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A false image dominates too many recent surveys of Canadian history: that Lower Canada opposed canals, which Upper Canada supported. This pervasive image is not borne out by an examination of the public support for canals in the two legislatures. Both supported large-scale ventures (Lachine and Welland). French Canadians also supported smaller regional canals as well as canals above Montreal. Upper Canadians were more sharply divided along regional and party lines in support for the Welland Canal than were Lower Canadians over any canal. Legislatures in both the Canadas supported canals that they saw as most beneficial for their supporters whether conceived as a region or a party. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the founding and financing of national Indigenous organizations during the shift in Canadian politics towards the ideal of participatory democracy during the late 1960s and early 1970s. It investigates the emergence of two separate organizations, the National Indian Brotherhood (nib) for "status Indians" and the Native Council of Canada (ncc) for "non-status Indians" and Métis, following the collapse of the pan-Indigenous National Indian Council (nic) in 1968. It highlights the key role that funding played in the structuring of national-level Indigenous politics but argues that accepting federal funding did not simply equate to government control. Instead, both the nib and ncc successfully resisted and – in limited ways – shaped federal policies towards Indigenous peoples. The issue of federal funding opened questions regarding Indigenous rights and self-determination, concepts that were employed in differing ways by the leaders of these organizations and federal officials. While marking a stark shift away from the earlier suppression of Indigenous political movements, federal funding was used to integrate different Indigenous groups as citizens into the Canadian settler state. Nevertheless, federal funding served not only to limit, but also to expand, the practical possibilities of Indigenous organizing, with political leaders recasting government money as the right of Indigenous peoples and a tool for self-determination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1962, the Board of Broadcast Governors (BBG), an arm of the Canadian federal government responsible for broadcasting, made the unprecedented move to force the national public broadcaster to televise the Grey Cup, the championship game of Canadian football, ostensibly because it was in the national interest. However, research reveals that this decision was not necessarily made because it was in the national interest, but more so to assist the new struggling private television network, CTV. The important content, allegedly linked to cultural citizenship, was not the national championship, but the television commercials. This paper explores why the BBG intervened and how the dispute was settled. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars have long studied the influence of parties on citizens' policy preferences. Experiments conducted outside Canada have convincingly shown that the cues offered by political parties can influence people's attitudes. However, the most prominent study of party cue effects in Canada finds weak effects, concluding that Canadian parties are less influential because they are less clearly ideological than parties elsewhere. We propose that parties are actually more influential than they appear because party cue effects partly depend on variables other than partisanship, notably attitudes toward the cue-giver. This is especially true in countries like Canada with multi-party systems. We show that attitudes toward parties are not clearly reflected in partisanship in Canada. We then show that more specific measures of party and leader attitudes better account for how experimental participants react to cues than does party identification alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cabinet committees are important sites of executive politics in Canada. This article examines the extent to which two representational attributes—gender and region—determine influence, as a function of cabinet committee structure. Employing a dataset of ministers under the three most recent prime ministers, I find that female ministers are less likely than male ministers to be influential in terms of connections to other ministers, to belong to the core of most influential ministers and to be represented on the most powerful committees or chairing committees. However, there is evidence of improvement over time. While regional representation is an imperative in cabinet making for Canadian prime ministers, its role in determining ministerial influence within committees is not evident: ministers from less-represented regions are no more likely to be influential than other ministers. This analysis highlights a neglected but central arena for social representation in Canadian government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article talks about the political thoughts of Canadian politicians Louis Riel and John Norquay. It mentions that the Manitoba Legislative Assembly unanimously passed a Resolution to Recognize the Historic Role of Riel as Founder of Manitoba in May of 1992. It also mentions that there are several Louis Riel schools in Ottawa and Calgary and a Louis Riel School Division in Winnipeg; and there is a Louis Riel bridge, park and monuments. It mentions that there are biographies, movies and plays about Riel. A major highway in Saskatchewan was renamed the "Louis Riel Trail" in 2001.

The article talks about the 150th anniversary of Treaty No. 1, an agreement made by the Government of Canada with the Anishinabek and Swampy Cree of southern Manitoba in 1871. It mentions that the arrival of settler colonialism (the process and structure of dispossessing indigenous peoples of their land base and replacing them with invasive settlers who assert their own narratives of belonging) led rapidly to the signing of the Numbered Treaties to extinguish aboriginal title to the lands of the Prairie West.

The article talks about the political thoughts of Canadian politicians Louis Riel and John Norquay. It mentions that the Manitoba Legislative Assembly unanimously passed a Resolution to Recognize the Historic Role of Riel as Founder of Manitoba in May of 1992. It also mentions that there are several Louis Riel schools in Ottawa and Calgary and a Louis Riel School Division in Winnipeg; and there is a Louis Riel bridge, park and monuments. It mentions that there are biographies, movies and plays about Riel. A major highway in Saskatchewan was renamed the "Louis Riel Trail" in 2001.

