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The article discusses aspects of the resettlement programmes of federal government in Canada. It highlights the effort of the Canadian private citizens in sponsoring the resettlement of the refugees as well as their education and health care. It also cites the country's commitment to fulfill its international obligations to Syrian refugee resettlement.

The various ways which federalism influences gender policies has recently received a surge of academic interest. This article contributes to this literature by moving beyond formally adopted policies to study the influence of federalism on social learning amongst women's organizations. Using a most-likely case study design, this exploratory work traces the policy positions held by women's organizations in Canada during a seven-year period now known as the Great Pension Debate. Focusing on four empirical indicators of issue attention, participation in policy discussions, specificity of policy proposals, and consensus for reform, the findings suggest that the plurality and temporal proximity of successive policy venues - such as royal commissions and parliamentary committees - created by various governments offered women's organizations an optimum environment to engage in ongoing exchanges leading to the development, and greater specification, of policy positions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on the work of Richard Simeon and using the cases of equalization in Canada and Belgium's social security system, this article shows how nationalist ideas combined with institutional management structures, government formation rules and the configuration of party systems to condition the territorial dynamics around these two programmes. In Canada, resentment against equalization in many provinces, often because it is perceived as accommodating Québécois nationalism, has translated only into moderate pressures on the programme because federal parties have largely stayed away from this divisive issue and federal executive discretion over the programme has meant that provinces cannot force change. In Belgium, pressures on social security have been more intense because the absence of pan-Belgian parties has given greater resonance to Flemish nationalist ideas within the political system. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Municipal bylaws are routinely contested in court on the grounds that they are “ultra vires” or beyond the legal authority of the municipality. Many of these challenges allege that the municipal exercise of power infringes on federal or provincial powers as assigned by ss. 91 and 92 of the British North America Act, 1867. These conflicts have not been systematically studied and we address this lacuna by surveying the reported cases of municipalfederal and municipal-provincial conflicts in the LawSource database of Canadian judgments. Our preliminary finding-that challenges on federal grounds are much more likely to succeed than those on provincial grounds-requires an explanation. After factoring some disparities in the case sets (including a disproportionate number of zoning cases in the provincial context), we argue that the persistent diff erence in win-rates is due to a greater acceptance of municipal autonomy in the provincial context (despite their origins as “creatures of the province,” a number of provincial statutes have granted broad authority to many municipalities) whereas the federal conflicts run more clearly against constitutionally-defined interests. We conclude by considering this asymmetry and its significance for Canadian multi-level governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the 2005 federal electoral campaign, Conservative leader Stephen Harper announced what he called a "Charter of Open Federalism" to guide relations between his future government and the provinces, offering to put an end to what he described as centralizing federalism. However, ten years later, once three consecutive Conservative governments had elapsed, the state of intergovernmental relations in Canada was precarious. The Conservatives may have used the "open federalism" promise as a cover for a vast program of federal withdrawal from social policy, and centralization of economic and security policies. This doublespeak stressed relations with the provinces and minority nations to the point that the Liberal government formed in November 2015 has taken explicit distance from this legacy to reestablish healthy intergovernmental relations. Confirmation of this project is still a work in progress. The Liberals first year in office was crucial to assess whether continuity or change will prevail. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cannabis is not a new drug. In fact, the cannabis or hemp plant grows in most parts of the world and has a long history of both medical, as well as non-medical use. Little is documented on the use of cannabis in the first half of the century, however, despite legal sanctions consumption of cannabis increased notably in the 1960s and 1970s and usage seems not to have abated since that time. Its resurgence as a medicinal drug of interest came out of the AIDS pandemic and in 1999 two patients obtained permission by the Federal Government to smoke marijuana and in 2000 the Courts ruled that Canadians had a right to use cannabis as a medicine and in 2001, the Liberal government enacted the Medical Marihuana Access Regulations (MMAR), allowing cannabis for therapeutic purposes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A contested issue is the extent to which refugee claimants should have access to health care in Western host countries with publicly subsidized health-care systems. In Canada, for a period of over fifty years, the federal government provided relatively comprehensive health coverage to refugees and refugee claimants through the Interim Federal Health Plan (IFHP). Significant cuts to the IFHP were implemented in June 2012 by the Conservative federal government (2006-15), who justified these cuts through public statements portraying refugee claimants as bringing bogus claims that inundate the refugee determination system. A markedly different narrative was articulated by a pan-Canadian coalition of health providers who characterized refugee claimants