1. 1 Lecture 15: Elites in the Canadian Political System SOSC 152

2. 2 Key Questions Class Background of Elites? Representation Versus Agglutination? Exit Pattern of Political Elites

3. 3 Class background of Elites 1.Porter's “Vertical Mosaic,” first major study. a. Economic Elite: looked at corporate elite of 1940-1960 critical role of upper class family ties, exclusive private schools, Anglo-Saxon ethnic background, Anglican religion, membership in exclusive clubs board of directors of 183 corporations--"internally cohesive and concentrated elite characterized by extensive interlocking directorate between corporations.“ The same people were on many corporations’ boards

4. 4 b. Political Elite: political and bureaucratic elite less exclusive social backgrounds, still middle and upper classes strong level of cooptation from other elites, Cabinet membership led to easy entry into corporate elite. labour elite as lowest social class Findings: high level of agglutination and class power NOT model of pluralist systems as political, corporate, and bureaucratic elites from same background and highly interdependent.

5. 5 2. Wallace Clements: a. strong movement between law and financial world for PM and Cabinet Ministers. in 1917, 70% of Cabinet ministers had business relations. 1965, 21/34 Cabinet ministers had corporate ties Liberal governments 1935-1957 -- 64% (37/58) had business ties. ties stronger if includes Crown Corporations, Royal Commissions, Senate, Advisory Boards

6. 6 b. Weakness of Political Elite political elite lacked institutional cohesion to make it a powerful counter-elite to business elite. Political elite highly penetrated very high turnover – in Clement’s study, 40% of politicians don't return for next election, today incumbency is higher hard for the citizens to develop influence over politicians, easier for business to influence politicians. Politicians more concerned about jobs after political career than insuring re-election

7. 7 3. Olsen Study: a. Significance of Education educational level of elites increases as one moves from municipal, to provincial to national elites. lawyers very important; from 1960-1980, businessmen replaced lawyers. experience of federal politicians at local political level decreasing.

8. 8 of 66 Cabinet ministers in 1961-1973: Local Experience of Federal Cabinet Ministers Porter (1940-60) Olsen (1961-73) Served in Municipal Government16%12% Experience in Provincial Legislature20%8% Most people spend political life working at only one level of government Why?

9. 9 Province as Autonomous Power Base Strengthening of province as autonomous power base, with rich resource base--people feel no need to move up to federal politics. trend likely to have increased in 1980s. bad news for regional and national integration: Reinforces regional ties Federal-Provincial Conferences became so important

10. 10 Law of Increasing Disproportion Before Trudeau era (1968-1984), French Canadians (and Catholics) underrepresented. percent of Francophones dropped from 36% in 1863 to 22% in 1918. in 1965, only 5% of senior government bureaucrats were Francophone, while French made up 25% of population. Jews kept out of corporate elite, banking, railroads. heavily anti-female bias in government bureaucracy: 1921 government regulation restricting hiring of married women, in effect until 1955. until a few years ago, women not allowed in certain clubs in Parliament

11. 11 Law of Increasing Disproportion— cont’d Why? Key role of education and graduation from a few key schools such as McGill, Laval, Queens, and University of Toronto. Background of Prime Ministers Table shows that the majority had law degrees: some had come up through the Civil Service, majority come from Ontario and Quebec, almost all men

12. 12 The Prime Ministers of Canada

13. 13 Exit Pattern of Political Elites how people retire from political office affects how they behave in office 1940-1973: 1/3 of Cabinet members received political appointment--judges, Senate, lieutenant governor, chair of regulatory board 1961-1973: 69 federal ministers left posts, 24 took "patronage post," 13 to business of whom 10 had come from business When Trudeau retired in 1984, he gave many political allies posts in the Senate.

14. 14 Exit Pattern of Political Elites – cont’d high degree of circulation from business elite into politics, back into business or direct movement from political elite to business. Result: very elite oriented decision making, not so open process for popular influence on decision makers low costs of losing elections: if people lose, go into business