Electoral Cooperation (or, the NDP and the Liberals Part Two)

A blog or two ago I suggested that electoral mergers are not flags of convenience. They occur for specific historic reasons that involve more than people in opposition saying "hey, let's get together to win an election." Instead, they occur because the differences that organized people into different political perspectives are no longer relevant, because people come together for a new reason (say, as did Harper and his crew to fundamentally alter Canada).  There may be other reasons but my point is that we need to treat politics seriously. We can't see it just as bunch of win-the-election by hook or by crook; the one is the same as the other Ottawa soap opera. (Spin doctoring is important for politics, to be sure, but spin doctoring is part of how an historic bloc functions and has changed over time.)

The possibility of an NDP/Liberal merger or electoral coalition, I suggested, might be one of those "time is right" ideas not in the sense that it would ensure defeat of the Conservatives. It wouldn't. I won't predict who will win the Stanley Cup next year; I'm not going to predict who will in an election in three years time! Instead, the time is right because of historic changes. There has been a great deal of talk about these historic changes and, frankly, my own view is that they are easy to overestimate. In all the talk about changes (communications, technology, education, jobs, media), we might think about the things that have remained the same. We might get an oddly long list.

Historic change, then, is not some vague type of thing ("everything changes"). Instead, it is specific set of changes in the organization of society, the place of Canada in the global capitalist order, gender relations, etc. The rise of the CPC is one element of this change. It represents the views of a particular set of ideologues (what Gramsci called "organic intellectuals") and a specific organization of society. It signals the rise to power of a specific historic bloc (a particular formation of social classes) that imagines Canada's future in a specific way and looks to use government to attain that imagined future. It involves the articulation of the aspirations of subject classes through a dominant class. I need to do more work on this to be even more specific but you get the point. The rise of the CPC both is and is not the historic change to which the NDP and the Liberals need to respond.  It is not an historic change in the sense that losing an election is not necessarily an historic change. The PCs lost a bunch of elections in the 1960s and 1970s (1963, 1965, 1968, 1972, 1974, 1980); the NDP lost even more if you add in 1979 (won by Clark's minority PC gov.). These defeats were not historic because the structure and nature of Canadian politics did not change as a result of these defeats. Being on the losing side in an election might demonstrate, for instance, a balance of forces in a particular historic bloc.

On the other hand, some electoral defeats (which, of course, are wins for others) do signal changes. The 1921 election of King's Liberals signaled a wider shift in the nature of Canadian liberalism and Canada, for instance.  

The Harper electoral victories, on the other hand, can be an historic change if they represent the development of a new historic bloc; that they signal a transition in the organization of Canadian society (both domestically and in terms of how Canada relates to the world). I have been suggesting that this is precisely the case. Mulroney's 1984 victory was of "historic proportions" but did not really change the character and nature of Canada. Indeed, his efforts to do so by and large failed in the face of opposition from Canadians who were willing to "turf out" the Liberals but who remained committed, with lot of caveats here, to liberal ideas. In effect, in 1984, Canadians tried to opt for liberalism without the Liberals. Mulroney's failure was that he misunderstood this and, wrongly, believed that his victory meant that Canadians were turning their back on Trudeauvian liberalism. They weren't. They turned their backs on the Liberal Party, but not the ideas and image of the country it inspired.

Harper's victories can be seen as something else. I don't think Canadians have ditched the ideals of liberalism but I do think that Harper and his crew are setting out, in a more thorough and careful way, to alter the fundamental conception of the country. Unlike Mulroney, Harper seemed to understand that he did not have a mandate to change Canada and that part of his job, as a Conservative, was to lead Canada in a new direction though without actually saying that was what he was doing. He understood, in other words, that there is a difference between wanting to change things and having a mandate to change things. You can change things, if you don't have a mandate, but it requires a different type of politics. This is what Harper is up to.

