The Crisis of Canadian Democracy

Most of "The Crisis of Canadian Democracy" dissects the many serious faults in Canadian democracy with a few solutions.  The last chapter is about the crises we are facing, including Trump and why we need to change our approach to democracy to better deal with the future.  

Explaining his solutions he also admits that those who have the power to make changes know they owe their power to the present system.  It appears most Canadians are not conscious of our deficiencies and perhaps an increased awareness will be a start.  But we are running out of time. 

With a poor democratic structure we are less fit to resist Trump.  One wild speculation has been he would be satisfied with luring Alberta to join America.  Blind patriotism may not be enough.

This post cannot be a summary of all Andrew's good ideas, but hopefully will inspire some to read the book and others to be more conscious of our deficiencies.

 The Canadian Prime Minister has too much power.  As with all party leaders he has power as to who gets nominated in ridings and obviously on cabinet ministers.  Cabinet members especially, and M.P.'s are expected to go along with government positions.  He or she has the power to call an election (at their convenience).  The power of prorogue to stop opposition, very effectively done by Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau.

Andrew feels the leader should be decided by the caucus as they have the best understanding of the job and the character required.  This is not a new idea, but got lost with the lure of money making recruiting new members.

Parliament is where ideas get discussed and debated and where some local concerns can be aired, but time devoted to it is diminishing.  Parliament is where the government has to answer to the people, but when not sitting grievances pile up.  Canada has fallen behind other nations.  One reason has been elections that even once resolved Canada takes longer than most nations to resume Parliament.

Chrystia Freeland was shabbily treated, because Justin could, and this helped finally to force him to resign.  Before she got into politics a book (and some tv. appearances)got my attention http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2013/01/plutocrats-by-chrystia-freeland.html

Andrew states "Conventional management theory teaches that the greater the size of the operation, the more important it becomes to delegate authority to subordinates."  Instead the Canadian government is centralizing power.  

The Supreme Court is appointed by the Prime Ministers.  One of their roles is judicial review that now is more important because of the Charter of Rights and specifically the "notwithstanding rule."  Without allowing for exceptions to the charter it would not have been agreed upon.  Nonetheless it is subject to abuse.  The Quebec Bill 21 wants to ban religious garb such as turbans, hajibs or skullcaps from public service.  Recently I learned some in Alberta would like to place restrictions on transexuals.  The federal government is supposed to protect all citizens from prejudice.

The Senate is all appointed and subject to Prime Ministerial favoritism.  Andrew feels it should be elected, but not based on population.  Some groups have special rights, but not majority clout.  An example might be the indigenous.  My opinion, this could offset some of the power of majorities to overlook human rights.  It might also help to honor agreements that have been made to Prince Edward Island and francophone Quebec

A few points on election campaigns.  Journalists put too much emphasis on the horse race aspects.  Andrew feels they should be explaining policies and characters to help voters sort for their big decision

He also feels debates should be a bigger part of the campaign.  The networks know debates take away from profitable ad time.  The debates should be managed by a non partisan group.  Ideally held once a week on different topics and all should be bilingual.  The networks should not have any control over content or format, but obligated as part of their license agreement.

Essentially democracy means the voice of the common citizen should be heard and respected, but all votes are not equal.  To start with the size of ridings.  Canada  has a greater variance than in other countries, for example from the 2021 census, the smallest riding is in Labrador with 27,000 people while the largest is Edmonton-Wetaskiwin with more than 209,000 people meaning it takes more voters in some ridings to elect a member.  

Another serious concern is that most votes are wasted.  In our first past the post electoral system the decision is made by plurality and not majority.  In actual practice it is very normal for the minority parties to have gained more votes  than the winner, yet their votes do not count and thus their views are not represented.  Also the winner usually has unneeded votes that are also wasted.  Many voters use strategic voting meaning they vote for a secondary choice in order to lessen the chances for a disliked party.  

Proportional representation is a concept to remedy the wasted votes plus the need for strategic voting and has been found to actually increase voter turnout.  Unfortunately those in power don't like this idea as they got their power for the current system.  Still hundreds of countries have adopted a variation allowing a more realistic opinion of their voters to be reflected by their government.

Andrew also likes the idea of mandatory voting as the government is supposed to represent the whole country and not just the educated and informed.  

As Andrew points out Canada's future is full of challenges such as pandemics, climate change, Parti Quebecois, a European War, aging population and immediately Donald Trump.  The stronger our democracy the better we can weather the storms.  He also warns that the future will call for sacrifices (that might be painful).

An earlier blog regarding proportional representation:  http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2023/10/your-vote-neednt-be-wasted.html

Israel has long been used against the proportional representation concept.  In truth Jewish voters and elected representatives dominate Arabs, but nonetheless there are occasionally opportunities:  http://www.therealjohndavidson.com/2021/07/is-israel-such-bad-example-for.html