Agent of Change: My Life Fighting Terrorists, Spies, and Institutional Racism

by Huda Mukbil

In Agent of Change Huda Mukbil takes us behind the curtain of a leading spy agency during a fraught time, recounting her experiences as an intelligence officer for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service. Mukbil was the first Black Arab-Canadian Muslim woman to join CSIS and was at the forefront of the fight against terrorism after 9/11.

Mukbil’s mastery of four languages quickly made her a counterterrorism expert and a uniquely valuable asset to the organization. But as she worked with colleagues to confront new international threats, she also struggled for acceptance and recognition at the agency. Following the American-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 and the rise of homegrown extremism, Mukbil was framed as an inside threat. Determined to prove her loyalty, while equally concerned about the surveillance and profiling of Muslims and revelations of Western agencies’ torture and torture by proxy, Mukbil started to question CSIS’s fluctuating ethical stance in relation to its mandate. Her stellar work on a secondment to MI5, the British Security Service, earned commendation; this shielded her, but only temporarily, from the hostile workplace culture at CSIS. Ultimately, Mukbil and a group of colleagues went public about the pervasive institutional discrimination undermining CSIS and national security from within.

Mukbil’s expertise in international security and her commitment to workplace transparency drove important changes at CSIS. Dazzlingly written, her account is an eye-opener for anyone wanting to understand how racism, misogyny, and Islamophobia undermine not only individuals, but institutions and the national interest – and how addressing this openly can tackle populism and misinformation.

Genres: Nonfiction, Canada, Memoir, Biography, Book Club

266 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 15, 2023

Reviews

[Alan Chrisman · Rating 4 out of 5]

1st black Arab/Cdn. female agent to work in Canada's intelligence agency, CISIS. Spoke 4 languages which was helpful dealing with Islamic terrorism after 9/11. Began to feel discrimination early on, but it became more open when she wore hijab to work. Despite her excellent record, even loaned out to M15 in London where she was useful in tracking down subway bombers. Kept getting passed over (many managers came from white boys cliche also in RCMP and police). She and other minority women had to sue the organization to get rights recognized. Childhood living in Egypt before Canada and growing up on Montreal and Ottawa had made her a fighter.

[Stacie Dore · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this up interested to read the story of someone who fought institutional racism at CSIS. What I didn’t anticipate was just how close to home this book would come. Of course I know that CSIS HQ is technically in Ottawa, but I hadn’t known that Huda mostly grew up in Ottawa, walked the same streets as me, not only went to the same university as me, but even had a prof or two in common, and she is only a handful of years older than me. I find the racism that she described before even joining CSIS to be shocking. I knew there was racism but not that level of ignorance in my generation in this city.

I also generally think of the government institutions in this town as not really part of Ottawa, but more just implants that don’t really interact with the city. But as Huda describes the jerks she encountered over the years, it occurs to me that these people don’t just live in their government offices, but leave at night and blend in with the rest of the population.

It’s brave of Huda to have spoken out, commendable to have written this book. I didn’t feel satisfied with the ending but I guess that’s the silly thing with writing non fiction…. Reality getting in the way.

[Pamela · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was interested to read this book having been impressed that Ms Mukbil was running for federal office in my riding. I'd recently moved back to Ontario after many years in NYC, including 2001. And I had some experience working with law enforcement agencies and had observed the attitudes and perspectives of those officers. This is a riveting read - and an important story. Her patriotism for Canada shines through the whole book. While it is notable that CSIS hired her in the first place it is astounding that her accomplishments were not celebrated and rewarded. Despite having to refrain from revealing any details of her work, the book still showcases her amazing achievements, only one of which was her brave choice to expose the racism and Islamophobia of the "old boy's club" in the agency.

[Audrey Monette · Rating 5 out of 5]

Une lecture révoltante mais malheureusement pas surprenante qui lève le voile sur la discrimination et le racisme systémique qui polluent le Service canadien du renseignement de sécurité, le boys club qui permet à cette discrimination de se perpétuer et les obstacles que doivent surmonter les personnes aux identités marginalisées au Canada. Huda Mukbil raconte son histoire de façon poignante, inspirante et sincère. Un livre à lire absolument!

[Carolyn Whitzman · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent memoir of a life in public service and what it is like to experience systemic discrimination in the workplace. Huda Mukbil was born in Ethiopia and grew up in Egypt before moving to Canada. Fluently multilingual and interested in law and justice, she started work with CSIS - the Canadian spy service - in July 2001. 9/11 made her skills in Arabic vital. But increasingly, she herself was treated as suspicious by her supervisors, particularly once she started wearing a hijab. The details of her investigations, which are somewhat constrained by details that still mustn’t be shared, are interesting but it is her accounts of micro-aggressions and systemic harassment over 15 years that really hit home.

