Politics of the Commonwealth nations?

[Zioneer]

So I'll be the first to admit that I know very little of international politics, even those in English-speaking countries. My main international focus tends to be those countries with massive internal conflict (the Arab Spring countries, basically), so I don't know too much about those nations with peaceful politics. I'd like to know more about the internal politics of the countries belonging to the Commonwealth of Nations. I'm looking specifically for an overview of the last 40 years in politics for the big three minus the UK (Australia and Canada), but I'll take information on any of the Commonwealth nations.

Why do those countries have the political divisions they have, and so forth.

[DC Al Fine]

It's hard to do 40 years of Canadian politics because we have massive realigning elections every 15-20 years, so I'll just give you an overview of the last few realignments. The main thing to remember in Canadian politics is that we use first past the post and our politics are very regional, which leads to some very strange results

The 1960's and 1970's had two major parties, the Liberals and Progressive Conservatives and two minor parties the NDP (Social Democrats) and Ralliement Creditiste (Quebecois social conservatives).

The Liberals were led by a very charismatic and left leaning leader Pierre Trudeau and dominated during this period.

In 1984 there was a realigning election with Brian Mulroney of the Progressive Conservatives winning in a massive landslide. Mulroney had assembled a coalition of Western populists, Eastern conservatives and Quebecois nationalists. Brian Mulroney's chief policy achievement was a free trade deal with the United States.

Mulroney's coalition broke up in the early 1990's. Several new parties were formed going into the 1993 election. The major parties in 1993 were the Liberals and Progressive Conservatives, NDP, Reform (break-away from Progressive Conservatives, consisting of anyone who thought the PC's weren't conservative enough. Weird mix of Libertarians, Socons, and populists), the Bloc Quebecois (Quebecois Seperatists) and the National Party(anti-free trade party).

The Liberals won the election handily. Reform and the Bloc were able to do well due to the regional nature of their support while the PC's went from 160+ seats to 2 in a single election. The National Party died out after failing to win seats in the 1993 election. The late 1990's and early 2000's had similar election results as the PC's and Reform would consistently lose to the Liberals due to vote splits. The Liberals governed more conservatively in the 1990's and cut spending similar to the Clinton administration.

The Liberals lost their stranglehold on power in 2006 due to a) The Progressive Conservatives and Reform Party merging into the Conservative Party of Canada and b) The Sponsorship scandal. (explanation below)

In 1995, there was a narrowly defeated referendum on Quebec separating. After the referendum, the Liberals instituted a program to improve the federal government's image in Quebec, which mostly consisted of sponsoring things like concerts, festivals etc. What happened in practice was that the government would award an over priced contract to an ad firm which would in turn donate money to the Liberal party. When this broke the Liberals were thrown out of office.

The last realignment happened in 2011. The NDP, led by the charismatic Jack Layton jumped from 4th to 2nd place and became the main left wing party. They had a major surge in Quebec, almost wiping out the Bloc Quebecois. They also took many traditionally Liberal seats. The Greens leader Elizabeth May also picked up their first seat ever in 2011 as well.

Anyway, that's my quick history. Feel free to ask me any questions you like. I'll do another one for Quebec politics at some point since that's a whole other story.

Oh, here are some major election results.

1968
Liberal 154 seats
Progressive Conservative 72
NDP: 22
Ralliement Creditiste: 14
Independent 1
Liberal-Labour 1

1984
Progressive Conservative 211
Liberal 40
NDP: 30
Independent 1

1993
Liberal 177
Bloc Quebecois 54
Reform 52
NDP: 9
Progressive Conservative 2
Independent 2

2011
Conservative 166
NDP: 103
Liberal 34
Bloc Quebecois 4
Green 1

Oh, here's a map from the last election.

[Foucaulf]

I would spend a lot of time talking about Canada, particularly since I can't find a big intro writeup for Canadian politics here like for Spain, Brazil, or Italy. I can start with political parties and go from there. While the following is not a history of Canadian politics in any form, the topics hinted at are ripe for elaboration.


CANADIAN POLITICAL PARTIES (FEDERAL)

The "Federal" distinction will be made clear. For now we mention five parties with nonzero influence in decision making.

The Liberal Party of Canada (LPC), in its current state, seems to head towards freefall. In the past five elections, the party has shed more than half of its vote share and lost a net 95 members of parliament. Relegated to third-party status, the Liberals are becoming more known for leaking details about infighting to the press than any policy proposals. Despite moving in the Third Way since Clinton was President, the Party is both accused of being reckless tax-raising socialists by the right and defenders of a corrupt status quo by everyone else. How the hell all this happened is still the obsession of Canadian pundits.

