Muslims in Canada Data Initiative (MiCDI)
Project Description
MiCDI is a research initiative focused on creating and analyzing large data on Muslims in Canada. It undertakes projects that are developed by the research team or in collaboration with external partners. MiCDI produces data-informed studies to improve the visibility of Muslims across Canada. MiCDI is led by a team of experienced sociologists and quantitative specialists from across Canada's research universities.
Importance of MiCDI
Between the 2001 and 2021 Census, Muslims in Canada grew from 2% to 4.9% of the overall population. Despite the rising population, Muslims remain under-represented in large scale data analyses. Policy makers rely on numbers and robust datasets to ensure their decisions are representative of their constituencies. Without a concerted effort to make Muslims in Canada legible to policy makers, Muslims will remain a blurred and muted group. Coherent and competent data analysis is essential to making a real impact on the state, needs and desires of Muslims in Canada. MiCDI’s data reports provide a higher resolution understanding of Canada’s Muslim communities to enable more effective discussions about policies and decisions that affect Muslims.
Objective
MiCDI identifies new research questions, creates new data, and analyzes existing data —all of which center the Muslim experience in Canada. To maximize engagement across the public and academic sectors, MiCDI’s reports are published online in open-access digital format, as well as in peer reviewed journals. Recognizing the limits of data, MiCDI reports identify areas for future research either through greater data analysis or other more qualitative disciplines.
Status
MiCDI is currently undertaking two studies. (1) The first is called the Study of Muslims in Canada (SMiC). Drawing on census 2021 data, SMiC will administer a social perception survey to 900+ Muslims and 1000 non-Muslims in Canada to assess the current state of Muslim experience in Canada. The survey was administered in Fall 2024 by Forum Research. The report is drafted and under production, with a release in Spring 2026. (2) The second is a study that relies on the SMIC survey to also showcase an Islamophobia Index that can be replicated for longitudinal and cross-regional comparisons.