[Mike Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Huda Mukbil describes herself as the first Black Arab Muslim woman to ever work for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). This is her memoir. She was born in Ethiopia to parents of Ethiopian and Yemeni ancestry in 1976. Her family lived for a time in Egypt before moving to Canada in 1987. By the time she graduated university in Ottawa in 2000 with a bachelors degree in law, she spoke four languages (Harari, Arabic, French, and English). Family and friends suggested that, with her degree, linguistic skills, and interest in politics and foreign affairs, she should apply to CSIS. She did, in early 2001 (before 9/11). After a lengthy hiring process that included a detailed security clearance screening, she began working at CSIS in early 2002.

By Mukbil's account, she enjoyed her work as an intelligence officer and was commended frequently for her work ethic, leadership, and ability to connect with sources who were suddenly of great interest to CSIS: Muslims. She was selected for an overseas assignment in the United Kingdom to help the British government in the aftermath of the July 2005 bombings there. She received a letter of gratitude from the Director General of the British Security Service.

But Mukbil could not get promoted or the positions that she really wanted. She was routinely passed over for people who were younger, less experienced... and male and white. She followed the proper procedures and filed complaints about how she was being treated, but either received no response or was told that all her supervisors' actions had been appropriate.

Years later, when she and four other CSIS employees from various minority groups (racialized, LGBTQ, female, non-Christian) filed a lawsuit claiming systemic discrimination, harassment, and bullying, Mukbil received copies of her complaints and found that they had been all been accepted and agreed to, but managers had overridden those decisions and identified Mukbil as the problem, not them. Mukbil and the other complainants eventually settled out of court, and Mukbil resigned from the Service in 2017.

Memoirs can be tricky. By their nature, they present only one version of events (although Mukbil does provide citations to various online sources, and the lawsuit was public knowledge). If the memoirist didn't keep diaries or other records at the time, they have to rely on memory alone for past events and conversations, and memory can be faulty. Finally, in a work like this, I think it must be very hard to be balanced and objective. But even with all those caveats in mind, I have to say that I find Mukbil's story convincing and believable, and therefore very disturbing.

I have worked over 30 years in the defence and security sectors in Ottawa. I haven't been as involved in the intelligence world as Mukbil was, but I've been adjacent to it. There are a lot of aging ex-military and ex-police working in defence, security, and intelligence, and they... we... can be a tight-knit group. They are mostly men, mostly white, mostly straight, and mostly Christian. And they don't always warm up to those who are... "other". Canada likes to think of itself as a progressive, modern country, but as this book shows, we still have a long way to go before we can claim that we treat all our citizens fairly.

What saddens me most is that these attitudes don't seem to be changing. When I was young and observed this sort of thing in my early military career (so ably described in Kate Armstrong's The Stone Frigate: The Royal Military College's First Female Cadet Speaks Out), I thought the misogynistic, racist, homophobic old guard would die out eventually, and my generation would usher in a fairer leadership. It looks like that didn't happen. I don't know how we get the old guys to stop poisoning the minds of the young guys. I don't know how we break this cycle. I hope somebody knows.

[نُسيبة · Rating 4 out of 5]

هدى مكبيل، عالمة ومُحققة استخبارات كندية، هي أول مسلمة سوداء-عربية-كندية تنضم لوكالة الاستخبارات الكندية CSIS قبل أحداث الحادي عشر سبتمبر، ويتناول الكتاب تحدياتها المهنية، مكافحة الإرهاب، والانتماء المضاعف وسط بيئة استخباراتية مهيمنة ثقافيًا .
• ولدت في إثيوبيا من أصل يمني-هاري، وهاجرت إلى كندا، حيث أثمرت خلفيتها الثقافية المتعددة عن امتلاكها أربعة لغات أساسية جعلتها قيمة في مكافحة الإرهاب تميّزت بخبرتها اللغوية، وتم إرسالها لفترة عمل مؤقتة في جهاز الاستخبارات البريطاني MI5 بعد تفجيرات لندن في 2005، حيث لعبت دوراً حاسماً في تحليل الاتصالات وترجمة الأدلة، مما ساهم بإلقاء القبض على مشتبه فيه .
• واجهت شكوكاً ظالمة من زملائها في CSIS بعد غزو العراق 2003، وصعود التطرف المحلي، لكونها محجبة ومسلمة، وظنّ بعضهم بأنها “تهديد داخلي” ، فقررت خوض معركة قانونية، وكانت طرفاً في دعوى قضائية جماعية وفضحت العنصرية المؤسسية التي تمنع التنوع وتعيق الأمن الوطني نفسه طرحت تساؤلات قوية حول الأخلاقيات المتقلبة داخل CSIS: خصوصاً حول مراقبة المسلمين، واستخدام التعذيب أو تورطه بشكل غير مباشر، ودعت لمزيد من الشفافية والمساءلة، وقد شاركت في الضغط لتغييرات ثقافية داخل الجهاز .
الكتاب إضاءة على التمييز المؤسسي، و نموذج ملهم لمقاومة التمييز العنصري.

