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Flashback: Getting political at Laurier

Jean Chretien

During the course of five decades, Laurier's Department of Political Science has welcomed high-profile speakers to the university's Waterloo campus. The department will do the same this academic year as part of its 50th anniversary celebrations.

In the above photo, then-minister of justice and federal attorney general Jean Chrétien gestures to the crowd during a talk at Laurier on Oct. 21, 1981. Political Science professor John Redekop is seated behind Chrétien.

Just over 12 years later, Chrétien would be sworn in as Canada's 20th prime minister, a position he held for more than a decade, from Nov. 4, 1993 to Dec. 12, 2003.

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