It wasn't always this way. The LPC is called Canada's "Natural Governing Party" for a reason; in the 20th century it has been in power for 68 years and contributed four of Canada's five longest-serving prime ministers. Despite efforts to blemish the history, people still know the Liberals as the architects of modern Canada. It is the Liberals who established a broad immigration policy, autonomy from Britain, universal health care, the Canadian flag, bilingualism, multiculturalism and the current constitution, if not also the model of today's executive government.

Descended from a coalition of French and British reformers demanding popular rule in the 19th century, the Liberals have always had a soft spot for governance that guarantees individual rights and autonomy. At the party's foundation it represented free trade with the U.S. and anti-clericalism in Quebec, while by 1972 it represented cultural diversification and a safety net. So the Liberals are not the most ideologically consistent party there is; in fact, some would argue in the LPC ideology plays second fiddle to coalition building. Having shifted left and right with shifts in leadership and suitable coalitions, Liberal MPs are a mix of protectionists, libertarians to neoconservatives. Admittedly, the market-liberal wing is at its most powerful at the moment.

Through patronage appointments, charismatic leaders and a keenness to act the technocrats, the Liberals held on to power with votes from the East, the Atlantic provinces and the West. When the West fell away from the party, the immigrant vote made up for it. Any time a non-Liberal party won over Quebec, the Liberals would gain it back ten years later. Evidently, the party's recent misfortunes means something went horribly wrong. But, given their bench of Ottawa veterans and supply of lifelong voters, no one really thinks the Liberals are down for the count.


The Conservative Party of Canada (CPC) is a modern creation, which needs to be distinguished from the Tory parties of the past. The CPC was founded in 2003, and has been led by the Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, since creation. It is a merger between a rump Progressive Conservative Party- the party of the Canadian right in the past century - and the Western populists in the Reform Party. As such, it is not fair to tie it to the Tory tradition of Canadian history.

The Conservative caucus ranges from those that make the Tea Party have a run for its money to those with a belief in Burkean, "Red Toryism". The miracle of Harper has been to cover up the ideological disparity, designing a party that is more corporation than popular assembly. Harper's inner circle of five to six people hold the big posts in Cabinet, and Members of Parliament are demanded to follow the Cabinet line. Such party discipline has been exercised by the Liberals often, but Harper's degree of control over the party has not been seen for a while.

Using a mixture of Rovean smear ads and Obama-pioneered targeting technology, the Conservatives continue to dominate all other parties in fundraising and electoral precision. By 2011, they have perfected a coalition that delivered them a majority government. Appealing to populist anger in the West and Ontario, combined with immigrant outreach, accomplished what was once thought to be impossible; forming government with very little representation in Quebec.

As for what a Conservative government entails, no one is really sure. Harper was forged in years of ruling in a hung parliament, and spent the first five years being as protectionist or as chauvinist to whichever group of voters he desired. Now that his majority government is in place, he is beginning to establish Canada as a trading partner in exchange of its diplomatic influence, which maintains a boom fueled by resource extraction in the West. Whether he will alter the rules of government, like many progressives fear, is yet to be seen. And it is also very hard to imagine a Conservative Party without Harper at its helm. A division of the CPC's populist and center-right wings is always a possibility.


The New Democratic Party (NDP) is the heir to a socialist tradition that began on Canada's prairies during the Great Depression. Of course, the party isn't really that socialist today, but it is still the party of choice for the activist left. It was founded in 1961 as a joint venture between the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and the Canadian Labour Congress. The former is a left-wing party that was a significant force in western politics sans Alberta. The latter is the largest federation of Canadian labour unions.

There are two aspects of note about the NDP's internal composition. The first is that it has a privileged role for members of unions, only recently abolishing the unions' right to appoint a third of all delegates responsible for electing leaders. The second is that the party as a legal entity includes both its federal and provincial wings, typical among most parties in federations but unique in Canada.

The NDP was never designed to be a party of government, or indeed a "Loyal Opposition". It is a party of principles and activism, born outside of parliament and all; very similar to the UK's Labour in that respect. It gains influence either through sweeping into a majority position or letting the Liberals pass legislation they want in exchange for parliamentary support. The caveat is that legislation championed by the NDP, most famously universal health care, has been co-opted by the Liberals.

Being the activist party it is, the NDP has never stuck its head into the coalition building of the two main parties. Consequently, Canada's plurality voting system makes it very hard to translate NDP votes into seats. From its establishments to the early nineties, NDP support was highest among the industrial cities dotted around Ontario, sparsely populated Northern Ontario, Western residents satisfied with NDP governance and dissatisfied with a federal government crammed with Eastern politicos, and eventually those living in an economically depressed Maritimes. But a resistance to recognize the Quebec sovereignty movement made the party moribund in the province, and by the late nineties the party was very close to electoral decimation.