If this is the case, the Liberals and NDP face a number of possible options for the future. If they are facing an historic change, they may indeed want to reconsider the character and nature of their parties. If they are facing an historic change, their task in opposition, is to articulate a vision of Canada that can serve as a realistic option to Harper's conservatism. This might require a new party. Indeed, I'd be so bold as to suggest it will. But, if Harper's victories do not represent the development of a new era, as it were, in Canadian public life, then something less than a merger will work. Indeed, branding alone might be a good reason to maintain different parties. The Liberals, for instance, retain regional bases of strength (anglophone Quebec, middle class Ontario, parts of Newfoundland) that might not go for a new party. In this case, an electoral coalition of sorts that would allow each party to win seats without having to devote resources to competing with the other - useful in the face of the Tory war chest - would certainly have an appeal.

So … to conclude: losing an election is something that requires analysis. For neither the NDP, Liberals, nor the old PCs or Reform, is an election loss a reason to "jump ship." One needs to carefully analyse what is going on with that loss, why it occurred, etc. before one decides on a response to it. Abandoning an ideology one holds dear (say, liberalism or socialism or conservatism) is not easy. Precisely because it is not easy, no party can assume that its followers will, in fact, follow it into a new political party. We know that a lot of PCs did not follow their leaders. Losing an election might indicate simply that one lost an election. This happens in a democracy. It might, however, mean something else. I will bet we will only see a merger if members of the NDP and Liberals have decided that their loss in the last election means something else.

Liberals, NDP and the Polls

Would joint Liberal/NDP candidates defeat the federal Conservatives if an election were held today? Or, more pointedly and more importantly, in three or four years time? This is the question pundits are now asking. The long and the short of it is that we don't know. Comparisons with the earlier CA/PC merger suggest not while raw numbers suggest that, in fact, they would. According to the Globe's reporting of an Angus Reid poll close to 50% of Canadians who are decided voters and likely to vote, would vote for an NDP/Liberal joint candidate if they had the option while the Globe is right to point out that the PC/CA merger into the Conservatives Party of Canada did not bring with it everyone who had voted PC or CA. In other words, the total CPC vote was less than the two parties received separately in the previous election. Two plus two, in other words, ended up not equally four.

This is an interesting academic puzzle and makes some fun as a discussion point. It is likely, however, no more than that because it treats political parties and ideologies in too broad and vague a way. I've complained about this before but I'll say it again: political parties are not like clothes that one puts on because on happens to like their look. There were significant ideological differences between the PCs and the CA; that is why they were two separate parties. They were not distinct political entities because their leaders disliked each other or because one or the other set of insiders clung to the nattered belief that they could win without the other. They were different and distinct from each other because they were different from each other. Their hard core supporters believed different things, thought about Canada in different ways, self-identified differently, and had different political heritages.

This is the problem with reporting political ideologies in broad strokes "centre-left" or "centre-right." It fails to capture the nuances of different ideological perspectives and different conceptions of the future of Canada, indeed, even different conceptions of Canada's past. To those who are outside of a particular ideology (or, political perspective), the views of others look like variations on a theme. If one is not particularly well informed about politics, then they differences can look very much less like differences. After all … right wing parties believe right wing party like things … do they not? If you want to understand the difference between the CA and the PCs read Bercusson and Cooper, Deconfederation and compare it to Grant's Lament for a Nation.  

These are dramatically different ways of thinking about Canada and its future, the nature of the economy, the place of morality in politics, the role of the state. This is what makes Harper's ability to forge an alliance between the PCs and the CA an event of historic importance. He did not bring together like minded people. Any dimwit can do that. He brought together people who saw eye-to-eye on some things but not on others. He built, in other words, a new historic bloc that was neither CA nor PC. He drew on provincial conservative parties and ideologues. In the process, he lost some PCs (Danny Williams anyone) but attracted others (Bernard Lord). He marginalized some old Reformers but drew in others and brought in new people who were neither Reform, CA, or PC. He did not just simply ask for compromise (in the manner of Mulroney) but -- along with many others -- forged a new political movement whose goal was to do more than win an election, whose goal was to refashion Canada (drawing heavily on the Republican election handbook in the process).

