The Building

"We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools."

Martin Luther King Jr.

In 2005, Dr. Arthur Clark – a Professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Calgary – decided it was time to take his passion for civil society and give it a physical form, a home where others of like mind could gather to discuss, collaborate and spread the word about a new way of “living together as brothers” (and sisters).

The host of monthly discussion groups at his home, founder of the Irma Parhad Student Internship program at the University of Calgary and member of the Consortium for Peace Studies, Dr. Clark felt that it was necessary to take what people like him were doing all over the world and expand upon it. He knew that the idea of civil society was unfamiliar to most people, and yet as natural as meeting your neighbors, sharing stories, working together on important projects and deciding as a family, as a community, as a society or as a nation what course of action to take in planning the future. He also knew that the pressures and the opportunities of our times were making it critical for this work to be carried out on a global scale, for people around the world to see themselves as members of the same community. And thus The Calgary Centre for Global Community was conceived.

Inspired by the vision of a world-class centre for global collaboration, he approached Calgary architect Marc Boutin to design a striking monument to the ideals of civil society that would attract people – and attention – from around the world. Marc’s own vision was of a multi-layered, transparent structure that was open to its environment, an expression of many elements of the philosophy of civil society. The building site is bisected by a railway, a challenge that led to the building’s conception as a symbol of overcoming resistance and transcending the duality of opposition. For this, the building design received the prestigious Award of Excellence by Canadian Architect magazine in 2007.

While Dr. Clark’s vision of a monument to global community represents an ongoing source of inspiration, The Calgary Centre for Global Community is already actively engaged in pursuing the goals of civil society. It is currently focused on developing a virtual “centre without walls” where the networking and dialogue can begin, with the possibility of an interim phase in which it would rent administrative space while the work of fundraising and construction of The Centre proceeds.