political culture of canada

Political culture refers to a collection of views, values, and sentiments maintained by a polity that provide order and context to the political process that takes place within a society. According to Telford, political communities are built on philosophies. These philosophies reflect various perspectives on what it means to live a healthy life. Ideologies are not perfect and can evolve over time. It is possible for a democrat to become a communist in the context of a specific event. Scientists refer to these large political differences in a nation as cleavages. In his publication, In Search of Canadian Political Culture, Nelson Wiseman ignores all available routes to finding the political culture and turns to his own understanding of the political culture in Canada. His thesis is that the search for political culture in Canada has unhelpfully focused on the national scene when the realities of the political culture are found at the regional/provincial level. He argues further to say that the existing provincial studies lack a comparative dimension. The regions and provinces have been treated largely as unique small worlds unto themselves. His argument thesis is that Canada has five separate political cultures - Atlantic Canada, Quebec, Ontario, the ‘‘Midwest’’ (Manitoba and Saskatchewan) and the ‘‘Far West’’ (Alberta and British Columbia) (Nelson Wiseman, 2007) . The North (Yukon, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories), home of the Aboriginal people in Canada is not culturally unique and is therefore not treated separately. The separate chapters on each of these five regions are detailed analyses of cultural specificity and difference, majorly informed by the history of immigrants coming to Canada from different cultures and countries at different times.

Although Wiseman (2007) directly challenges some of the major contributions that champion the study of the Canadian Political culture, his argument well aligns with Telford’s in terms of the geographical division of the different political cultures. Telford states in Rules of the Game that Ontario and Quebec make up about two thirds of the country, which therefore goes to show that these two provinces to a large extent determine the political culture of Canada. Atlantic Canada is more numerically disadvantaged than the west but its political culture is relatively consistent with the Canadian norms. There is a similarity in how they’ve both described the Canadian cultures. Still, I concur with Wiseman’s sentiments. Wiseman (2007) provides insight on the distinct immigrant waves that came to be the present Canada within broad times. This adds to the knowledge I have information about the France immigrants in 1760 who brought to Quebec and Acadia a quasi-feudal conservative orientation and also about the world war two immigrants from Asia, Southern Europe, the Caribbean and Latin America for who support for individual equality rights was the main orientation. Wiseman (2007), also offers four approaches for analyzing political culture which are; probing history, surveying values, examining constitutions and institutions, and exploring political socialization.

Lastly, I would recommend Wiseman’s book to every student that would like to acquire a deeper understanding of matters that concern real Canadian political culture. There is a lot of truth and insight offered therein that has been researched for a long time. His analysis is based on the Canadian history and on a more personal level, he views bringing history and political science together as one of his tasks. Wiseman’s book leaves us with questions. It triggers thought about the Canadian political culture which is an interesting concept of giving you knowledge and something to think about too.



References

Nelson Wiseman. (2007). In Search of Canadian Political Culture. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.