Kristin Good
Associate Professor / Graduate Coordinator

Email: kristin.good@dal.ca
Phone: (902) 494-1944
Mailing Address:
- Canadian political institutions and constitution
- Canadian city politics and governance
- municipalities
- comparative urban politics
- federalism
- intergovernmental relations and multilevel governance
- local (municipal) immigration and diversity policy
- Indigenous-newcomer relations in cities
- Indigenous-municipal relations and decolonizing local government
Dr. Good’sresearch focuses on municipal governance including with particular interests in municipal elections and democracy, local (municipal) immigration policymaking, municipal-Indigenous relations and reconciliation with Indigenous peoples as well as making the case for the constitutional significance of municipalities in Canada.
Dr. Good is the pillar lead (of the multilevel governance pillar) of the Canadian Municipal Barometer project which is funded by a seven-year SSHRC Partnership Grant (2024-2031). More information about this project is available here: In addition, Dr. Good continues to work on research funded by a SSHRC Insight Grant (2022) with Co-Investigators Drs. Zachary Taylor (Principal Investigator), Sandra Breux and Martin Horak to study the role of money in local politics. As part of this work, she contributed to a mixed methods study of the Halifax Regional Municipality’s election in the fall.
Among her most significant works are three books:1) Canadian Urban Governance in Comparative Perspective (2024), which she co-edited with Jen Nelles. This book is both a textbook and offers original conceptual contributions to the comparative study of municipal governance by leading experts in the field; 2) Municipalities and Multiculturalism:The Politics of Immigration in Toronto and Vancouver(2009), which won the Canadian Political Science Association’s 2010 Donald Smiley Prize for the best English-language book published on Canadian politics in 2009 and has been quoted by the Supreme Court of Canada (in 2021); and 3) Segmented Cities?How Urban Contexts Shape Ethnic and Nationalist Politics(2014), which she co-edited with Luc Turgeon and Triadafilos Triadafilopolis. This work contains chapters from leading experts in urban governance and ethno-nationalist relations in countries across the globe. She is a founding co-editor (with Martin Horak) of the McGill-Queen’s Studies in Urban Governance book series.
Selected Publications
Good, Kristin R. and Jen Nelles. eds. 2024.Canadian Urban Governance in Comparative Perspective. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Good, Kristin R. 2024. “Moving Beyond the ‘Creatures of the Provinces’ Doctrine: Exploring Pathways to Municipal Empowerment in Provincial Constitutions.” InCities and the Constitution: Giving Local Governments in Canada the Power They Need, edited by Alexandra Flynn, Richard Albert, and Nathalie Des Rosiers, 243–71. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Good, Kristin R. 2019. "The Fallacy of the 'Creatures of the Provinces' Doctrine: Recognizing and Protecting Municipalities' Constitutional Status,"IMFG Papers on Municipal Finance and Governance, No. 46, Institute on Municipal Finance and Governance, Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy, University of Toronto. Available at:
Good, Kristin R. 2019. "Municipal Immigration Policymaking in Canadian Cities: The State of the Art," in Caponio, T., Scholten, P. and Zapata-Barrero, R. Eds.The Routledge Handbook of the Governance of Migration and Diversity in Cities. Abington, UK: Routledge, pp. 216-227.
Good, Kristin R. 2016. "Municipal Political Parties: An Answer to Urbanization or an Affront to Traditions of Local Democracy?," in Gagnon, Alain-G. and Brian Tanguay. Eds. Canadian Political Parties in Transition. Toronto: UTP, pp. 432-464.
Good, Kristin R., Luc Turgeon and Triadafilos Triadafilopolis. Eds. 2014. Segmented Cities? How Urban Contexts Shape Ethnic and Nationalist Politics. Vancouver: UBC Press.
Good, Kristin R.Ed. 2014.”Reopening the ‘Myth of the North American City Debate’ĝ[Special issue]International Journal of Canadian Studies,49, 7-249.
Good, Kristin R. 2014. “Governing Immigrant Attraction and Retention in Halifax and Moncton: Do Linguistic Divisions Impede Cooperation?,” (Chapter 13) In Luc Turgeon, Martin Papillon, Jenn Walner and Steve White eds. Canada Compared: Citizens, Government and Policy. Vancouver: UBC Press.
Good, Kristin R. 2009. Municipalities and Multiculturalism: The Politics of Immigration in Toronto and Vancouver. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, pp. 349.