as innocent victims done further harm by inhumane health-care cuts. This article presents an analysis of these two positions in terms of frame theory, with a greater emphasis on the health-provider position. This debate can be meaningfully analyzed as a contest between competing frames: bogus and victim. Frame theory suggests that frames by nature simplify and condense, in this case packaging complex realities about refugee claimants into singular images (bogus and victim), aiming to inspire suspicion and compassion respectively. It will be argued that the acceptance of current frames impoverishes the conversation by reinforcing problematic notions about refugee claimants while also obscuring a rights-based argument for why claimants should have substantial access to health care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines judicial reasoning in the area of Aboriginal title, paying particular attention to the Supreme Court of Canada's Tsilhqot'in Nation (2014) decision. While the decision has been heralded as a ‘game-changer’ within media circles and legal commentaries for its recognition of a claim to title under section 35(1) of the Constitution Act, 1982, the authors argue that the decision does not depart substantially from prior judicial logics predicated upon the production of Crown sovereignty and the denial of Indigenous legal orders. In fact, the authors argue that the decision displays a clear judicial orientation towards the present jurisdictional divisions of Canadian federalism which not only serves to eliminate Indigenous legal orders and territorial responsibilities, but also provides federal and provincial governments with enhanced powers of ‘incursion’ into Aboriginal title lands. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Canadian heritage institutions are perceived as being used as political instruments of nation-branding to advance a government ideological agenda. Faced with budget reductions and increased federal government oversight, the national library and archives of Canada, titled Library and Archives Canada (LAC), has, in the eyes of stakeholders, abdicated its stewardship role and responsibility for all of the nation's collections and records to focus on government priorities. Behind what has been described as a "smokescreen" of digitization, a "modernization" approach at LAC has resulted in the loss of expertise, a moratorium on acquisitions, and the elimination of national archival development and interlibrary loan programs. This paper examines the new strategic priorities of LAC with respect to digitization and resource allocation against a failed digital strategy, which has impacted its ability to fulfill its legislated responsibility for acquisition, preservation, and access; explores the ramifications and barriers created by the digital priorities and strategy of LAC for underserved populations, with a focus on Canada's Indigenous peoples; and concludes with a discussion of the findings and recommendations of the 2014 Royal Society of Canada's expert panel's report, The Future Now: Canada's Libraries, Archives, and Public Memory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policy entrepreneurship is often used to explain agenda setting through reference to the behavior of individual 'change agents.' But there are still gaps in our understanding of what motivates entrepreneurs. Rational choice theory emphasizes the importance of material and nonmaterial incentives; however, it remains unclear what role institutions play. This article aims to empirically examine the relationship between incentives and institutional encouragement of innovation. Using a case study of the federal government of Canada, I find evidence that incentives matter. Government agencies with many incentives are more likely to encourage innovation than agencies with few incentives. These results underscore the importance of institutions in determining the motivations of policy entrepreneurs, and suggest future research should focus on the interplay among individual, political, and institutional factors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cumulative effects of multiple stressors are a pressing global concern for marine ecosystems. The effectiveness of marine management can be improved by considering three key elements that can affect their impacts: stressor interaction types, non-linear stressor–effect relationships, and ecosystem tipping points. Little is known about the degree to which cumulative effects, or these key elements, are considered in marine management in Canada. We surveyed Canadian federal government managers involved in managing either marine conservation areas or commercial fisheries, and asked (1) if they currently assess cumulative effects in decision-making, (2) if so, how and which elements are considered, and (3) the perceived importance of considering the three key elements. We also compared approaches among federal departments, management type, oceans, experience levels, and position types. We found that most managers (84%, n = 80) consider cumulative effects in decision-making. Responses clustered into either a structured approach, which included using an assessment framework and considering the three key elements of cumulative effects, or an intuitive approach, characterized by the absence of a formal framework or consideration of key elements. Neither was strongly linked with demographic categories. Despite most managers (97%, n = 37) believing that the three key elements of cumulative effects are important to consider, only 21% actually did so in decision-making. This discrepancy appears to be underpinned by barriers such as a lack of guidelines for assessing cumulative effects and data quality, quantity, and availability. We provide recommendations to overcome these challenges. • Most surveyed Canadian marine managers generally assess cumulative effects (CE). • Responses clustered into either structured or intuitive approaches to CE. • Perceived importance of specific CE elements is high but actual consideration is low. • Barriers to implementation include a lack of standardized guidelines and data limitations. • Recommendations include modifying existing approaches and novel modeling techniques. