Avalon

Atlantic Canadians don’t usually think about political ideology. With the collapse of our old ideological foes the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact our liberal democracy seems safe for the moment. However that does not mean we should take it for granted nor stop looking for ways to improve it. There is, in fact a new ideological foe; China, a new global power still dominated by one-party totalitarianism. China’s attitude towards our liberal democracy is clear. Recently Jia Qinglin, China’s fourth-most senior official, charged Communist Party members to strengthen their “ideological unity” and to support wholeheartedly the one-party state. “Build a line of defence to resist Western two-party and multiparty systems, bicameral legislature, the separation of powers and other kinds of erroneous ideological interferences,” Mr. Qinglin wrote in an essay published in the party’s main ideological journal, Qiushi (seek truth).

If there is such a thing as a rule of thumb in political analysis it is this; whatever ideologically driven totalitarian people or parties or states want should probably be resisted and anything they say is bad is probably a good thing.

So what would Mr. Qinglin say about us? Our multi-party system and federal bicameral system show “erroneous ideological interferences”. But then he would notice how ineffective the Senate is with all the power concentrated in Parliament. He would certainly approve of our lack of separation of powers and the concentration of almost all power into the hands of a few party leaders at the federal and provincial levels. This, he would say, ensures no “interferences” in governance, particularly from citizens.

Yes, Mr. Qinglin could be quite comfortable here.

“Every government degenerates … “ – Thomas Jefferson

Canadians are still waiting to see who will govern in Ottawa. Whether it is the lack of a leader for months at a time, inactive government, or a Prime Minister closing down the citizen’s legislature to avoid being removed from office Canada’s political system is a laughingstock. The previous installments in this series have examined the reasons for this; an electoral system that does not allow citizens a clear choice of who is to govern and a broken two party confidence system struggling with more than two parties. The result is too much power in the hands of the political elites allowing constant political manipulation of the citizen’s democratic will.

The prescription to this ill is clear. A reformed electoral system with the Prime Minister directly elected for a fixed term and the removal of the government from the legislature. This ensures our leadership is clearly selected by citizens and governments are not manipulated by the elites using the broken concept of confidence.

It is time to do the right thing.

“Every government degenerates … “ – Thomas Jefferson

It is the New Year yet we still do not have a federal government, either coalition or Conservative.

Canada derives its government traditionally from the largest faction in the Legislature. Under a two party system this could be argued to be somewhat reasonable; the people have decided after an election to select one of two parties to be pre-eminent, therefore they should have control of the government.

However as Canada no longer has just two parties how are we to decide ‘who’ will be the government in this particular case. Of course, ‘we’ the citizens do not decide, it is the partisan maneuvering that will decide and that’s a shame, not only is it undemocratic but the best choice may not be selected since the result will be a political choice and not necessarily a reasoned choice.

It is time the citizenry were able to select their government, that is democracy.