> Where Montreal's think tanks get their funding

Thinking of creating your own think tank? Wondering how to get money? Keep in mind this basic rule of thumb: if you're willing to defend business interests, money is much easier to come by. If not, well, you're going to have to be creative. Here's where some of Montreal's more prominent think tanks get their money:

The free-market-boosting Montreal Economic Institute (MEI), with well-connected businessmen and free-market academics on its board, has managed to raise funds in the hundreds of thousands. And their main benefactor, the Donner Foundation, has helped fund free-market think tanks across Canada. In addition to funding the Vancouver-based Fraser Institute, Donner dollars also helped start up the Institute for Atlantic and Maritime Studies in Halifax; the MEI appears to be the Donner Foundation's foothold in Quebec.

The Montreal-based Institute for Research on Public Policy (IRPP), meanwhile, is funded by a generous government endowment created in the 1970s--so it never has to worry about raising money. But despite being government funded, with people like former Tory potatohead Hugh Segal, United Alternative booster Peter White and free-marketeering professor William Watson working there, it's taken a marked shift to the right.

Left-leaning institutes have traditionally been funded by governments, but UQAM's Chaire d'études socio-économiques decided to go a different route: they sell memberships to unions and community organizations, with the membership fees financing their research.

Montreal is also home to two prominent enviromental think tanks. The Business Centre on the Environment (BCE), which observers say is the most influential enviro-policy institute in Canada, was created in 1993 by the Conseil du Patronat, Quebec's largest business lobby group. According to director Michael Cloughesy, the BCE "is not here to defend polluters. We're here to find real solutions to complex problems." The BCE, however, is funded by corporate memberships.

Not to be confused with the BCE is the CIBE, or Canadian Institute for Business and the Environment. Created in 1997, the CIBE is a one-man show run by former Greenpeace founder Gary Gallon. He funds his research through consulting work for governments and other organizations, and through subscriptions to the Gallon Environment Letter. With over 1,500 subscribers, the Letter--a simple but useful collection of enviro-news clippings and insider scuttlebutt--brings in almost $25,000 per year.

Meanwhile, left-leaning think tanks that depend on government funding are having trouble keeping their heads above water. Two years ago, Concordia professor Harold Chorney, a Keynesian, yes-to-government-intervention economist, helped create the International Research Group on Employment (IRGE), whose research focuses on structural-unemployment problems and on how to reach full employment.

However, in an ironic turn of events, the employment-focused IRGE is struggling to keep the shop running. Says Chorney: "We received promises from both governments, but now everyone is reneging on us."

--Philip Preville