That is, until Jack Layton became leader. Having started in politics as a councilor for the City of Toronto, he emphasized appealing to urban liberals and placing less stress on economic policy. Like with America's unions and the Democrats, the left stayed with the party. Recruiting also Quebec provincial minister Thomas Mulcair in 2007, Layton led the NDP into the role of Official Opposition by drawing on a sense of alienation between Quebeckers and the Harper government. After Layton died from cancer, Mulcair is trying to whip his party into the tedium of parliamentary duty. Whether he will become prime minister is a very open question.

[Foucaulf]

The Bloc Québécois (BQ) was the result of the 1990 Meech Lake Accord, an attempt by Brian Mulroney to revise Canada's constitution into one that Quebec's government would sign. Led by Lucien Bouchard, a former Progressive Conservative federal minister, a parliamentary caucus formed after several nationalist MPs split from their parties, forming an "ad hoc rainbow coalition".

By the 1993 election, Bouchard's popularity was on its way to meteoric highs and the BQ formed the official opposition. It was in that role that the BQ supported Quebec premier Jacques Parizeau's referendum on independence in 1995. Independence was shot down, the Liberals clawed back their Quebec seats in the coming years, and Bouchard moved to provincial politics, replaced by Gilles Duceppe.

Under Duceppe's command, the party evolved into being the defender of Quebec interests. In practice, this meant either letting the provincial government handle federal responsibilities or lobbying for pork. On the other hand, Duceppe has supported left-wing policies, making the BQ for a time Canada's most left-wing party. After the Liberals' "adscam" scandal in 2004 the BQ again held almost all of Quebec's federal seats, and it would threaten to vote down Harper's minority government unless more concession were made to Quebec.

By 2011 Harper had created a path to his majority without Quebec, and the BQ had little leverage in parliament after the coalition crisis. At this time the NDP has set its sights on Quebec, and Duceppe bizarrely responded by kicking the separatist rhetoric into high gear. The result was electoral decimation. While the BQ has some inertial support left, its coffers are running thin and its leader is invisible. At this point, its fate is completely decided by the NDP's actions or lack thereof.


The Green Party, formed in 1983 but only relevant after the 2004 election, is a bit of an enigma. It espouses a mixed bag of policies, and espouses a pro-market rhetoric matched only by the Greens in Switzerland. Investment in green technology is coupled with eliminating the deficit, along with usual libertarian favourites like legalizing marijuana, e-democracy and homeopathy.

At this point you could read this astoundingly in-depth history of the party, or read my summary of it below plus events after 2008.

In 2004, leader Jim Harris put the party on the line by refusing co-operation and putting a candidate in every riding, which blew up the party's vote count. When Elizabeth May succeeded him as party leader, she continued to cause a stir by lobbying for a spot on the televised leaders' debates. When she finally did so, in 2008, the Green vote was at a record 6.8%. The problem was this was accomplished by a wide slate of candidates rather than any depth, and May failed to take the riding of prominent Conservative Peter MacKay. The party was left heavily in debt and May had to survive a leadership challenge.

By the 2011 election, the Green campaign has been downscaled considerably. Much of the party's funds were spent to ensure May's victory in a British Columbia riding, which she actually accomplished. She has been a formidable source of opposition, but whether they can rise to be taken seriously by the Liberals and the NDP remains to be seen.

If the Greens are to be any threat at all, it would do so on British Columbia's "left coast", where its ecological and libertarian rhetoric strikes the hardest. After there is Alberta, where in the cities there is some demand for a progressive but pro-market party. The NDP would overshadow the party everywhere else.

[Zioneer]

Fascinating! Both of you, thanks! Canada has a very interesting political history. Odd that the reversals were so dramatic though; it's like you have a Depression-era reversal every few decades. I think I'd be most comfortable as an NDP voter in any case; they seem like they'd be leftist enough for me.

[Smid]

Here are maps of the last few Canadian elections - you can watch the blue and orange grow, and the red and aqua shrink... Bigger versions in the Gallery (and I'm in the process of re-doing them, using Earl's colour scheme).

2004

Liberal minority government.

2006

Conservative minority government.

2008

Conservative minority government.

2011

Conservative majority government.

[Gass3268]

Haha, I've been looking and looking and I can't find where Elizabeth May's Green seat is located. Anyone care to help point that out for me?

Edit: Is it in Victoria?

[World politics is up Schmitt creek]

Just north of Victoria, yes. The seat is called Saanich--Gulf Islands.

[Gass3268]

Just north of Victoria, yes. The seat is called Saanich--Gulf Islands.

Thanks! I wish we gave our districts locality names like they do in Canada

[Hatman 🍁]

Just north of Victoria, yes. The seat is called Saanich--Gulf Islands.