The article talks about the 150th anniversary of Treaty No. 1, an agreement made by the Government of Canada with the Anishinabek and Swampy Cree of southern Manitoba in 1871. It mentions that the arrival of settler colonialism (the process and structure of dispossessing indigenous peoples of their land base and replacing them with invasive settlers who assert their own narratives of belonging) led rapidly to the signing of the Numbered Treaties to extinguish aboriginal title to the lands of the Prairie West.

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.)

Challenges in distinguishing between core policy and operational decisions in the public policy process have spawned a legal grey area in Canadian public administration. Governments are immune from civil liability for policy decisions made by the cabinet yet they remain exposed to liability for operational decisions by public servants. We seek to raise awareness of this nexus within the Canadian public administration community by drawing on key interviews with lawyers, former attorneys general, a former premier, a former judge and a legal scholar. We explain that demarcating policy from operational decisions relies on written documentation that is difficult to locate and may not exist. Clarity is desired, but Canadian courts are reluctant to overrule a public authority's opinion, which is based on socio‐economic and political considerations. We conclude with observations for public administrators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The duty to assist is a core principle in Freedom of Information (FOI) law in Canada and elsewhere. FOI coordinators working in each Canadian government agency are responsible for implementing this duty, though they face challenges in doing so. Examining Information Commissioner rulings, we elaborate on the dimensions of duty to assist as articulated in Canadian law and policy. We argue that while attention to the duty to assist is a necessary but insufficient condition for refurbishing FOI law in Canada, improving adherence to it would enhance "internal mechanisms of administrative justice" (Adler 2003). We conclude by discussing remedies and implications for literatures on FOI, administrative justice, and due process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A public commission of inquiry is an administrative tool used exceptionally by governments to inquire into and report on controversies of significant public importance. Such inquiries allow the public to better understand the complexities of a scandal or tragedy, but provide no ultimate accountability when criminal activity is at play. In Canada, the use of public commissions of inquiry to investigate corruption and collusion poses significant legal challenges from a constitutional division of powers perspective (between the federal and provincial levels of government) and with regards to the protection of the rights of the accused under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Typically, when criminal conduct is at the heart of the controversy, governments will wait for the completion of all investigations and prosecutions before launching a public inquiry into any remaining matter of public importance. However, the scale of a corruption scandal and the growing public demand for answers may be such that a government is left with no option but to launch a public inquiry immediately, even if there are serious risks of compromising criminal investigations and prosecutions. This paper discusses the legal difficulties associated with the creation and operation of public commission of inquiry into crime, corruption and collusion in particular, and presents a way forward in analysing the various measures that may be adopted at the onset and susbsequently at the operational level to minimize legal risks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on implications for public administration research and practice in the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic crisis along with information on and repositioning governance. Topics include reform challenges posed by COVID-19 for government-as-executive, and responses of Canadian governments to the Global Financial Crisis and COVID-19 pandemic.

Since 1970, recognized political parties in the Canadian House of Commons have received funding for caucus research offices. Staffed by political partisans, research offices provide policy, communications, research and administrative support to party leaders and their parliamentary caucuses. This research note examines the evolving organization, work and function of these offices. It demonstrates, first, that the tendency towards centralization, evident in Canadian politics for decades, is clearly reflected in research offices' primary support for leaders rather than individual caucus members. Second, research offices are integral to parties' strategic communications and marketing efforts, and this, especially in government, often eclipses their policy contribution. Third, while the government party views caucus researchers as a useful supplement to public service and ministerial office resources, opposition parties rely heavily on their caucus research offices as their dominant source of staff capacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Are parties "high discipline, low cohesion" in Westminster legislatures? This study applies network analysis to voting behavior among members of parliament (MPs), a novel approach that measures not deviation from party-line voting, but rather whether MPs with similar voting patterns are co-partisans. We study the Canadian Parliament from 2006 to 2015, during which time the governing party under Prime Minister Stephen Harper maintained tight central control and discipline, a likely source of elevated cohesion. We find that "low cohesion" generally holds, and parties do not always conform to commonsense expectations about how cohesively they "should" behave in various parliamentary situations, though they show themselves capable of learning over time. Moreover, we find that party cohesion stems less from shared voting behaviors and more from simple partisan identity. Further research should consider to what extent parliamentary behavior is based mainly on party alignment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two margins of political party life in Canada since Confederation (1867) are analyzed—the extensive margin involving entry and exit (together with party turnover or churning) and the intensive margin determining survival length. The results confirm many hypotheses advanced to explain entry and exit—the importance of social and religious cleavage, election institutions, and economic circumstance. More novel are the findings that public election funding and periods with larger immigration flows have reinforced established parties at the expense of entrants and smaller sized parties. The intensive margin uses a discrete hazard model with discrete finite mixtures to confirm the Duverger-type presence of two distinct long-lived political parties surrounded by a fringe of smaller parties. Both parametric and semi-parametric models concur in finding that public funding and higher immigration flows are as successful in extending the life of established parties as in discouraging entry and exit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

