Parties Elections And The Future Of Canadian Politics

On May 2, 2011, as Canadians watched the federal election results roll in and Stephen Harper's Conservatives achieve a majority, it appeared that we were witnessing a major shift in the political landscape. In reality, Canadian politics had been changing for quite some time. This volume provides the first account of the political upheavals of the past two decades and speculates on the future of the country's national party system. By documenting how parties and voters responded to new challenges between 1993 and 2011, this book sheds light on one of the most tumultuous periods in Canadian political history.

Canadian Parties in Transition examines the transformation of party politics in Canada and the possible shape the party system might take in the near future. With chapters written by an outstanding team of political scientists, the book presents a multi-faceted image of party dynamics, electoral behaviour, political marketing, and representative democracy. The fourth edition has been thoroughly updated and includes fifteen new chapters and several new contributors. The new material covers topics such as the return to power of the Liberal Party, voting politics in Quebec, women in Canadian political parties, political campaigning, digital party politics, and municipal party politics.

Party systems. Party organization. For too long, scholars researching in these two areas have worked in isolation. This book bridges the divide by bringing together political scientists from both traditions to examine the intersection of rules, society, and the organization of parties within party systems. Blending theory and case studies, Parties and Party Systems builds upon the work of R. Kenneth Carty to examine how parties weather the organizational challenge of appealing to a dispersed membership while maintaining a degree of central direction. This volume will provoke theoretical reconsideration and inspire research at the organization-system nexus.

Political parties are central to democratic politics, but where does the power lie within them, and how is it exercised? The Political Party in Canada explores the inner workings of these complex organizations through an examination of the composition and roles of key party actors, as well as the interactions between them. The authors reveal the activities and power-sharing relationships that characterize Canadian parties. It focuses not only on which groups are included in decision-making but on what authority rests with each level of the parties’ respective structures. This comprehensive examination provides important insights into a fundamental institution that makes modern democracy possible.

Why do Canadians vote the way they do? For more than forty years, the primary objective of the ongoing Canadian Election Studies (CES) has been to investigate that question. This volume brings together principal investigators of the Studies to document the history of this impressive collection of surveys, examine what has been learned, and consider their future. The wide-ranging collection of essays provides useful background and insights on the relevance of the CES and lends perspective to the debate about where to steer the CES in the years ahead.

Canadian party politics collapsed in the early 1990s. This book is about that collapse, about the end of a party system, with a unique pattern of party organization and competition, that had governed Canada’s national politics for several decades, and about the ongoing struggle to build its successor. Rebuilding Canadian Party Politics discusses the breakdown of the old party system, the emergence of the Reform Party and the Bloc Québécois, and the fate of the Conservative and New Democratic Parties. It focuses on the internal workings of parties in this new era, examining the role of professionals, new technologies, and local activists. To understand the ambiguities of our current party system, the authors attended local and national party meetings, nomination and leadership meetings, and campaign kick-off rallies. They visited local campaign offices to observe the parties’ grassroots operations and conducted interviews with senior party officials, pollsters, media and advertising specialists, and leader-tour directors. Written in a lively and accessible style, this book will interest students of party politics and Canadian political history, as well as general readers eager to make sense of the changes reshaping national politics today.

New material in the fourth edition covers topics such as the return to power of the Liberal Party, voting politics in Quebec, women in Canadian political parties, political campaigning, digital party politics, and municipal party politics.

The New NDP is the definitive account of the evolution of the New Democratic Party’s political marketing strategy in the early twenty-first century. In 2011, the federal NDP achieved its greatest electoral success – becoming the official opposition. The moderation of its ideology and modernization of its campaign structures brought the party closer than ever to governing. But by 2015, it had fallen back to the third-party spot. Were moderation and modernization the right choices after all? This incisive book provides lessons for progressive parties on how to win elections in the age of the internet, big data, and social media.