The NDP/Lliberals face the same types of issues. The truth of the matter is that the NDP and the Liberals are not and should not be the same political party. They are different because one (the NDP) is a socialist political party that, theoretically at least, aims -- like the CPC -- to build a different type of country. The other (Liberals) are civic nationalists who, in fact, built the country Harper and his crew are trying to dismantle. Civic nationalists have had a significant influence on Canadian socialists (and, oddly, on Conservatives as well) but they hold different views (civic nationalists are, for instance, capitalists who look askance at ethno-linguistic nationalists). Socialists, theoretically at least, want to replace capitalism with something else and are willing to discuss the merits of ethno-linguistic nationalism if it represents an oppressed people.

What pushed the CA and PCs together was like mindedness. Indeed, as the numbers show, a lot of PCs stayed away from the new CPC (a number joining the Liberals and some dropping out of politics all together). Instead, what contributed to the merger and its eventual success were two things. First, the spectre of electoral destruction. It is hard to remember this but the pre-sponsorship scandal Liberals looked like they were poised (under Martin) for a victory of historic (Mulroneyesque) proportions. the PCs, in particular, were faced the possibility of being finally wiped out. The CA was going to be rolled back to a rural rump with extremist views. It was only in the face of this type of massive defeat that merger was seriously considered, that the PCs and the CA were willing to put some water with their wine and modify their ideological positions. Second, times changed. The PCs no longer represented what we can think of as a broad ideology. Toryism had long been in opposition in Canada but it represented the views of a significant minority of Canadians, perhaps 25% perhaps 30%. By the early 2000s, this was no longer the case. The number of committed Tories -- people committed to Toryism as a way of seeing the country -- had shrunk to perhaps 10-15%. And, new ideological perspectives (neo-conservatism) that had only a loose connection to Toryism had popped up.

For the Liberals and the NDP, the question is do these same circumstances apply. One reason that I'd suggest that a Liberal/NDP merger might be successful is that the ideological perspectives represented by each of these parties have changed. Their opposition to Harperesque neo-conservatism does not make them mirror reflections of each other (the centre-left is a big, big, big political space occupied by the Greens and the Bloc as well). But, the old battles of Trudeauvian liberalism are no longer battles and Canadian socialism, as I've pointed out before, is not really socialism. It's sort of a vague progressive reformism. What this means is that there is an opening for some type of electoral cooperation in the sense that what divided the parties in the past has been, in part, overcome by history. We have, right now, a civic nationalist Liberal Party led (comfortably it seems) by a former socialist and socialist NDP led (perhaps slightly less comfortably) by a former Liberal civic nationalist. Both are pragmatists (unlike, say, Trudeau and Broadbent or Pearson and Douglas) who are committed to the Canada that Trudeau and company built (multiculturalism, bilingualism, charter rights, regional equalization, autonomy in foreign affairs) with some twists and turns. Moreover, the Liberals face the same question the PCs faced a decade ago: is our ideological perspective relevant any longer in the sense that Canadians are willing to commit themselves to it. I don't know for sure, but my guess is that the number of true believers is considerably less than it was. For most people civic nationalism is the background of Canada; the goal. Hence … a merger of some sort just might work.

Conservatism: A New Historic Bloc

Conservatism: A New Historic Bloc?

A couple of entries ago, I tried to argue that we needed to treat the victory of the Conservative Party seriously. I recognize that a lot of people do. For a fair number of Canadians, the Conservatives are a threat to their vision of the country. They seem to want to cow tow to the US with a  "please sir, may I have another" approach. Key Conservatives have made some pretty questionable statements that leads one to believe they don't have much use for equality (whether on the basis of gender, sexual orientation or ethnicity), and are skeptical that there is any need to do anything about environmental change. Add to this an odd fascination with the military that amounts to inventing history (as opposed to studying it or understanding it) and, for a lot of people, you have good reason to be concerned about the bunch in power in Ottawa right now.