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examining multi-level vertical party linkages in Canada’s largest province, this paper makes two primary contributions to the literature. First, drawing on data from a unique survey of constituency associations, the paper focuses on an often unexplored aspect of parties: their local organisations. Second, the paper offers an exploratory analysis of constituency level factors in order to determine which types of constituency associations are the most likely to be integrated. The results of the logistic regression demonstrate the possibility of non-party-based factors such as electoral strength that may contribute to vertical party integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the invasion of North America by white male colonizers, Indigenous women and girls have been constructed as homogenized and dehumanized "Indian princesses" and "savage squaws." These constructions, albeit false, have real consequences, resulting in disproportionate rates of male violence against Indigenous women and girls in the context of a contemporary for-profit rape culture. In 2015, the Canadian federal government announced a long-awaited inquiry into violence against Indigenous women and girls. This article recommends an expressly Indigenous feminist framework in order to comprehensively address the issue of male violence against Indigenous women and girls in a national inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of National Journal of Constitutional Law is the property of Carswell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper revisits the conventional notion of accountability rooted in bureaucratic and hierarchical structures of government and advances an alternative conceptualization more useful for analyzing complex horizontal network delivery systems. Although such systems are increasingly prevalent, they often exacerbate the problem of accountability in the public sector. By examining regional economic development policy implementation in Manitoba, this article illustrates the prospects and challenges of adapting conventional constructs of accountability to horizontal network delivery systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urban sustainability is a priority for cities, challenging public administrators to coordinate action on environmental policy, economic development and social policy. Multilevel governance is now a popular theoretical framework but research must illuminate the constraints on local administrators. This case study reviews efforts of public administrators in the City of Ottawa and Canada's national capital region to implement sustainability policies with collaborative governance, but new governance relationships are constrained by traditional intergovernmental relations. Case study research illuminates the challenges of multilevel governance for local governments and provides insights on the pursuit of sustainability with environmental programs, land use, and urban and development by Crown corporations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Government policy-making affecting Indigenous communities in Canada has often been met with stiff resistance from Indigenous leadership. We examine multilevel governance as an alternate model for Aboriginal policy-making by examining a particular case study: the process leading up to the 2005 Kelowna Accord. We find that although multilevel governance may have the potential to produce highly desirable outcomes, its emergence seems to depend heavily on political agency. Meaningful and enduring change to Aboriginal policy-making will therefore likely require significant institutional adjustments to the Canadian federation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Federal funding for basic scientific research is the cornerstone of societal progress, economy, health and well-being. There is a direct relationship between financial investment in science and a nation’s scientific discoveries, making it a priority for governments to distribute public funding appropriately in support of the best science. However, research grant proposal success rate and funding level can be skewed toward certain groups of applicants, and such skew may be driven by systemic bias arising during grant proposal evaluation and scoring. Policies to best redress this problem are not well established. Here, we show that funding success and grant amounts for applications to Canada’s Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) Discovery Grant program (2011–2014) are consistently lower for applicants from small institutions. This pattern persists across applicant experience levels, is consistent among three criteria used to score grant proposals, and therefore is interpreted as representing systemic bias targeting applicants from small institutions. When current funding success rates are projected forward, forecasts reveal that future science funding at small schools in Canada will decline precipitously in the next decade, if skews are left uncorrected. We show that a recently-adopted pilot program to bolster success by lowering standards for select applicants from small institutions will not erase funding skew, nor will several other post-evaluation corrective measures. Rather, to support objective and robust review of grant applications, it is necessary for research councils to address evaluation skew directly, by adopting procedures such as blind review of research proposals and bibliometric assessment of performance. Such measures will be important in restoring confidence in the objectivity and fairness of science funding decisions. Likewise, small institutions can improve their research success by more strongly supporting productive researchers and developing competitive graduate programming opportunities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article considers the balance between federalism, multinationalism, and multiculturalism in Canada and discusses the status of Québec in the 21st century. Topics include Canadian politics and identity, Québec nationalism and the rise of the separatist movement from 1960 to 1995, political reconstruction in Québec and the development of a Québécois identity since the Quiet Revolution, and the Constitution Act of 1982. The author also mentions Québec-Canada relations and notes the importance of solidifying the Canadian federal identity.

