Accommodation and the politics of fiscal equalization in multinational states: The case of Canada

The politics of accommodation in multinational states sometimes features an important, yet often overlooked, fiscal dimension. In fact, the scholarly literature on the accommodation of nationalist movements emphasizes territorial autonomy, access to power and representation within central institutions, and the promotion of the state national identity, but it is virtually silent on how patterns of territorial fiscal redistribution, and more specifically programs of horizontal fiscal equalization, may contribute to accommodating sub‐state nationalism. This article looks at the Canadian case and analyses the multidimensional relationship between equalization policy and Québécois nationalism. It explains how a key motivation behind the creation of Canada's fiscal equalization program in 1957 was to “end” the institutional and political isolation of Québec and how equalization may have, thereafter, contributed to making Québec's secession less appealing to a good number of Quebeckers than it would have been in the absence of this program. Simultaneously, the article discusses how equalization may have contributed to a certain political backlash against Québec in the other provinces, thus providing mixed evidence in the assessment of the accommodation potential of equalization policy.     

The Changing Faces of Canada: Images of Canada in National Geographic

Carol Shields, one of Canada's and America's most popular and critically acclaimed writers, is the perfect example of the former permeability of the Canada–United States border. Born Carol Ann Warner in Oak Park, Illinois, in 1935, she married Canadian engineering student Donald Shields and immigrated with him to Canada in 1957, becoming a Canadian citizen in 1971. Between her immigration to Canada and her death nearly half a century later, Shields criss-crossed the 49^th parallel – traditionally known as the world's longest undefended border, until 9/11 drastically changed travel – with ease. Her fictional characters cross the Canada–United States border with equal ease. Shields crosses borders not only literally, but also figuratively, as she travels from genre to genre with ease. Most famous for her fiction, Shields published in many genres, including poetry, drama, short stories, biography, and literary criticism, and she incorporates these other genres in her novels. Thus, Shields shows how art can cross borders with exemplary grace.     

Religiosity in Canada and the United States: Diverging Paths

Comparing degrees of religiosity, Canada and the US have been moving along divergent trajectories for the past several decades. Regional variations are evident in both societies, but, taken as a whole, the divergence holds up even when these intrasocietal differences are accounted for. Neither the classic secularization thesis nor the more popular religious economy model in the sociology of religion adequately explain the contemporary disparities in religious practice and belief in the two societies. More compelling explanations lie in human security and welfare state models. Canadian and US demographic patterns, particularly internal differences among recent immigrants, are additional explanatory factors. Levels of existential security and immigration trends in the two societies are likely to sustain the divergence in religiosity.     

加拿大双语和二元文化讨论探析

加拿大的多元文化主义政策日益引起国内外学者的广泛关注。通过对该政策的分析,笔者发现,在多元文化主义政策的出台过程中,20世纪60年代的双语和二元文化讨论占有非常重要的地位,是多元文化主义政策出台的前奏。对双语和二元文化讨论进行深入分析,可以揭示它与多元文化主义政策之间的关系。     

Sailboats Used on the St Lawrence River in Quebec City, Canada, in the 18th Century: Tradition and Adaptation

Many years after their discovery, the small boats at the Musée de la civilisation in Quebec City still fascinate and hold some of their mysteries. Revisiting these boats has allowed the author to examine shipbuilding practices from a different perspective and to sum up many observations made but never published. The paper also contains previously-unpublished illustrations. This material may help other scholars in their interpretation of future discoveries.
© 2008 The Author     

Forks in the Road: Energy Policies in Canada and the US since the Shale Revolution

ABSTRACT

This article examines policy responses in Canada and the US to the shale revolution and changing North American oil and gas markets. We outline the effect of the shale revolution on North American oil and gas markets, and how the subsequent energy policy choices in each country changed the relationship between Canada and the US. In the US, increasing production, combined with the policy imperative of maintaining energy security, led to less support for Canadian supply and the subsequent on-off-on saga of the Keystone XL pipeline. In Canada, growing concern about the balance between the environment and the economy led to stalled pipeline development and reform of regulatory systems, problems exacerbated by the new policy direction in the US.     