What I am trying to do in these blogs (this one and a previous entry) is not to recite these concerns but to treat conservatism seriously on another ground.  There strike me as a couple of ways to look at Canada's now five year old Conservative federal government: as a much of malcontents who slipped into office by bamboozling Canadians and political context (the internal war in the Liberal party, for example, and ineffective opposition leadership). Or, as representative of something else: a new "historic bloc." An historic bloc is a particular alliance of social and economic forces that is relatively stable over a longer period of time. It can be a governing bloc (as I argued were the Liberals federally for some time in the 20th century) or an opposition bloc (as Ian McKay argues in his works on the history of socialism).  In a previous blob on this subject, I tried to suggest the outlines of those particular alliances as they applied to both 20th century Liberals and 21st century Conservatives.

Another key to an historic bloc is that it is not interested simply in holding onto power. This is one of the things I would argue differentiates Conservatives at the federal level in Canada from at least some provincial Progressive Conservative parties. The PCs in New Brunswick, where I live, want to remain in government but they are not very ideological. Indeed, what separates their actual policies (as opposed to their discourse) from Liberals is often not at all clear.  Political parties are looking to maintain power for a variety of reasons. The forces in an historic bloc are looking to maintain power to use it: their goal is not simply to stay in government so they can direct policy but refashion the country. The Liberals under Pierre Trudeau are a case in point.

How does an historic bloc refashion the country? The Liberals did so in a number of ways. First, we need to recognize that they cannot do it by force of will. Refashioning a country requires leadership but it is not a so-called "great leader" pushing the rest of us forward in history. Instead, historic bloc's refashion society through politics and education. In democratic societies (that is, societies that have some level of popular representation of which governing parties must take some account), the state cannot simply impose its will on society. Hence: politics and education. The ruling party will attempt to lead society in a different direction through suasion, leadership, good old fashion politicking ("our opponents are idiots who will destroy civilization as we know it"), and educational programmes that teach people the merits of particular political perspectives. The implementation of a new system of values associated with a new historic bloc is not easy.  It involves compromises and negotiations. To be sure, the state will use a coercive apparatus. The Harper government simply declared Canada's commitments to Kyoto at an end; they simply cut funding for groups of people whom they considered "troublemakers" (artists and French-speaking Canadians living outside Quebec). The blunt force of the state "here are the changes, we will not discuss them" is used. Most of the time, however, and for a variety of reasons, an historic bloc needs to "take what it can."

What this means is that historic blocs are constructive thing: they look to build as opposed to simply impose or tear down. The Conservatives, in other words, were never looking simply to "get rid of the welfare state" (indeed, they had and have big plans for it) or turn back the clock on gay rights. Instead, they are looking to build a new order. The question, then, is what might that order entail. And, our first conclusion is this: it will be established by fiat only at the margins, where the historic bloc thinks it can "get away" with the blunt use of the state. Our second conclusion is that it will involve an educational and political process that looks to push Canadians toward a different value structure. And, our third conclusion is that a Conservative historic bloc will negotiate. It will do so from a position of power but it will negotiate because it has to. It will have to compromise and accept things that it does not like. For instance, core supporters of Conservatism will need to put some water with their wine and accept the equality of gay people. That is an advance of the previous historic bloc that cannot be undone. They have to accept women in the paid workforce; they have to accept some role for the welfare state in society (it is pretty clear for instance, that key Conservative constituents don't like socialized medicine). In short, they will not be able to get everything they want. To accomplish some things … they will have to give on others. To challenge equality, for example, in some sort of head-on fashion means losing an election, something the Conservatives will not do.

The development of a new historic bloc is, then, complicated business. If the Conservatives can stabilize it, however, there is a payoff: long-term political success. This will not remove the need for politics (for electioneering and whatnot) but it will keep the Tories in a position of power. What is at stake then when I suggested we treat Conservatism seriously is something more then arts funding or equality. What is at stake is a new historic bloc. Both those who oppose and those who support c/Conservatism should bear this in mind.