Who are we? What are we about? John Deakins argues that, if we are to make valid sense of ourselves, let alone everything else, we mustn’t flinch from examining the assumptions that direct our efforts. Are we allies in the enterprise of achieving a meaningful existence, or competitors vying for ascendancy? It is the way we make sense, both independently and together, that determines and defines who we are able to be.

As a social worker, John Deakins has witnessed first hand the terrible things we both knowingly and unknowingly do to one another. He trained at the University of Bristol in England and subsequently obtained his PhD in Social Service Administration at the University of Chicago. After three years of practice in England, and six in the US, he and his family moved to Canada, where for 22 years, until “retiring” in 1991, he taught at the University of British Columbia. He lives in Vancouver, BC.