Canada faces problems of national identity, regionalism and legislative ineptitude

Henry Srebrnik, [Charlottetown, PEI] Guardian

What kind of country will the new Liberal government take charge of when Paul Martin replaces Jean Chretien? Despite all the happy talk at the recent Liberal convention, Canada remains a country with deep fissures and, Liberal propaganda notwithstanding, one that is increasingly unsure about its very identity.

Whereas the old Dominion of Canada's self-definition once rested - - for better or worse -- on the founding union of two ethno- religious groups, British Protestants and French Catholics, the only collectivities we now constitutionally acknowledge as organic entities are the native First Nations and Metis people. Everyone else falls under a vague umbrella of multicultural diversity and individual rights.

The federation we call Canada has become so all-encompassing that it is now little more than a geographical place, a land mass with sovereignty.

Little wonder that for many, Canada is little more than a 'hotel', its citizenship a passport of convenience.

If you wish to contrast Canada with a traditional nation, consider this: Imagine that the 40 million or so Polish-speaking, overwhelmingly Catholic Poles, who have lived in Poland for some 1,000 years, were all removed from their country and replaced by an equivalent number of, say, Italians, Russians, Thais or Turks. Would the country still be 'Poland'? Not in any genuine sense.

But if all 30 million non-aboriginal Canadians, whatever their language, religion, skin colour or historical origin, were removed, and replaced by a random cross-section of 30 million people from anywhere and everywhere in the world, and were these people then given citizenship, this would, certainly outside Quebec, still be 'Canada'. After all, we are the world, we contain all of humanity.

Maybe this helps explain why, of the 20 most-watched TV programs in English-speaking Canada, the only domestically-produced one, according to University of Calgary professor of communications Bart Beaty, is 'Hockey Night in Canada'. Many a citizen lives in a psychological space that has little to do with the country.

In French Canada, by contrast, the top 20 are all Quebecois shows. Even non-separatist francophones in that province typically consider Quebec their primary source of collective identity and focus on their government in Quebec City when they think of politics.

In that sense, the francophones of Quebec, especially those whose ancestry dates back to the colonization of New France, still fulfil a common-sense definition of nationality: if they all left Quebec, that province would no longer be what it is today.

So we face an asymmetrical situation: French Canadians revolve around Quebec as their 'nation', whereas in the rest of Canada, in what we used to call 'English' Canada, nationhood as such has become a nebulous concept.

Maybe identity has devolved even in the rest of the country. After all, many people identify more strongly with their province -- this is certainly the case in Atlantic jurisdictions such as Newfoundland and perhaps P.E.I.

Thus we have the problem of alienation in the regions outside central Canada. The country under Liberal rule is governed like an old-fashioned household: The father and mother (Ontario and Quebec) run the home and determine how to spend the income. The other provinces and territories are the children.

If they are unemployed or in low-paying jobs (say, New Brunswick or Manitoba), then mommy and daddy support them, on condition they do what they're told. If they have a lucrative occupation or profitable business (Alberta, of course, and, in the past, British Columbia), then it's their duty to bring home their earnings and hand them over to the parents, who know best how to allocate the money -- including doling out allowances to the other kids.

Given this situation, it is perhaps not surprising that on the federal level our Liberal-dominated political class in Ottawa has become more autonomous and detached from popular will. And the preeminent role now reserved for the courts under the Charter of Rights has enabled the judicial branch to move into this political vacuum.

'The Most Dangerous Branch: How the Supreme Court of Canada has Undermined Our Law and Our Democracy', a new book by Robert Ivan Martin, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Western Ontario, asserts that our highest court is weakening our constitutional democracy.

The justices, he argues, have begun to impose their own personal preferences in setting the country's social agenda. This constitutes an abnegation of popular sovereignty, as elected officials are meant to set social policy.

But what if this task has in effect been foisted on the courts, given the reluctance of a 'big tent' party like the Liberals to propose controversial or unpopular measures that may undermine their ability to retain power? Perhaps the courts are unfairly taking the heat when the fault really lies with our increasingly timid and inept parliamentarians.

The Chretien era has been one of stagnation, with a government capable of doing little more than protecting the privileges of its constituents and supporters, in the party and among allied interest groups -- including those business leaders dependent on government subsidies or other favors.

'Crony capitalism' has long been a feature of Canadian life and many an entrepreneur -- an incoming prime minister comes to mind -- has benefitted from favorable government legislation and sweetheart deals.

One-party dominance without alternation of power leads to stagnation and corruption in political institutions. Yet the psychological mind-set that condones this dysfunctional system seems deeply rooted among large numbers of Canadians, to the benefit of the 'natural governing party'.

Will a new conservative party of the right be able to best such an entrenched political machine? Are the Liberals vulnerable going into a spring election? We will find out soon enough.

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