Empire and Cultures of Militarism in Canada and the United States

While Canadians have been described as an “unmilitary people,” their historic affections for empire have contributed to a conspicuous reluctance to criticize past military exploits. A tradition of anti-imperialism, meanwhile, has colored American attitudes to war, and produced a powerful current of antiwar sentiment throughout US history – even as that nation developed into a dominant imperial power. This essay finds the source of these national discrepancies in the founding myths of each country and in subsequent demographic, economic, strategic, and ideological transformations which have both reinforced and challenged each nation's traditional responses to empire. The result is a relationship between war, imperialism, and national identity that is multifaceted, often paradoxical, and in certain instances, surprisingly antiquated.     

美加联盟中的政治与经济利益博弈——以加拿大对华粮食贸易为核心的考察

20世纪50年代末60年代初,面对中国发生的粮食紧缺问题,作为美国冷战盟友的加拿大开始采取自主行动,主动与中国开展粮食贸易。此时美国仍对中国进行政治孤立和经济封锁,加拿大的行为无疑与美国的冷战遏制战略相冲突,美国与加拿大的博弈由此开启。美加双方具有不同的利益诉求,加拿大希望扩大粮食销售市场,解决国内粮食过剩的问题,而美国更看重冷战联盟,并着眼于维护冷战联盟内部的团结,为此在不涉及美国核心利益的问题上向加拿大做出一定的让步。美国与加拿大之间的博弈反映了作为联盟主导者的美国开展联盟管理的困境,也体现了联盟政治与经济利益之间的张力。     

Origins of Difference: Professionalization,Power, and Mental Hygiene in Canada and the United States

This study examines the emergence and development of mental hygiene professional organizations in Canada and the US by analyzing discursive differences in the publications of two sister committees: the National Committee for Mental Hygiene and the Canadian National Committee for Mental Hygiene. The analysis finds that while mental hygiene in North America initially emerged as a single, shared continental professional discourse, the two movements diverged in critical ways for reasons directly related to their institutional contexts and donor bases. Even as US popular and political discourse veered towards eugenic policies, the US mental hygiene discourse shifted sharply away from eugenics. In contrast, in Canada, mental hygiene publications focused increasingly on the moral dangers of Canada’s immigrant population and played a role in producing scientific legitimacy for eugenic policies. This analysis suggests that the different trajectories of the two professional communities have their origins in organizations’ membership and donor bases, not broader differences in national character.     

Confidence in Political Institutions in Canada and the United States: Assessing the Interactive Role of Region and Race

This article uses nationally representative sample survey data to assess the confidence of Canadians and Americans in four major state institutions: the police; the civil service; the federal government; and political parties. Long-standing arguments suggest that Canadians are more trusting of government than Americans. Results, however, indicate small national differences, with variations within countries being much more important, especially for regional and racial subgroups within each nation. Consistent with their traditional minority position in Canada, Quebecers stand out as having the least confidence of respondents in either nation. In contrast, and despite their minority position, nonwhites express more confidence in political institutions than do whites in both countries, especially in English Canada. One exception is somewhat lower confidence in the police among nonwhites, particularly in the northern United States. The findings demonstrate the need to go beyond an exclusive focus on national differences when comparing political attitudes and values in Canada and the United States.     

Fearing Food: The Influence of Risk Perceptions on Public Preferences for Uniform and Centralized Risk Regulation

Public opinion features prominently in policy research because it sets bounds on the definition of policy problems and acceptable policy solutions. We contend that public opinion is also important for setting bounds on the level of government at which policy hazards are regulated by shaping preferences for uniformity of regulation and, relatedly, preferences for centralization. We offer a theoretical argument for why risk creates pressures for uniform standards and examine the extent to which preferences for uniformity and centralization are the product of fairly stable individual-level predispositions (e.g. partisanship and ideology) versus more fluid attitudes like perceptions of risk, which vary in response to crises, new information, and issue framing. We test our argument using survey data in the policy domain of food safety and find that individuals who anticipate greater risk from food-borne illness prefer more uniform food safety regulation, which translates into preferences for federal-level policymaking. Our results imply that contextual circumstances and strategic communications that influence risk perceptions can create not only generalized public demand for more regulatory policy but specific demand for uniform, centralized regulation.     

