The Origins Of Canadian Politics

The conditions of colonial politics in Canada between 1760 and 1848 produced features that became permanent landmarks of post-Confederation Canadian politics -- sharp partisan battles, intense use of patronage, strong one-man dominance in party leadership, and a 'statist' orientation not only in government in Ottawa but also in Ontario and Quebec. In this compelling book Gordon Stewart deals with these topics in an original way by placing Canadian politics in a comparative context against the background of political and constitutional developments in England and America between 1688 and the 1820's.

Why do the United States and Canada have such divergent political cultures when they share one of the closest economic and cultural relationships in the world? Canadians and Americans consistently disagree over issues such as the separation of church and state, the responsibility of government for the welfare of everyone, the relationship between federal and subnational government, and the right to marry a same-sex partner or to own an assault rifle. In this wide-ranging work, Jason Kaufman examines the North American political landscape to draw out the essential historical factors that underlie the countries’ differences. He discusses the earliest European colonies in North America and the Canadian reluctance to join the American Revolution. He compares land grants and colonial governance; territorial expansion and relations with native peoples; immigration and voting rights. But the key lies in the evolution and enforcement of jurisdictional law, which illuminates the way social relations and state power developed in the two countries. Written in an accessible and engaging style, this book will appeal to readers of sociology, politics, law, and history as well as to anyone interested in the relationship between the United States and Canada.

The sixth edition of Canadian Politics offers a comprehensive introduction to Canadian government and politics by a highly respected group of political scientists. For this edition, the editors have organized the book into six parts. Part I examines Canadian citizenship and political identities, while Parts II and III deal with Canadian political institutions, including Aboriginal governments, and contain new chapters on the public service and Quebec. Parts IV and V shift the focus to the political process, discussing issues pertaining to culture and values, parties and elections, media, groups, movements, gender, and diversity. The chapters on Parliament, bureaucracy, political culture, political communications, social movements, and media are new to this edition. Finally, three chapters in the last section of the book analyze components of Canadian politics that have been gaining prominence during the last decade: the effects of globalization, the shifting ground of Canadian-American relations, and the place of Canada in the changing world order. Of the 21 chapters in this edition, 9 are new and the remainder have been thoroughly revised and updated.

The Oxford Handbook of Canadian Politics provides a comprehensive overview of the transformation that has occurred in Canadian politics since it acheived autonomy nearly a century ago, examining the institutions and processes of Canadian government and politics at the local, provincial and federal levels. It analyzes all aspects of the Canadian political system: the courts, elections, political parties, Parliament, the constitution, fiscal and political federalism, the diffusion of policies between regions, and various aspects of public policy.

Was Canada’s Dominion experiment of 1867 an experiment in political domination? Looking to taxes provides the answer: they are a privileged measure of both political agency and political domination. To pay one’s taxes was the sine qua non of entry into political life, but taxes are also the point of politics, which is always about the control of wealth. Modern states have everywhere been born of tax revolts, and Canada was no exception. Heaman shows that the competing claims of the propertied versus the people are hardwired constituents of Canadian political history. Tax debates in early Canada were philosophically charged, politically consequential dialogues about the relationship between wealth and poverty. Extensive archival research, from private papers, commissions, the press, and all levels of government, serves to identify a rising popular challenge to the patrician politics that were entrenched in the Constitutional Act of 1867 under the credo “Peace, Order, and good Government.” Canadians wrote themselves a new constitution in 1867 because they needed a new tax deal, one that reflected the changing balance of regional, racial, and religious political accommodations. In the fifty years that followed, politics became social politics and a liberal state became a modern administrative one. But emerging conceptions of fiscal fairness met with intense resistance from conservative statesmen, culminating in 1917 in a progressive income tax and the bitterest election in Canadian history. Tax, Order, and Good Government tells the story of Confederation without exceptionalism or misplaced sentimentality and, in so doing, reads Canadian history as a lesson in how the state works. Tax, Order, and Good Government follows the money and returns taxation to where it belongs: at the heart of Canada’s political, economic, and social history.

The Canadian party system is a deviant case among the Anglo-American democracies. Unruly and inscrutable, it is a system that defies logic and classification – until now. In this political science tour de force, Richard Johnston makes sense of the Canadian party system. With a keen eye for history and deft use of recently developed analytic tools, he articulates a series of propositions that underpin the system. For its combination of historical breadth and data-intensive rigour, The Canadian Party System is a rare achievement. Its findings shed light on the main puzzles of the Canadian case, while contesting the received wisdom of the comparative study of parties, elections, and electoral systems elsewhere.

Canadian Government and Politics delivers an up-to-date and concise introduction to Canada’s political institutions, processes, and issues. The text integrates theory, history, Census data, and current affairs to give students an orderly picture of the wide-ranging landscape of Canadian government and politics. This seventh edition includes coverage and analysis of the 2019 general election, as well as a preview of the new Canadian government. It also adds exciting material on Canada’s cultural landscape, institutions, and policies, along with a new chapter on Indigenous Peoples. Other chapters examine the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government, the electoral system, bureaucracy, Québec nationalism, foreign policy, and much more. The authors provide trenchant coverage of many key issues of concern to Canadians, including regionalism, nationalism, climate change, defense policy, Indigenous Peoples’ rights, minority rights, pipelines, and the USMCA trade deal. These topics are addressed by way of fair-minded impartial discussions, aimed to foster a vital and optimistic perspective on Canadian politics that will encourage critical thinking and active citizenship.