The article discusses the concept of a nation and the rhetoric on nationalism in Canada. The founding of Canada in 1867, the status of Québec as a nation, and the Clarity Act regarding Québec's separation from Canada are mentioned. Additional topics addressed include sovereignty, the rhetoric of aboriginal nationalism which began with the Dene Declaration of 1975 recognizing the Dene peoples as a nation, the standard use of the term First Nations after 1980, and relations between the First Nations and the administration of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The article discusses the concept of a nation and the rhetoric on nationalism in Canada. The founding of Canada in 1867, the status of Québec as a nation, and the Clarity Act regarding Québec's separation from Canada are mentioned. Additional topics addressed include sovereignty, the rhetoric of aboriginal nationalism which began with the Dene Declaration of 1975 recognizing the Dene peoples as a nation, the standard use of the term First Nations after 1980, and relations between the First Nations and the administration of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The article considers the balance between federalism, multinationalism, and multiculturalism in Canada and discusses the status of Québec in the 21st century. Topics include Canadian politics and identity, Québec nationalism and the rise of the separatist movement from 1960 to 1995, political reconstruction in Québec and the development of a Québécois identity since the Quiet Revolution, and the Constitution Act of 1982. The author also mentions Québec-Canada relations and notes the importance of solidifying the Canadian federal identity.

The article aims to make three methodological and substantive contributions to the literature on substate cleavages in political values. Considerable controversy characterizes this literature. The paper argues that this controversy is due to how indicators representing political values are chosen and constructed. The paper proposes to use factor analysis to select and construct indicators of political values. The analysis identifies five dimensions, which collectively account for 57% of Canadians’ political values. They include support for moral traditionalism, egalitarianism, pluralism, openness to immigration and personal responsibility. Second, the paper shows that there is only limited variation across provinces in political values. Third, the paper shows that this result holds when considering regional variations rather than provincial variations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this work we offer results drawn from a dataset of a post-provincial election survey in eight Canadian provinces to assess the impact of party system congruency on partisanship. We postulate that partisanship will be more likely and stronger in provinces that share a similar political party system to the federal level. We extend this preliminary analysis to test the underlying mechanism by examining the impact holding partisan ties at the provincial level has on the likelihood and strength of federal identification, according to party system similarity. Our results show very limited support for the party system congruency factor, raising further questions of its applicability in the Canadian context. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 2014, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the unelected nature of the Senate is an inherent feature of Canadian parliamentary democracy and is a central pillar of the constitution. Members of the Upper House are appointed by the Governor General, acting on the advice of the Prime Minister. The decision taken by the Prime Minister is not subject to review by Parliament or the provincial legislative assemblies. Patronage appointments have given the Senate a reputation as a dumping ground for political friends and party insiders. In 1989, the province of Alberta enacted the Senatorial Selection Act, arguing that it would serve as a stepping stone for substantive reform to the Senate. The province has held four elections in which the people of the province have chosen senators-in-waiting. This article argues that the Court's opinion in Reference re Senate Reform undermines the foundation upon which the provincial statute rests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For several decades, the Canadian federal government has been the subject of many administrative reforms whose nature, scale and resources vary considerably. The frequency of these reforms increased considerably during the 1990s, although political stability on the federal level was particularly high at the time. By using the normativity-governmentality dynamic as a heuristic model, this article focuses on the Public Service Modernization Act (PSMA) to better understand the effects of the transformation of norms on the modes of interactions and power relationships between actors, institutions and social groups in the Canadian public service context. It questions the way in which transformations in normativity change the conditions of governmentality in Canada. The main thesis of this paper argues that the normative flexibility given to managers (by the PSMA) in the staffing process does not lead to a real increase in their room to manoeuvre, due to: 1) the (re)definition of merit (confusion factor); 2) the concomitant implementation of the Financial Administration Act (inertia factor); and 3) the legacy of previous administrative reforms (the one-step-forward, one-step-back factor). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The conundrum for all political systems has been to ensure fairness and equity to all political communities regardless of place while maintaining social cohesion and national unity. How national governments have sought to accommodate the goals and aspirations of various subnational groups within a country has been one of the pressing concerns of federalist states. The failure to do so had created periods of resistance in Canada. This paper examines Newfoundland and Labrador's fight with Ottawa for control over offshore oil and gas from the 1960s to the 1980s. This paper shows that the province believed it was not only articulating and championing its own limited interests but also engaging in a process to solve larger problems facing the nation. Federal leaders, such as prime minister Pierre Trudeau, believe that only they can protect the national community; they had to resist attempts by provincial premiers to strengthen their economies. Yet no resolution to the offshore dispute was possible until the election of a new prime minister who realized that sometimes the existing constitution does not meet the specific objectives of all provincial political communities. The resistance of provinces could only be addressed by finding political accommodation among the political elites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Zeitschrift für Kanada-Studien is the property of Gesellschaft fuer Kanada Studien e.V. