Dr. Conway, Professor and Chair, has B.A. (Honours) and M.A. degrees in psychology and social psychology and a Ph.D. in political sociology. He is the author of three books published in multiple editions, The West: The History of a Region in Confederation (third edition, 2006), The Canadian Family in Crisis (fifth edition, 2003), and Debts to Pay: English Canada and Quebec from the Conquest to the Referendum (first edition, 1992), Des comptes à rendre: Le Canada anglais et le Québec, de la Conquête à l'accord de Charlottetown (1995), and Debts to Pay: The Future of Federalism in Quebec, (third edition, 2004); and of monographs on the place of the Prairies in Confederation and on the re-emergence of separatist sentiment in Western Canada during the early 1980s. He has also published numerous reviews, articles, book chapters and scholarly papers. His interests encompass the social sciences in general while his research interests have tended to focus on the social, political and economic history of both the West and Quebec in Confederation, as well as gender relations and the crisis of the modern family.
Dr. Conway is a freelance newspaper commentator on economics and politics. He is the regular political columnist for Prairie Dog in Regina and Planet S in Saskatoon. He does research, writing and consulting for a variety of popular organizations. He is an active labour arbitrator. In 1991 he was elected Trustee to the Regina Public School Board, and subsequently re-elected five times, serving as Vice-Chair from 1995 to 1997 and as Chair from 1997 to 2000. In 2000-2001 he served as Chair of the Saskatchewan Urban Public Boards’ Caucus, a section of the Saskatchewan School Boards’ Association.
Before escaping into academe over thirty years ago, Dr. Conway had experience as an officer cadet at Royal Roads military college, as a psychiatric aide in a mental hospital, as a psychologist intern at the Saskatchewan Penitentiary, as a group worker with emotionally disturbed children and as a basic literacy teacher on an Indian reservation.