is a public intellectual, historian, and Canadian politician. He has held academic positions at Cambridge, Oxford, and Harvard. An award-winning author, he has also worked as a journalist and documentary filmmaker. Ignatieff was based in the United Kingdom from 1978 to 2000. During this time he was on the faculty at both Cambridge and Oxford Universities and worked as a film-maker and political commentator for the BBC. He lived in the United States from 2000 to 2005; there, he was director of Harvard's Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. He returned to Canada in 2005 to take a position at the University of Toronto, and entered politics the following year, winning election as the Member of Parliament for Etobicoke—Lakeshore.
Ignatieff was named associate critic for Human Resources and Skills Development in the Official Opposition Shadow Cabinet on February 22, 2006. He left this position on April 7, 2006 to run as a candidate in the Liberal Party leadership convention. On December 2, 2006 he was defeated by Stéphane Dion on the leadership convention's fourth and final ballot. Ignatieff is currently serving as the party's Deputy Leader.

See his website: michaelignatieff.ca.
His many books and life story can be found on:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Ignatieff.
His contribution to Nexus 50 is entitled ‘The Quest for Identity’.