All nations construct national identities that are important, though often ambiguous and sometimes conflicted. Ideas and policies that become part of the national identity are never fixed. They are subject to ever-changing contexts in the search for national well-being and new ways to sustain established political communities and accommodate new ones. At Confederation and in the decades that followed, the national narrative, and, by extension, the character of Canada promoted by successive prime ministers from Sir John A. Macdonald onwards, focused on Canada as a political community that had to recognize the existence of two founding settler communities, two languages, two cultures, and two different legal systems. Following the turmoil and upheaval of depression and war in the 1930s and the early 1940s, which threatened to destabilize Canada, a new national identity emerged. William Lyon Mackenzie King was at the centre of that reconstruction. Although King is often seen as a pragmatic and careful politician, he constructed a national identity for Canada that included a set of social rights, shared and available to all citizens. He hoped this would enhance a sense of community and build social cohesion as well as safeguarding the existing capitalist system. Coupled with a call for the ending of an isolationist foreign policy, the creation of new symbols, including a Citizenship Act, and the overhaul of Canada's discriminatory immigration legislation, King believed this new approach to Canadian identity would strengthen the level of attachment of citizens to the nation and encourage them to see themselves as members of a single community, enjoying a common set of liberal ideas and values while sharing common obligations to each other and to the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although retirements are a major source of legislative turnover, research on the topic has been limited, especially outside of the US House of Representatives. In this article, we address this shortcoming by examining retirements in two countries with similar electoral systems yet different legislative environments and party systems: Canada and the United Kingdom. In particular, we extend analysis on the Congress that has consistently shown Republican members retire at higher rates than their Democratic counterparts to examine whether this finding is generalizable to legislators from other parties of the right and/or favouring devolution in other parliamentary settings. In presenting data that support many of these hypotheses, we explore an important normative implication: because their partisan predispositions make them less willing to serve, politicians from parties favouring limited government and/or devolution may be less able to translate their vision of politics into policy because they face systemic problems maintaining legislative seats. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, Canada has witnessed an increase in visibility of far‐right groups and activities. This phenomenon is particularly interesting as it contrasts with the broader Canadian context of acceptance of immigrants and support for multiculturalism. How do far‐right groups represent themselves and their claims to the public considering the dominant discursive environment in which they operate? Moreover, are far‐right groups' discourse and rhetoric marked by contextual differences? This paper analyzes the way the distinct Canadian and Quebec chapters of the vigilante group Soldiers of Odin (SOO) use their public Facebook pages, comparatively. This research demonstrates that both SOO chapters negotiate their self‐representation by employing cultural elements that are salient and meaningful in their respective sociopolitical contexts and that can be exploited to infer motivations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of International Journal of Canadian Studies is the property of University of Toronto Press 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.)

Indigenous Peoples in Canada currently experience much higher rates of oral health problems than their non-Indigenous counterparts. A number of recent reports have shown that Indigenous children have very high rates of tooth decay, that large numbers of Indigenous people report experiencing ongoing and persistent pain in their mouths, and that significantly more Indigenous people than non-Indigenous Canadians have no teeth at all. These oral health inequalities are important, not just because they have a profound impact on Indigenous Peoples' quality of life but also because poor oral health is linked to other health issues that currently disproportionately impact Indigenous communities, including diabetes and heart disease. From 1945 to 1979, the federal government made only limited attempts to provide oral health care to Indigenous Peoples despite treaty promises of health care. The government did not believe that it had any obligation to provide oral health care, and as a result, the services provided were rushed, inadequate, inconsistent, and sometimes cruel. Indigenous Peoples experienced much higher levels of tooth extractions and lower rates of denture provision than was the case among non-Indigenous peoples in Canada, with ongoing consequences for their oral health today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While national electoral reforms in the early twentieth century have received considerable attention, subnational adoption of P.R. systems in otherwise 'non-adopting' countries such as Canada have generally been overlooked. The strategic contexts in which these subnational reforms occurred, involving absent or emerging party systems and limited strategic knowledge, provides a new opportunity to test recent arguments about electoral reform, focused on normative ideas and strategic contexts, against an older 'left threat' thesis. Drawing from analyses of new electoral, archival, and news- paper data, this article offers a comparative explanation of urban electoral reform in four of the most important subnational instances of P.R. adoption in Canadian history (Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, and Winnipeg). I argue that the 'left threat' thesis cannot explain these cases; instead, P.R. was adopted as a result of a reform coalition for whom electoral reform was an immediate policy objective. I suggest that two recent challenges to the 'left threat' thesis, fit together into a persuasive alternative interpretation of early-twentieth-century electoral reform in the North American subnational context.. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the efforts of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada in negotiating carbon pricing. It mentions about the impact of the carbon price on macroeconomics, and the plan of Trudeau which involved providing rebates that would actually improve the economic standing of Canadian households. It also mentions that while Canadians were unlikely to feel any negative effects of the carbon price, they would learn about it from conservative politicians and right-wing media outlets, who indicated early on their intention to take advantage of the public's poor grasp of carbon pricing to undermine the policy and gain electoral advantage.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including public sector leadership in Canada, public administration and relationship between leadership and innovation.

