OTTAWA—A new study will attempt to chart the evolution of far-right, white supremacist and right-wing extremist movements in Canada.

Barbara Perry, a researcher at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology, is set to update a groundbreaking 2015 report documenting the nature and numbers of far-right extremism in Canada.

In her 2015 report, co-authored with researcher Ryan Scrivens, Perry suggested there were at least 100 white supremacist and Neo-Nazi groups active in Canada, as well as roughly 30,000 individuals involved with “sovereign citizen” philosophies that typically reject Canadian laws.

Perry told the Star last year that, between 2015 and 2018, the number of groups active across the country increased by as much as 25 per cent. But she now says that might have been an overly conservative estimate.

“Now that we’ve started to sort of list the groups and name them … we’re getting close to 300 groups,” Perry told the Star in an interview, noting that number includes multiple chapters of the same umbrella group.

Canada’s far-right groups and movements are not well documented. Aside from Perry and Scrivens, only a handful of researchers have devoted serious study on the topic.

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But some of the worst mass killings in recent Canadian history were perpetrated by people who were reportedly influenced, in varying degrees, by far-right voices and philosophies — including Alexandre Bissonnette’s killing of six men at a Quebec City Mosque in 2017 and Alek Minassian’s van attack in downtown Toronto last year.

Hate crimes against religious minorities — especially Jews and Muslims — have also been steadily rising over the last three years, according to StatCan data.

The study, which received $366,000 in funding from the federal government on Wednesday, is meant to provide an “up-to-date national survey on beliefs, motivations, activities and connections that characterize right-wing extremism in Canada” according to Public Safety Canada.

“(The study) will support law enforcement, the intelligence community, policy-makers, and community organizations to tackle issues associated with this type of extremism,” the agency wrote in a statement.

“This includes hate crimes and the promotion of hated and fear in communities and on the internet.”

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Perry said that the updated “environmental scan” of Canada’s far right will be more comprehensive than the 2015 report, involving more interviews in more communities, including more rural communities where groups may fly under the national radar.

Correction — March 7, 2019: This article was edited from a previous version that misstated the name of University of Ontario Institute of Technology.