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Purpose: This paper examines actors and discourses shaping new Canadian legislation designed to advance diversity in corporate governance. Design/methodology/approach: This paper performs a stakeholder and discourse analysis drawing on texts of parliamentary debates. Findings: The paper illuminates tensions regarding definitions of diversity, its importance for boards of directors and the mechanisms favoured for implementation. Official discourses examined show that, unlike for other political issues, opposition was largely muted, and most stakeholders engaged in the process supported legislation advancing diversity. Nonetheless areas of debate and positioning by actors and suggest important differences, with outcomes linked to non-traditional power bases. Research limitations/implications: This study provides insights into the discursive environments of organizations and processes relating to promoting diversity and equality in the political decision-making domain, a critical venue for understanding advancement of equity, often neglected in organizational studies. Practical implications: By understanding the complex and competing discourses surrounding diversity and inclusion at the macro level this paper provides a context for understanding organizational (meso) and individual (micro) beliefs and behaviours. Social implications: This study shows how advocacy shapes how policy and legislation are framed and the ways mainstream organizations, including women's groups, may advance gender equality without regard to other dimensions of diversity or intersectionality. Originality/value: This study maps the political discourse around recent Canadian legislation designed to improve diversity on boards that must, in the Canadian context, address more than gender. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]