1. UBC POLI 101 Canadian Politics
The Development of Canada
What is the Canadian Political Community?

2. Change in marking scheme:
Logistics
Change in marking scheme:
NO FIRST PAPER!!!!!
5% to tutorial participation; 5% to the final paper
Tutorial now 15%; paper now 25%
Next week, go to your discussion section
Readings will be one week behind the course schedule
So… next week discussion will be on 1.1 & 1.2

3. Context: Size, Population, Geography
Canada is BIG: but why does it matter?
Diverse regional communities with regional attachments
Understanding of other regions limited by distance
Economy is regionalized so policy has regional effects
Canada is small: but why does it matter?
USA next door, 10X our population
Only ½% of world pop. (1 in 200 people are Canadian!)
Much ‘uninhabited’ land, controversy over use
Canada is medium-sized: but why does it matter?
Some economies of scale, but not as much as USA
Economy – price-takers and trade-takers  dependency
Foreign policy – we have to ‘fit in’, play ‘honest broker’
Immigration – obligation(?) to accept immigration?

5. Indigenous Peoples, European Settlement
All this is necessary because history matters – path dependence  history sets context for present.
Before European contact, over 50 distinct cultures/languages with well-defined territory. The result of gradual movement from Asia between 20,000 and 1,500 years ago.
Early contact was genuinely between nations, but European values denigrated indigenous, non-Christian cultures.
British Royal Proclamation (1763) recognized land rights
First French, then English settlement pushed westward. Displacement of aboriginal peoples became extensive in the early 1800s.
Massive depopulation, mainly disease: 500,000 to 140,000

6. Quebec Act (1774), Constitutional Act (1791), 4/5 Colonies
Quebec Act solidified the French presence in Canada – recognized civil law, Catholic church, signeurial landholding
But NO representative assembly, unlike other colonies
1791, two colonies: Upper & Lower Canada Representative Assemblies, but no power
NO RESPONSIBLE GOVERNMENT
Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and PEI separate colonies
Influx of Loyalists from American colonies
1837 rebellions against lack of responsible, popular gov’t
Lord Durham’s Report (1838):
Assimilation of French population
Re-unification of the Canadas – one assembly
Responsible government (came slowly – 1848)

7. Political Reasons: Union of Canadas = stalemate:
Confederation - Why
Economic Reasons: Britain cancelled preferential access and Americans cancelled reciprocity (free trade), so a need for an ‘intercolonial’ market and therefore an intercolonial railway
Political Reasons: Union of Canadas = stalemate:
Two parties: reformers and conservatives
Two groups: French and English (Lower & Upper)
Military Reasons:
Threat of US annexation after US civil war
Worry about western border (BC gold rush)
Britain didn’t have money to defend Canada

8. British North America (BNA) Act (1867)
Confederation - What
British North America (BNA) Act (1867)
Canada West (Ont.), Canada East (Quebec), Nova Scotia, New Brunswick (PEI & NF rejected it)
Defined governmental structures:
Federal arrangement: national & provincial gov’ts
House of Commons & Senate
Judicial system (courts)
“Peace, Order, and Good Government” (POGG)
“with a Constitution similar in principle to that of the United Kingdom”
Elections and qualifications of citizenship
Powers of taxation

9. How different was it? 1800, 1900, and NOW
Think of a political difference, why it was different, and what that meant for people’s lives.
Example: patronage
1800 – very little government activity – all patronage
A lot of uncertainty in economic affairs (property rights?)
Application of law depended on personalities and relationships
1900 – government doing more, large government projects, parties depend on patronage; but professionalizing civil service, freer press
Macroeconomy, employment depended on government
More stability. But more dangerous for people when things went sour, since there was no social safety net
Political participation / debate were linked to money and gov’t jobs
NOW?