Violence, Order, and Unrest: A History of British North America, 1749–1876 ed. by Elizabeth Mancke et al. (review)

It is hard to review a book of 21 essays dealing with over 150 years of Canadian history and organised around themes so general that they could include almost anything. In their introduction the editors take particular aim at the idea that Canada has historically been a 'peaceable kingdom'. They do, however, admit that neither 'interpersonal violence, particularly homicide' nor 'large-scale military conflicts ranging from revolutions to civil war' figure 'as prominently in Canadian history as they do in other countries'. They reach this conclusion by somewhat downplaying the importance 'of the Seven Years War, the American Revolution, and the Rebellions of 1837–8'–not to mention the prolonged clashes along the American–Canadian border from 1783 to the American Civil War (pp. 5–6). In fact, the focus of the book is on 'less insidious and less overt forms of violence that contributed to the consolidation of British rule in northern North America' (p. 487), with a particular emphasis upon 'the collective violence of riots, the legislated coercion of the state, and settler dispossession of Indigenous peoples' (p. 7). Some of the most interesting chapters are on this last theme. John Reid points out that although 'a narrow definition of collective violence in British North America might be used to apply a benign veneer to Indigenous dispossession, a broader view reveals a more sombre reality' of dispossession through demographic and environmental change (p. 123). E.A. Heaman shows that the colonial state failed to 'police and protect Indigenous land and rights to anything like accepted standards in areas settled by Europeans' (p. 151), while Thomas Peace examines 'the complex processes' through which settler colonialism established its hegemony over Indigenous peoples in central Canada (p. 193). These are sophisticated studies, as is Harvey Whitfield's examination of black slavery in the Maritimes. Unfortunately, some of the essays on riots and state coercion are somewhat less sophisticated, drawing mechanically upon Ian McKay's liberal-order framework, despite Jerry Bannister's warning that the 'liberal-turn' approach 'runs the risk of creating new orthodoxies that are just as stifling as the old ones' (p. 79). Several of the authors also fall back upon older, simplistic models of elite social control. Undeniably Dan Horner is correct to argue that local elites used the civil powers at their disposal to 'foster an orderly public culture' (p. 363) but is it not possible that many working-class people also had a 'diminishing tolerance' for popular violence and unrest' (p. 366)? Some of the essays are also less original than they claim, dressing up old interpretations in a pretentious new jargon. But there are some real gems here, such as D.C. Bélanger's study of 'Loyalty, Order, and Quebec's Catholic Hierarchy, 1763–1867', Jerry Bannister's 'Liberty, Loyalty, and Sentiment in Canada's Founding Debates', Ian Radforth's 'Boys, Young Men, and Disorder in Mid-Victorian Toronto' and Donald Fyson's detailed study of 'Executions in Quebec, 1759–1872'. In sum, this is a somewhat eclectic collection of essays but it brings together innovative research in a number of fields and is well worth reading.