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Canada and Australia bear many similarities, but historical developments have affected the way each country practices federalism. This article seeks to answer the following question: Why have institutionalized horizontal relations been present in Canadian intergovernmental relations (IGR), while they have generally not in Australia? Developments in each country have produced different dynamics in intergovernmental relations which serve to favour vertical relations in Australia and open up space for horizontal relations in Canada. These dynamics become especially apparent when the histories of the institutions for facilitating intergovernmental relations in each country, notably the Canadian Council of the Federation and the Council of Australian Governments, are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2012, Canada's federal government announced cuts to refugee health coverage. Evidence suggesting that the cuts represent a social policy failure has since been accumulating, including the 2014 Federal Court ruling ordering their reversal. This explanatory case study uncovers the problem definition process that led policy development by applying coding methods to governmental publications, transcripts of parliamentary proceedings and internal governmental correspondence obtained under the Access to Information Act. The systematic analysis identifies avoidable gaps that occurred and proposes an avenue for strengthening future federal social policy processes so as to avoid negative outcomes such as those that resulted here. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is strong evidence that gender mainstreaming (GM), a gender equality governance strategy, is performing poorly across jurisdictions. While many national and regional governments have adopted gender equality policy tools, developing and implementing an integrated GM strategy requires substantive reforms to existing procedures and institutional settings. The goal of the article is to demonstrate that, in Canada, current gender equality policy using a gender-based analysis (GBA) approach does not feature the same governance arrangement as the alternative GM approach would entail. Using the Canadian federal government as a case study, the gender equality policy instrument mix is examined to demonstrate how different problem definitions result in suboptimal performance. The article concludes that Canada’s current gender equality policy regime only advances the mainstreaming of GBA, and not the mainstreaming of gender equality in general. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The purpose of this paper is to calculate what the results of the 2015 federal election in Canada might have been using a system of proportional representation based on the system in use for elections to the Scottish Parliament. The Scottish model was recommended by the Law Commission of Canada in its March 2004 report. This paper does not attempt to deal in any depth with the implications of a proportional representation system, such as the tendency for it to result in a minority government, or with the relative merits of the various possible systems for proportional representation. Those matters are canvassed more fully in the Law Commission report. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Canadian Political Science Review is the property of Canadian Political Science Review and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This article examines the application of the theory of the unity of the Crown in Canada in the context of Indigenous peoples. It reveals a consistent retreat by the courts from acceptance of the theory in the late nineteenth century to rejection of it in the second half of the twentieth century. This evolution of the theory's relevance, it is argued, is consistent with Canada's federal structure and eventual independence from the United Kingdom. However, in a startling reversal, the Supreme Court reverted to the theory in its 2014 judgment in Grassy Narrows First Nation v Ontario (Minister of Natural Resources) to support its decision that the provinces have control over natural resource development in the areas of Canada that are covered by the numbered treaties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does regulation impede or facilitate immigrant participation in the labor market? To answer this question, we focus on the growing and increasingly regulated Canadian health-care sector. On the one hand, occupational regulation may facilitate immigrant entry into the labor market as it imposes standards based on credentials, and recent immigrants tend to be highly skilled. On the other hand, regulatory standards are often enforced by provincially designated authorities whose selection criterion may unwittingly penalize those with foreign credentials or experience. Using a longitudinal data set combining information on the regulation of nine Canadian health-care occupations and the Canadian Census from 1991 to 2006, we test whether the introduction of regulation places a greater burden on the immigrant population relative to the native-born. Specifically, we employ a difference in methodology, exploiting variation across provinces and over time in whether an occupation is regulated to identify its effect on the ratio of immigrants-to-native-born workers employed in that occupation. The results indicate that, on average, a province's introduction of occupational regulation increases the participation of immigrants relative to the native-born by 20 %. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The First World War changed the Canada-U.S. border forever. From the beginning it placed incredible pressure on a fledgling immigration apparatus weakly supported by the Canadian federal government. This article carefully examines how the government and immigration agents stationed along the actual border responded to new threats to national security between 1914 and 1918. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]