Continuity and Change in Canadian Politics: Essays in Honour of David E. Smith (review)

A festschrift in honour of the distinguished political scientist David E. Smith, this collection of ten essays was designed ‘to reflect David Smith’s scholarly interests concerning Canadian federalism, political institutions, and the West.’ To respond to this mandate, the collection’s contributors, composed of his professional colleagues and former students, employ both analysis and advocacy.

In the opening article Peter Russell contrasts the failure of ‘mega’ efforts to achieve constitutional change, such as the Meech Lake and Charlottetown Accord, with the success of recent, more pragmatic, traditional, organic evolution ‘à la Burke,’ reminding us of our constitution’s flexibility, its statutory, judicial, and customary capacity to adapt to our political needs. A good example of this approach is decentralization of the public service, which Donald Savoie argues would make it an effective instrument of regional interests, not merely in the delivery of federal programs but by assuming an active policy advisory role.

Perhaps the most engaging part of Thomas Courchene’s two-part article are his suggestions on how Canada might retain and enhance its east/west social and political axis while accepting the loss of its economic sovereignty. Less convincing is his confident advocacy of greater north/ south economic integration; in the wake of the current Wall Street debacle, the erasure of economic borders may not be so attractive, prudent, or inevitable.

Roger Gibbon’s contribution, too, seems to have been overtaken by events and unforeseen contingencies. Written before the former president of the National Citizen’s Coalition became prime minister, Gibbon’s complaint that the West’s failure to exercise influence (read ‘implement the Reform agenda’), which he contrasts with Quebec’s ‘undue’ influence, seems more than somewhat dated. It also reminds us of the dangers of analysis through the looking glass. Scarcely a generation or so ago when a centre/left analysis was in vogue, the West was hailed as the model of reform, social change, cooperation, the kindergarten of progressive farm, labour, and political action, the pioneer of female suffrage, the epicentre of the social gospel, the birthplace of the United Church, medicare, etc.; in other words, far from the ‘margins of national consciousness and purpose.’ In the words of Frank Underhill, what the Winnipeg Free Press said today, the West thought tomorrow, and the better part of Canada would think some time later!

More helpful is Grace Skogstad’s article reminding us of Western cleavages, and more particularly the complexities of devising policies that respond to the diverse needs of Western agriculture, the Crow’s Nest Pass freight rates and the Wheat Board being the most obvious examples. In examining the Liberal Party’s ‘insensitivity’ to Western needs, however, it is scarcely fair to charge them with responsibility for the creation of the Wheat Board in 1919: after all, they were not in government at the time, but reduced to a severely mauled opposition!

Certain themes unite the collection, despite the book’s broad mandate. Perhaps its most pervasive topic is the changing nature of federalism, be it cooperative, executive, collaborative, instrumental, or unilateral. Unilateral federalism, the federal government’s most recent version, is in Brooke Jeffrey’s view a means of bypassing provincial governments and delivering programs, such as the Millennium Scholarships and the Canadian Foundation for Innovation, directly to the people. Eric Monpetit’s article on the federal government’s declining legitimacy argues for a return to executive federalism, a federalist approach that did ‘not deserve to be abandoned’ since it was a more convenient means of meeting the community’s claims for ‘goods and services.’ More problematic were the federal government’s attempts to shape the community’s sense of belonging and citizenship, as Joseph Garcea points out in his article on successive federal efforts to redefine Canadian citizenship. On the other hand, Greg Poelzer and Ken Coates’s article on the role of the Crown and Native peoples suggests the...