发达国家技术移民政策及其影响——以美国和加拿大为例

在经济全球化背景下,国际人口迁移呈现出明显的特点。其特点之一就是技术移民剧增成为全球化的一个突出现象。技术移民之所以在全球备受青睐,与发达国家制定技术移民政策有密切的关系,美国和加拿大是成功吸引技术移民的国家,两国之所以制定技术移民政策,是为了应对信息革命带来的全球性人才争夺战。同时美、加技术移民政策产生了双重影响。为了遏制人才外流,亚洲国家应采取积极的措施,制定人才强国战略,吸引有用人才尤其是技术人才,在国际人才竞争中取得主动,赢得未来。     

The introduction of multiculturalism in Canada and Australia, 1960s–1970s

This article compares the emergence of a policy of multiculturalism in Canada and Australia between the 1960s and 1970s. It charts the rise of the policy in the two countries through the adoption of a philosophy of multiculturalism as the basis of their national identities. There is a distinction between philosophy and policy: a multicultural policy emerged out of a philosophy of multiculturalism. Furthermore, a philosophy of multiculturalism replaced the ‘new nationalism’ as the foundation of the national identities of both English‐speaking Canada and Australia. The abandonment of the White Canada and White Australia policies and the adoption of non‐discriminatory immigration policies in both countries were also of importance in the emergence of a policy of multiculturalism. There are many similarities in the Canadian and Australian experiences. However, the major differences are explained by the presence of the French‐Canadians in Canada and the early non‐British migration that Canada received in the late‐nineteenth century compared with Australia.     

The Palestine Question in the 1940s and the Emergence of the Arab Lobby in Canada

In the early 1940s, Arab lobbying activities started to be noticeable in Canada. In 1944 the Canadian Arab Friendship League was founded in Montreal by Muhammad Said Massoud, a Druze emigrant from Lebanon. The League soon became the spearhead of Arab lobbying activity in Canada. Its declared goal was to improve Canada's relations with the Arab world, yet in the second half of the 1940s its main focus of interest was to struggle against the partitioning of Palestine and the establishment of a Jewish state there.     

Exclusion through Inclusion: Female Asian migration in the making of Canada as a white settler nation

In this article I explore the ways in which concerns over nation, ‘race’, gender and sexuality shaped late nineteenth and early twentieth century debates on whether Canada should exclude or include female migrants from China, Japan and India in the emerging nation-state. In the late nineteenth century, Canadians began to debate whether to allow female migration from China, Japan and India. The vast majority of those who participated in the debate argued that female migrants from Asia should be excluded, as their exclusion would insure that male migrants from Asia would be rendered as temporary residents. On the other hand, there was a small but vocal minority who argued that female migrants from Asia should be allowed into Canada. As the presence of single male Asian residents raised the specter of inter-racial sexuality, these Canadians suggested that it would be prudent to include female migrants from Asia within the nation-state. These debates raise important questions for scholars who study the relationships between nation, ‘race’, gender and sexuality. First, they point once again to the importance of gender in constituting the racialized practices of the nation. Second, as most scholars have focused on the exclusionary aspects of nationalism, they complicate our understanding of race, gender and nation by illustrating that racialized politics of nation can lead to not only exclusionary but also inclusionary practices.     

From Normative Debates to Comparative Methodology: The Three Waves of Post-Charter Supreme Court Scholarship in Canada

This article surveys the literature on the Supreme Court of Canada following the 1982 introduction of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and argues it has taken place in three distinct “waves.” The first involved tentative, prospective, and normative arguments about the impact of the Charter on national unity and Canada’s political institutions. The second was characterized by the legitimacy debate, the dialogue debate, and qualitative examination of how other political actors responded to Supreme Court decisions. By contrast, the third wave, initiated by American scholars drawing from American research, has been less normative, more comparative, and methodologically rigorous. While this comparative shift has been beneficial, the retreat from normative questions contributes to a misplaced sense that important debates are now settled. We urge scholars to engage in intellectual cross-fertilization by drawing from third-wave contributions to address normative questions about the Supreme Court’s increasingly important role in Canadian politics.     

