Why's America more conservative than other Western Nations? Plus party challenge

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I'm not sure if it is significantly more conservative than other industrialised countries. It has been much tougher territory for socialism than most but that is not exactly the same thing and is not an exclusive feature to the United States (i.e. the history of socialist politics in Canada is primarily one of noble failure). The fact that a large socialist party never established itself (although the SPA came close and maybe could have managed it with competent leadership: alas it had a saint instead) is significant and is unusual and has had important consequences (i.e. on the scope of social welfare policies etc), but is entirely explicable by the unusual structure of the American political system which happens to be wickedly effective at stymieing new political movements and at resisting structural change.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Well it depends on how far you take the structural explanation. To explain everything? No, I quite agree; that does not work. Here we have to look at social factors, political traditions and so on. But as you rightly point out most of the special factors that apply to the United States also apply to Canada, and this is where the structural explanation suddenly comes into its own.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Canada is far less religious than the US isn't it?  And it didn't have the slavery history, or racial history, that the US does, which has had such a profound effect, and still does, on American culture and politics.

The religious explanation can be thrown out (i.e. at the start of the twentieth century socialist politics had not trouble at all establishing itself in some regions with a profoundly religious dominant culture) and while Canada did not have those issues, it had some pretty significant ones of its own. Which have traditionally been brought up whenever the weakness of socialist/labour politics in Canada is contrasted with Britain/Australia/NZ.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Which ones?

The linguistic/cultural faultline that has always defined the country (and is actually the only reason - historically speaking - for its existence in the first place) and that it is a strange tacked together ramshackle country with poor internal communications (and this was more the case historically than it is now). Plus all the stuff that it has in common with the United States that DFB has already alluded to.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Because later on is too late.