Thanks! I wish we gave our districts locality names like they do in Canada

Me too

Smid, there is one error on that map (admittedly I did not correct it on my site), but Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup went NDP in a recount in 2011.  Just remember that when you re-do the colour scheme (thanks for that by the way! ... next we'll have to do the elections prior)
 

[Hatman 🍁]

Speaking of prior elections, here they are since 1988

1988



1993



1997



2000

[Hatman 🍁]

Another error, Smid. The 2004 border between Acadie-Bathurst and Miramichi was quite different.

[Smid]

Another error, Smid. The 2004 border between Acadie-Bathurst and Miramichi was quite different.

Thanks for picking up those errors - I remember the recount there, it was about nine votes, if I recall correctly. I'll fix it when I get the chance.

I should have clarified - those 2004 results are notional, based on the post-2004 redistributed boundaries. I can't recall where I initially found the numbers, but I think it may have been wikipedia. Anyway, that's why that boundary appears wrong.

I'm slowly updating the base map to prior elections, as well. I have the Atlas of Canada pdf maps from the site, but they can be a bit unclear where an insert cuts off the edge of a riding. For the last set of boundaries for 2000 and 2004, the last Census has a very good zoomable map by electorate - I can email you the link next week, if you don't already have it.

[Hatman 🍁]

I think I know what you're talking about, Smid, so it won't be necessary.

[Smid]

For anyone else, here is the link to that Census website I mentioned a couple of posts up.

I've corrected the 2011 map, updating it with Earl's colour scheme, and fixing up the error in Riviere du loup.

Also, I have included a comment in the title box for the 2004 map, advising that it is based on the redistributed boundaries (which I should have done in the first place).

[Hatman 🍁]

Im confused, Smid. The 2004 election was in actual fact played out on the current boundaries. No need for a note. The only boundary difference was in Acadie-Bathurst.

[Foucaulf]

Canada has a very interesting political history. Odd that the reversals were so dramatic though; it's like you have a Depression-era reversal every few decades.

Wikipedia cites an academic going through Canada's party systems:

You must be logged in to read this quote.

I think 1984 is one of the more overlooked elections in Canadian history. Mulroney's ability to bind the West and Quebec together in dissension against Trudeau's federalist overtures have never been done before or replicated since; banking the party on that coalition meant also a quick collapse by the time Mulroney retired.

The obvious American comparison is the New Deal Coalition, but that alliance still exists in some form in contrast to the Progressive Conservative collapse. I feel like elements of the Democratic machine in the South and in rural areas did not collapse as it did stagnate; a minority still supports the Democrats out of loyalty for sticklers like civil rights and such. In Canada, though, the absence of an event as historic like the Civil Rights Movement does not instill that loyalty.

Whereas the American party system has stayed mostly stable since FDR, Canadian politics has not. Clientelism has died down in both nations, but a more restrictive electoral funding system in Canada has nipped it better. Diefenbaker in the 1950s really began a Canadian trend of making parliamentary elections more about the leader, more of a presidential contest. This is why a charismatic leader like Trudeau or Layton accomplished their feats.


I haven't wrote up anything about Canada's provincial parties or the system of government yet. If you want more, though, I'd be happy to contribute.

[Smid]

Im confused, Smid. The 2004 election was in actual fact played out on the current boundaries. No need for a note. The only boundary difference was in Acadie-Bathurst.

Actually, it's me who has been confused. The change in A-B gave me the incorrect assumption (which I've thought for a while now) that 2004 was on old boundaries, and the figures I had were notional on new boundaries... Thanks for clearing it up for me! I'll fix it again!

EDIT: I think it's fixed now (hopefully!)

[Hatman 🍁]

Speaking of  notional, it would be interesting to see the 2000 results on the current boundaries. I suppose I could make a map of that.

[Smid]

Speaking of  notional, it would be interesting to see the 2000 results on the current boundaries. I suppose I could make a map of that.

It would be very interesting - but it would probably take a bit of work compiling the poll-by-poll figures.

[Hatman 🍁]

Speaking of  notional, it would be interesting to see the 2000 results on the current boundaries. I suppose I could make a map of that.

It would be very interesting - but it would probably take a bit of work compiling the poll-by-poll figures.

Not necessary. The data is out there, like at the Pundit's Guide.

[Zioneer]

Hmm... If any of you have noticed my political views in my postings, which party do you think I'd belong to in each of the major Commonwealth countries? Obviously in the US I'm a Democratic-leaning independent, but I'm at least somewhat more leftist than the establishment Democrats on most issues.

[RogueBeaver]

Here in Canada you'd probably be NDP, i.e. a social democrat. In Oz I'd hazard a guess as either left-Labor or a Green.

[Hash]

Zioneer, if you're interested in something else than The True North Strong and Free, I could put together something similar about South Africa. No promises as for when I could be able to do it, though.

[Vosem]

Zioneer, if you're interested in something else than The True North Strong and Free, I could put together something similar about South Africa. No promises as for when I could be able to do it, though.

I'm not Zioneer, but I for one would love to read that