The Broadbent Institute mourns the loss of former Ontario NDP leader Stephen Lewis. Lewis was a committed social democrat who worked closely with Ed Broadbent during his time as leader of Canada’s NDP, and in their concurrent careers in social democratic internationalism. Ed was a frequent interlocutor of Stephen Lewis, having also worked closely with his father, David Lewis, during his time as a new Member of Parliament.
Ed Broadbent’s and Stephen Lewis’ careers in social democratic leadership were intertwined. In Luke Savage’s recent remarks at the 2026 Progress Summit on Ed’s “Social Democracy Across Borders,” their thought leadership and views on the world were similarly formed and paths began to cross early on:
His first published writing on a question related to foreign policy I’ve been able to find comes in the form of a report, written in October 1956 while Ed was an undergraduate at the University of Toronto, for its student newspaper The Varsity (incidentally where I got my start as a writer).
The occasion for that report was a debate held at Hart House about Canada’s membership in NATO in which Lester B. Pearson faced off against a quite precocious second year student from University College by the name of Stephen Lewis.
In Seeking Social Democracy, Broadbent expressed his pride and hope for Lewis’ ONDP leadership in the 1975 provincial election that brought forward the first social democratic Official Opposition in Ontario since 1948. Throughout Lewis’ career as Canada’s UN representative, UN Special Envoy for HIV/AIDS in Africa, and as deputy director of UNICEF, Ed Broadbent’s work as President of Rights & Democracy would often cross paths again on the global stage.
The Broadbent Institute recognizes the legacy and values of Stephen Lewis as a part of the work that Ed built the foundations of our organization on. Our thoughts and condolences are with the Lewis family at this time.