Recently, certain mediatized events in Quebec have demonstrated that senior civil servants could control the information intended for elected officials. Is it possible that senior civil servants behave strategically in sharing information with politicians? Based on a game theory‐driven approach, the study offers in‐depth testimonies to illustrate the strategic dimensions of information transmission, which sometimes occurs between ADMs and elected officials. Quebec senior civil servants occasionally benefit from discretionary authority with respect to information and use it to promote specific lines of thought. Furthermore, elected officials and senior civil servants sharing similar views on specific public issues could facilitate information transmission. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Literature on Canada‐United States (US) counter‐terrorism (CT) cooperation from the early 2000s presumed that Canadian CT policy was driven by US security imperatives and fear, leaving little room for Canada to develop its own path in fighting terrorism. It presumed that: the Canadian government was more worried about the US reaction to terrorism than terrorism itself; Canadian security policy sought to be "separate but cooperative"; and Canadian policy was informed by "wise" understandings of the US. We argue these assumptions no longer hold. Since 2011, with the rise of the Islamic State and foreign fighter activity, the Canadian government took independent steps to address national security concerns in a multilateral environment. We use process tracing to track evolutions in the Passenger Protect Program (Canada's "no‐fly list" policy), showing how Canada has increasingly asserted agency in response to violent extremism. It suggests the prior scholarly consensus on the US role in Canadian CT policy must be rethought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on how control is exercised in the Canadian federal administrative system. More specifically, it aims to determine whether the management philosophy introduced by the Canadian federal government in 2000, which advocated for greater flexibility in the system, is reflected in government policies. The research examines the content of Canadian federal government financial management policies between 2000 and 2018. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cahiers des Dix is the property of Societe des Dix 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.)

At the request of the Pentagon, in the spring of 1985 the Central Intelligence Agency prepared an assessment of Canadian defence policy. Brian Mulroney's Progressive Conservatives had formed the government in the election of 4 September 1984 and, in the CIA's view, the new administration was likely to be more interested in defence than the Liberals. Even so, the assessment observed that "Canadians generally think little about defense and when they do, reject outright the idea of giving defense priority over maintaining the social welfare system.". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the resumption of great power rivalry, the Western-led liberal order appears to have failed to become synonymous with global order itself. Russia's "pivot to the east" and its deepening partnership with China have raised fundamental questions concerning the future role and pre-eminence of liberal states -- including Canada -- in the emerging global order. Given dueling European and Eurasian elements of Russian identity and foreign policy discourse, Russia remains a good case study for probing the extent to which a future world order can root itself in a monist frame in today's pluralistic world. This paper explores this question from a perspective rooted in the English School of International Relations, with the aim of deriving conclusions regarding the liberal international order's ability to maintain its hegemonic position in global international society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the construction of Canada's postwar international identity and how that identity continues to influence Canadian foreign policy, especially with the United States. Furthermore, the article illustrates how changes in Canadian policy necessitated by the Trump Administration may impact Canada's international identity in the future. The article argues Canadian policy makers have consistently constructed an international identity in opposition to the United States and continue to use the US as a reflective tool in shaping their own policy. The first part of the article briefly examines the concept of state identity outlining both type and role variants and their relevance to foreign policy and this is followed in the second part by a discussion of Canada's postwar international identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cabinet committees are key elements in parliamentary government, yet they are understudied. This article examines recent uses of cabinet committees in Canada as strategic instruments of their chief architects: prime ministers. My assessment of cabinet committees under three prime ministers – Martin, Harper, and Trudeau, from 2003 to 2019 – finds both similarities and differences in their use as coordination and placation mechanisms. Harper created smaller and fewer policy committees with larger coordinating committees, while both Martin and Trudeau created larger policy committees with denser ministerial networks. However, distributions of ministerial influence did not vary significantly between prime ministers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]