The Canada Infrastructure Bank: private finance as poor alternative

This paper analyzes the incipient Canada Infrastructure Bank (CIB), and argues that it offers, at best, a deceptive alternative to long-standing practices of austerity and privatization. The CIB aims to institutionalize the public–private partnership (P3) model and private finance schemes, reconfiguring public infrastructure as “commercializable” projects, and altering government decisionmaking and its orientation towards public works. Suggestions for actual, progressive alternative sources of revenue, both cheaper and more democratic than private capital, are provided.