Mark Carney talks a lot about staying humble. In his 2021 book, Values, he wrote that humility is one of the “five essential and universal attributes of leadership.” In March of this year, after he became leader of the Liberal Party, he stood on stage in an Ottawa convention centre and described the principles he’d learned from his childhood hockey coaches: ambition, teamwork and, “because it’s Canada,” humility.

Carney, a one-time Goldman Sachs executive and former governor for both the Bank of England and the Bank of Canada, had won the race in a landslide, despite having zero political experience. The evening of his victory, he gathered with jubilant advisers for a victory party in a backroom. There, they got a text from a staffer for Karina Gould, the 38-year-old MP from Burlington, Ontario, who’d run against Carney for the party leadership. Gould had made a few mild pokes at Carney during the campaign. In one debate, she took a jab at his reputation as a fiscally focused technocrat: “You can’t bring a calculator to a knife fight,” she said, referring to the trade war with the U.S.

The attacks were genteel compared to most political mud-slinging, and Liberals warmed to her during the campaign. They embraced her as both a cherished member of the Liberal family and, increasingly, the standard bearer for its left flank. But her needling got under Carney’s skin, even though he was the front-runner (she ultimately received only three per cent of the vote). He and his staff made their irritation plain; one member of Gould’s team told me that many of them were aggressive in their vitriol toward her.

When someone from Gould’s team texted to ask if she could stop by and congratulate the winner, Carney said no. In fact, according to one source I spoke with, he said he didn’t ever want to see her again. Carney’s staff sent Gould a non-committal answer, trying not to offend her, but she showed up anyway. That led to a brief, awkward meeting with Carney.

The incident rattled some of the people around the newly elected leader. Many had worked under Justin Trudeau, who, after a lifetime in politics, had skin like a crocodile. Carney, after years of being celebrated, venerated and treated with the deference accorded to a titan of the financial world, seems to have a skin like a peach.

A week later, Carney lost his temper again, at a press conference in London that marked one of the lowlights of his campaign for prime minister. When reporters pressed him about potential conflicts of interest stemming from his massive investment portfolio, he sounded exasperated, pointing out that he’d already put the assets into a blind trust. When CBC’s Rosemary Barton followed up, he blinked in annoyance. “Look inside yourself, Rosemary,” he said. “I have left my roles in the private sector at a time of crisis for our country.”

Carney reacted like someone accustomed to ending disputes in boardrooms and corner offices with a quick “case closed.” But that isn’t how news conferences work. His emotional response drew attention to an issue he’d hoped to pass over quickly, and it exposed his short fuse.

Carney said repeatedly during this year’s election campaign that he’s not a politician, and in such moments it showed. But Canadians looked past his gaffes, electing him instead on the strength of his extraordinary resumé. For years, he strode the corridors of power, taking on progressively more powerful jobs that brought him to the very top of the financial world. Carney has often been called Canada’s “Davos Man,” in reference to the Swiss town that hosts annual meetings of the World Economic Forum, where powerful business leaders, politicians and other members of the international elite gather to discuss the global economy. It seems like a natural setting for the most famous banker on Earth. Professionally, he is the smoothest of smooth operators, one of the cosmopolitan gold-collar workers who make sure your bank card functions, your savings are safely invested and that globalization continues apace. He rises early, drinks a litre of water upon waking and runs every day. He eats carefully and wears Savile Row suits without belt loops—a style available only to those who are rich, trim and expensively tailored. He’s a skilled communicator, too: charming, self-deprecating and always ready to boil complex questions down to three punchy points, if he may.

But all along, say friends, colleagues and acquaintances, he’s had one eye on an office in sleepy Ottawa and the comparatively paltry prime minister’s salary of $400,000. Until this spring, the capital was full of people confidently predicting that when he finally sought public office, he would be undone by his own inability to exhibit the humility he often espouses. I thought he might be brittle and smug, more an overbearing CEO than a national leader.

As it turned out, that’s what Canadians wanted. He successfully sold himself as the man we needed to face down Donald Trump and get the economy moving. He appeared to have sophisticated plans for expanding trade beyond the U.S. and revving up Canada’s sluggish economy. If his soliloquies on productivity went over the heads of some voters, he at least sounded like he knew what he was talking about—an experienced master of the interplay between markets and government, ready at last to take on the job he had been working toward since his youth. He seemed decisive and smart, with a capacity for ruthlessness a little bit chilling but also comforting, given the hard choices Canada faces.

But Canada is facing ominous economic headwinds. The national GDP shrank 0.4 per cent in the second quarter of this year. Unemployment is rising, up to 7.1 per cent as of August—the highest number since 2021. The country may be headed for a long-predicted recession, courtesy of the trade war with the U.S. And when voters can’t make ends meet, the government takes the blame. Already, Carney’s honeymoon with voters is flagging a little—some recent polls have put Pierre Poilievre’s Conservatives a hair ahead of the federal Liberals. (Carney’s personal polling numbers still far surpass his rivals’.)

Carney’s volatile temper and brusque demeanour also worries some of those in his orbit. For a politician, he is impolitic and officious, even with the most senior ministers and public servants. If you’re running a commodities desk or a central bank, arrogance may not be a career killer. But politicians have to make nice, smile when they don’t feel like it and command the confidence of colleagues and voters. Becoming a politician at age 59 is like becoming a concert violinist late in life—most people who are great at it have been doing it for decades. Political history is littered with blustery businessmen, like Carney’s friend and former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg, who learned the hard way that succeeding in politics requires a different skill set from bossing around employees or generating wealth for shareholders.

Today, Carney faces an economy on the rocks, a housing crisis Ottawa can’t possibly fix quickly and an authoritarian in the White House who is making a mockery of Canadians’ raised elbows. It is enough to rattle even the most confident character.

Carney spoke yet again about humility in April, during his victory speech after winning the federal election. Maybe he talks about being humble so much........

© Macleans