Co Operative Commonwealth Federation Programme

Often remembered for its humanitarian platform and its pioneering social programs, Saskatchewan’s Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) wrought a much less scrutinized legacy in the northern regions of the province during the twenty years it governed. Until the 1940s churches, fur traders, and other wealthy outsiders held uncontested control over Saskatchewan’s northern region. Following its rise to power in 1944, the CCF undertook aggressive efforts to unseat these traditional powers and to install a new socialist economy and society in largely Aboriginal northern communities. The next two decades brought major changes to the region as well-meaning government planners grossly misjudged the challenges that confronted the north and failed to implement programs that would meet northern needs. As the CCF’s efforts to modernize and assimilate northern people met with frustration, it was the northern people themselves that inevitably suffered from the fallout of this failure. In an elegantly written history that documents the colonial relationship between the CCF and the Saskatchewan north, David M. Quiring draws on extensive archival research and oral history to offer a fresh look at the CCF era. This examination will find a welcome audience among historians of the north, Aboriginal scholars, and general readers.

Vision and eloquence, two qualities valued in a political leader, were what Tommy Douglas was all about. Social policies we take for granted today -- Medicare, a Canada-wide pension plan, bargaining rights for civil servants, a Wheat Board to protect farmers -- were first advocated by Douglas. Medicare, his finest achievement, was first wrestled into place in Saskatchewan, and finally embraced by all of Canada.Tommy Douglas was a canny politician, but he never lost sight of his principles. He told his own party that, whenever it came up with a good idea like Medicare, political opponents were bound to take over. But that didn't matter to him. What mattered was that the ideas took root, to benefit every Canadian. Walter Stewart has written a passionate, clear-sighted biography of one of Canada's pre-eminent political trailblazers.

In this elegant and rigorously researched work, Kenneth McNaught details the life, work, and principles of J.S Woodsworth and shows the powerful moral and political force that the pacifist, Methodist thinker exerted on Canadian politics. Woodsworth first went to the House of Commons in 1922, and became leader of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation at its formation in 1933. A socialist to the end, he exhibited his anti-war convictions to Parliament, when, in 1939, he alone spoke out against joining the war in Europe. Woodsworth's ideas and strong social conscience helped to shape the development of the welfare state in Canada, and have left an intellectual legacy in both socialist and liberal circles. A Prophet in Politics marks the progress of socialism in Canada, as well as the economic and political conditions in the first half of the twentieth century. McNaught, who died in 1997, is himself an important figure in Canadian history, having fought as a professor of history for academic freedom and having brought the scholarly discussion of national politics into the public sphere. At the time of its original publication, Globe and Mail reviewers called it 'a definitive biography that in drama and organization ranks with the best books about the makers of Canada.' This edition, presented in the 'Reprints in Canadian History' series, includes a new introduction by Allen Mills.