The Curious Case of the Vanishing Debate over Irish Home Rule: The Dominion of Canada,Irish Home Rule,and Canadian Historiography

In the 1880s, the British Empire was abuzz with debate over the Irish Home Rule Bills being discussed at that time in the Westminster Parliament. The Dominion of Canada was no exception and the Canadian House of Commons held no fewer than three debates on the concept of Irish Home Rule. Studying these debates provides a way to explore British identity beyond the British Isles. Although the nineteenth century attempts to implement Irish Home Rule were ultimately a failure, for almost half a century the concept was discussed throughout the Empire. This article takes an in-depth look at the Canadian parliamentary response to Irish Home Rule. In doing so, it argues that the debates reveal much about British identity in the Dominion, at least at the parliamentary level, and sheds light on conceptions of Britishness in the wider British world. It also suggests that these imperial debates represent an important stage in the development of Canadian history and deserve to take their place in Canadian historiography.     

Medical versus social work-places: constructing and compensating the personal support worker across health care settings in Ontario,Canada

This article explores the role of place in explaining variation in caregiver compensation. Using the labour category of Personal Support Worker (PSW) in Ontario, Canada, it contrasts wage rates across three health care settings: hospitals, long-term care facilities and private homes. An evaluation of current literature from disciplines spanning geography, gender studies, political science and sociology is combined with a critical analysis of policy documents and wage data to reveal that, despite holding similar qualifications and performing comparable job duties, hospital-based workers receive higher wages than home-based workers. I theorize that this wage disparity is partially attributable to the historical privileging of hospital settings in Canada, based on a medical-social continuum of health care valuation. Given that the hospital is constructed as a highly medical place, whereas the home is considered to be a social place, caregiving work enjoys greater financing protection in the former. I argue that these constructions stem from deeply gendered historical roots which view the marketplace as a male-dominated setting for productive waged labour, and the home as a female-dominated setting for unpaid social pursuits. Thus, when personal support services shift from public institutions into private homes, these activities become invisible to the state, and their provision beyond its purview. I conclude that the medical versus social nature of the duties performed by PSWs has become secondary to the medical versus social nature of the setting in which these activities take place. This has translated into lower wages for home-based PSWs, effectively resulting in wage discrimination.     

Landscapes of (neo-)liberal control: the transcarceral spaces of federally sentenced women in Canada

This article maps the racializing, classing and gendering cartographies of cross-spatial marginalization and social control experienced by women who were formerly federally incarcerated in Canada. By investigating women's criminalization, prison and post-prison experiences, this article traces practices of racialization, gendering and classing that underwrite liberal to neo-liberal forms of social control. Results from 68 interviews with women released from federal prisons in Canada show that women's criminalization cannot solely be traced to shifts from liberal to neo-liberal governance, but rather to the ways in which structures of oppression have influenced women's criminalization across liberal to neo-liberal rationalities. This analysis shows how liberal ‘welfarist’ ideas and ideals are embedded in neo-liberal reforms and provide the discursive platforms of an extended and widened network of social control of criminalized women beyond prison walls, across institutions, including a variety of (non-)government actors and the women themselves. This widened web of (neo-)liberal social control constitutes practices that have formed carceral spaces beyond prison walls and have perpetuated and exacerbated women's marginality after their release from federal prisons in Canada.     

Spaces of Governance: Gender and public sector restructuring in Canada

While the literature on economic restructuring tends to understand neoliberalism as a uniform governance ideology or economic-political reality, we suggest that it is more useful to understand neoliberalism as a loosely knit assemblage of programmatic efforts that consist of various political rationalities and practices of rule that aim to manage social conduct. The paper focuses on the various ways that these efforts are connected to complex state rescaling processes in Canada. Specifically, the first part of the paper examines the restructuring of nation-state responsibilities in social service and security provisions. It illustrates the shift toward a new citizenship regime that renders women as active agents who are responsible for solving problems in an individualized manner. The second part of the paper exemplifies how neoliberal programmatic efforts create new spaces of governance, particularly those of flexibility through non-standard work. The massive rescaling of the public sector, the decreasing demand for women's ‘traditional’ occupations, and the increasing prevalence of women in non-standard work arrangements constitute women as political-economic subjects in new ways. We analyze these processes using data drawn from in-depth interviews with personnel in the Canadian Federal Public Service. We outline some of the implications these initiatives have had on public service programmes and various public sector groups. Additionally, we provide a selection of individual accounts of public sector restructuring and gendered work by professionals and contract workers employed in the public service, and offer empirical illustrations of the contentions surrounding neoliberal restructuring initiatives.