[Kelly Anne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am all too familiar with what it means to be a woman working in the early days for what was once an all male organization. Being a WASP in a very WASPy workplace meant I had to deal with the misogyny of the "old white boys club"; I cannot imagine throwing race and religion in on top of that.
I admire Ms Mukbil's tenacity in staying with CSIS for as many years as she did even when it was evident that she had been blacklisted early in her career, essentially from the day she decided to don a hijab. This insightful memoir details her life from growing up in Cairo, to her family's immigration to Canada, and throughout her career with CSIS. As with all memoirs I take any self adulation as well as claims of persecution with a grain of salt which is not to say that I don't believe that all the allegations against CSIS as an entity are not true, in fact I am sure it was worse than described.
Lastly, I thank Ms Mukbil for her years of service to Canada and to its citizens.

[Shafiqah Nor · Rating 5 out of 5]

Huda Mukbil served as an intelligence officer within Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). This memoir is a daunting account of her experience as a Canadian Muslim woman in the agency.

Huda shared her anecdotes of structural/institutional racism she encountered within the bureaucracy, the bullying and harassment, the conscious and unconscious bias denying visible minority employees like her from promotions and arbitrary deprivation from certain files. She is incredibly honest with her revelation on the impact of these on mental health. Huda's grit and willingness to share through this memoir undoubtedly forced her to relive these taxing moments.

This is an eye-opening and highly recommended read.

[Grace Mc · Rating 3 out of 5]

Agent of Change is a fascinating look into CSIS, albeit it was a bit dry for a memoir. There was lot of government speak and many emotional moments were told with distance and a lack of emotion. Yet, I admire Mukbil for telling her story and I was left with the impression that the systemic racism in many of Canada's institutions makes them less effective than they could be. The bright spot for me was Mukbil's stories of growing up and living in Ottawa. It is refreshing and fun to read a story set in your own city, even when the subject matter is heavy.

[Temur Davronov · Rating 5 out of 5]

Huda Mukbil's memoir highlights her legitimate grievance with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS). As a Black Arabic-speaking Muslim woman residing in Ottawa, she joined CSIS in 2001 and her experiences shed light on the "isms" and biases within the organization. It is not surprising considering CSIS originated from the RCMP, which Mukbil rightly identifies as an old boys' network. Her memoir is an engaging and recommended read, providing valuable insights.

[Amanda Cox · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book about a muslim-Canadian woman who joins the government intelligence service, and faces a lot of adversity from the old, white men who make up a majority of her department.

I appreciate her sharing her story, because it can't be easy. It's sad that the government is still like this, as it should be inclusive and welcome to those from marginalized groups.

Not a fun book, but it's important reading.

[Rhonda Struthers · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting insight on how CSIS operates in Canada and Abroad. I find it concerning that our government has allowed systemic racism in the workplace. I would think that it would be beneficial to our country to have vetted Canadian agents from around the world who know languages and cultures to ensure the safety of our country. All people should be treated with respect and be allowed to do their work and prosper in their chosen career.

[Tgandco2 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent. Well written, thorough, honest and insightful. It should be a must read for all Canadians to begin to understand just how had it is for racialized Canadians to be accepted, valued and successful.

[Aurora · Rating 4 out of 5]

An eye opening and inspiring memoir. Read this after “I was never here” by Andrew Kirsch (another IO at CSIS) and it’s mind boggling to see how different their experiences were within the same institution..

[Melissa Mills · Rating 5 out of 5]

A story about institutional racism in CSIS and the inner workings of CSIS. It was very insightful, Huda is such an incredibly strong woman to stay in this environment and fight for what she is worth.

[Marc-André · Rating 4 out of 5]

We need to hear those stories. A heartfelt, precise, devastating account of the impact of dysfunctional organizations and the cost of systemic discrimination.

[Colton Brydges · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic window into the world of national security in Canada, and a deeply personal account of Huds Mukbil's journey as a Black Muslim woman working at CSIS. Her courage in sharing this account is commendable, and shines a light on how our security institutions need to change to better reflect the diverse communities they are meant to protect