The Development Of Political Thought In Canada

What, if anything, makes Canada's political identity unique? Pollsters can measure values, but they cannot explain how these values arose over time, why they changed, or how people have attempted to make sense of them within a changing social and political environment. By examining the history of political ideas in Canada, we can better understand why Canada takes the shape that it does. In this book, Katherine Fierlbeck looks at the legacy of ideas taken from (or shaped in reaction to) the nations that have been most influential to Canada's development: the United Kingdom and the United States. The first section looks specifically at the nature of toryism, constitutional liberalism, and market liberalism. Then she examines the evolution of social justice in Canada. Does the country have, as J.S. Woodsworth hoped, a definitive "third way"? The final section focuses upon debates over cultural identity and minority rights. Contemporary political discussions in Canada are very much based upon the expressions of French-Canadian nationalism that have existed as long as, and perhaps even longer than, the country itself. How have these ideas influenced current thinking about culture and accommodation? The experiences;characterized by Canadian political thought also provide insight and ideas for nations around the world as their citizens struggle with similar questions. The political dynamics of the present are a product of how Canadians have viewed their country, or a vision of their country, in the past. These ideas of Canada, in history and in myth, provide a way of thinking about politics that may provoke and inspire Canadians—and others—to reflect upon their future.

This book presents selections of Canadian political thought from the nineteenth century to the present to show how ideas evolved over time to influence the values and debates of modern Canadians.

A History of Political Thought is an accessible introduction to the history of political and economic thought; its main focus is the rise, and eventual consolidation, of modern market society. It asks: What are the effects of private property and commerce on individual well-being and on the stability of the political community? A History of Political Thought answers this central question through the careful study of political philosophers and economists, from ancient Greece to the twenty-first century. The book does not have an ideological agenda and gives equal voice to thinkers on opposite sides of the political spectrum. This is one of its key merits and a mark of distinction: its willingness to treat stark opponents – Hobbes and Locke, Smith and Marx, Keynes and Hayek, among others – as equally worthy of serious study. In doing so, the book provides students with a very powerful arsenal of ideas about the evolution of the market and also provides a solid introduction to the history of political thought.

Compared to the United States, it is assumed that religion has not been a significant factor in Canada’s political development. In God’s Province, Clark Banack challenges this assumption, showing that, in Alberta, religious motivation has played a vital role in shaping its political trajectory. For Henry Wise Wood, president of the United Farmers of Alberta from 1916 until 1931, William "Bible Bill" Aberhart, founder of the Alberta Social Credit Party and premier from 1935 until 1943, Aberhart’s protégé Ernest Manning, Alberta’s longest serving premier (1943–1968), and Manning’s son Preston, founder of the Alberta-based federal Reform Party of Canada, religion was central to their thinking about human agency, the purpose of politics, the role of the state, the nature of the economy, and the proper duties of citizens. Drawing on substantial archival research and in-depth interviews, God’s Province highlights the strong link that exists between the religiously inspired political thought and action of these formative leaders, the US evangelical Protestant tradition from which they drew, and the emergence of an individualistic, populist, and anti-statist sentiment in Alberta that is largely unfamiliar to the rest of Canada. Covering nearly a century of Alberta’s history, Banack offers an illuminating reconsideration of the political thought of these leaders, the goals of the movements they led, and the roots of Alberta’s distinctiveness within Canada. A fusion of religious history, intellectual history, and political thought, God’s Province exposes the ways in which individual politicians have shaped one province’s political culture.

This book corrects an imbalance in Canadian political literature through offering a conservative account of Canadian political thought. Across 15 chronologically organized chapters, and with a mixture of established and rising scholars, the book offers an investigation of the defining features and characteristics of Canadian conservative political thought, asking what have Canadian conservative political thinkers and practitioners learned from other traditions and, in turn, what have they contributed to our understanding of conservative political thought today? Rather than its culmination, Canadian Conservative Political Thought will be the beginning of conservative political thought’s recovery and will spark debates and future research. The book will be a great resource for courses on Canadian politics, history, political philosophy and conservatism, Canadian Studies, and political theory.

Canadian theorists and philosophers are recognized internationally for their contributions to normative debates about citizenship, multiculturalism, and nationalism. The fact that some of these thinkers are better known abroad than they are at home, provided the impetus for Ronald Beiner andWayne Norman to bring together new essays in a unique, single volume.The essays collected in Canadian Political Philosophy reflect a broad range of contemporary political and philosophical issues: liberalism and citizenship; equality, justice, and gender; minority rights, multiculturalism, and identity; nationalism and self-determination; and finally, topics in thehistory of political philosophy.This edition documents the impact that canadian theorists are having in political philosophy debates and provides an outline of the themes around which Canadian theory is focused. Many of these themes arise out of a particular Canadian consciousness--for instance, constitutional crises havecultivated an interest in the nature of political membership--but are also emerging as themes in societies aroud the world. Canadian Political Philosophy demonstrates how contemporary Canadian theory is both a reflection of Canadian experience and an important voice contributiong to the world-widedebates in political philosophy.