The Liberal Party of Canada—colonial
Canada’s earliest champion of American-style direct democracy—now seems to
take its inspiration from Europe’s more layered approach to politics.
Its parliamentary leadership
accepts First Nation’s Chief Theresa Spence’s demand that the British Crown be
represented at First Nation negotiations with Canada’s Federal Government. And Liberal leadership candidates say they
would scrap Canada’s First Past the Post electoral system—a system that favors
big-tent national parties over protest parties, and often elects majority Prime
Ministers, as the US system elects Presidents.
Smart people like the
British, and Canadians too, can manage with today’s mixed monarchic,
theocratic, and democratic system. Surrounded by danger, smart people like the
Israelis can survive using a Proportional Election system that favors small
parties and, consequently, puts a dozen party bosses in charge of hammering out—after national elections—the
leadership, orientation, and priorities of the Israeli Government.
According to past liberal
principles and instincts, however, both of those models are second best. The
monarchal model confuses people and thereby makes it more difficult to figure
out who’s accountable and how to vote for effective change. Multi-party systems
make it easier to be a politician, but it's next to impossible for voters to decide
directly who should be in charge and whose vision should hold sway.
The direct election of political
heads of state does make cautious people nervous. The US presidential system
and the quasi-presidential Canadian party system can accommodate intemperate
swings in the popular mood. That’s why 18th-century liberals favored
a written bill of rights, federalism, and executive and legislative checks.
Their conservative counterparts in Britain and Canada successfully preserved an
un-elected Upper House and celebrate the magic (confusion) that goes with a
hereditary, constitutional monarchy.
The First Past the Post
system, along with the national election of the President, has been hard on new and
uncompromising interests that want to speak for themselves. However, as instruments
of direct democracy, they have made it possible for Americans to elect working
majorities and influence national choices.
It’s passing strange that
after all America has accomplished in the last century, after witnessing the
success of Barack Obama in winning two liberal national mandates, that Canadian
liberalism’s republican and pan-Canadian ambitions are now so feeble.
Surely, the key to inspire
interest in progressive politics and to solve problems like the woeful state of
First Nation communities in Canada is to champion an electoral system that can
actually mobilize the will of the people. This year, the President’s Inaugural
Address took less than twenty minutes. However, tens of millions in every state paid
attention, and over half the people could claim a piece of its authorship.
The First Past the Post
system now favors the center-right in Canada because they are united. It would
continue to work for Canadian democracy and, again, for the center-left, if
they united too.
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