Father Figuring
Oct. 17th, 2004 04:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
morgan_dhuAs a Canadian, I have been watching the current American electoral process very closely, for reasons that should be obvious. As former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau once said, in speaking about the Canada-U.S. relationship, “Living next to you is in some ways like sleeping with an elephant. No matter how friendly and even-tempered the beast, one is affected by every twitch and grunt.” The elephant is doing a lot more than twitching and grunting these days, and no longer seems all that friendly and even-tempered, so it is, I believe, even more important for the mouse to pay close attention, not just to what the elephant is doing, but to anything that can shed some light on why the elephant is doing it.
In this context, I have lately been hearing a great deal about George Lakoff, a UC Berkeley professor of cognitive linguistics who has made a considerable study of the language of politics. He has been getting a fair amount of media time of late with his discussions of framing in political language. (For anyone who has missed this, here is an interview with Lakoff that discusses framing.)
Lakoff has also theorised that much political thought in the United States is influenced by the “Nation as Family” metaphor, in which both liberals and conservatives see the nation as a family, with the government as the parent and the citizens as children. One of the results of thinking about politics within this metaphorical framework is that personal and family values, goals and morality are mapped onto the policies and actions of the state.
Lakoff observes that, while both liberals and conservatives use this metaphor, they rely on two different models of the family, which he calls the strict father model and the nurturant parent model; therefore, the two main political constituencies in the U.S. see the nation as two very different kinds of families – which in turn means that they have different expectations of the policies and actions of their governments.
Well, the progressive worldview is modeled on a nurturant parent family. Briefly, it assumes that the world is basically good and can be made better and that one must work toward that. Children are born good; parents can make them better. Nurturing involves empathy, and the responsibility to take care of oneself and others for whom we are responsible. On a larger scale, specific policies follow, such as governmental protection in form of a social safety net and government regulation, universal education (to ensure competence, fairness), civil liberties and equal treatment (fairness and freedom), accountability (derived from trust), public service (from responsibility), open government (from open communication), and the promotion of an economy that benefits all and functions to promote these values, which are traditional progressive values in American politics.
The conservative worldview, the strict father model, assumes that the world is dangerous and difficult and that children are born bad and must be made good. The strict father is the moral authority who supports and defends the family, tells his wife what to do, and teaches his kids right from wrong. The only way to do that is through painful discipline — physical punishment that by adulthood will become internal discipline. The good people are the disciplined people. Once grown, the self-reliant, disciplined children are on their own. Those children who remain dependent (who were spoiled, overly willful, or recalcitrant) should be forced to undergo further discipline or be cut free with no support to face the discipline of the outside world.
So, project this onto the nation and you see that to the right wing, the good citizens are the disciplined ones — those who have already become wealthy or at least self-reliant — and those who are on the way. Social programs, meanwhile, "spoil" people by giving them things they haven't earned and keeping them dependent. The government is there only to protect the nation, maintain order, administer justice (punishment), and to provide for the promotion and orderly conduct of business. In this way, disciplined people become self-reliant. Wealth is a measure of discipline. Taxes beyond the minimum needed for such government take away from the good, disciplined people rewards that they have earned and spend it on those who have not earned it.
Full article here.
This leads me to the recently published book Fire and Ice: The United States, Canada and the Myth of Converging Values. by Michael Adams.
This book was written by the founder of the Canadian public opinion polling firm I work for, and is based on research we and our research partners in other countries have been conducting for more than a decade into the predominant social values in a number of countries, including Canada and the United States. I’m not shilling the book here, I honestly think the research is of some importance to an understanding of a number of social trends in both Canada and the U.S.
Adams argues, based on more than a decade of research into social values in the United States, that there is a growing trend towards an acceptance of both traditional patriarchal authority and hierarchical social structures in the United States today.
One of the most striking items we have been tracking during the past decade addresses Americans’ orientation to traditional patriarchal authority. In 1992, 1996 and 2000, we asked Americans to strongly agree, somewhat agree, somewhat disagree or strongly disagree with the statement, “The father of the family must be master in his own house.”
In 1992, 42 percent of Americans agreed (either strongly or somewhat) with this statement. The number seemed high at the time (1992 wasn’t so very long ago), but we hadn’t, as they say, seen nothing yet. Support for the Father-knows-best credo was actually on the rise. In 1996, 44 percent of respondents agreed with the statement, and in 2000, a full 49 percent of our sample – almost half the population – agreed that Dad should be boss; this is in spite of the frontal assault on patriarchal authority waged by Homer Simpson and Bill Clinton during the 1990s.
This growing acceptance of traditional patriarchal authority is truly remarkable – and seriously divergent with the patterns in other advanced industrial nations. But it is not only patriarchal authority that is enjoying increased acceptance among many Americans. When we asked Americans in 1996 whether it was better for one leader to make decisions in a group or whether leadership should be more fluid, 31 percent agreed with the more hierarchical position that a single leader should call the shots. In 2000, the proportion agreeing with the hierarchical model had shot up seven points to 38 percent. These Americans were becoming more and more willing to fall in line and do what the boss tells them to do, and this was before their president and commander-in-chief began to rally them for a post-9/11 war on terrorism.
Here, then, is the link between Lakoff and Adams – Lakoff suggests that conservatives in America see the nation/family in terms of a strict father who disciplines his citizen/children into his model of self-reliant individualism, and punishes those who fail to achieve this goal, and Adams presents evidence supporting the view that an increasing number of Americans find the “strict father” family model to be comfortable – and perhaps even comforting. I do not argue a causal link here – it is impossible to say, given the available data, if the observed increase in the acceptance of patriarchy and hierarchy is supporting a move toward the political right in America, or is merely documenting shifts in social values resulting from an overall trend to the right that is also reflected in political ideology and policy.
However, if both the theory and the research do in fact reflect the reality of American politics and society, then the current rightist administration under Bush may not be an aberration, but a real reflection of where American society, and the United States as a sovereign entity, is headed. And if this is so, then it may also suggest that those in the U.S. seeking to counter this trend may need to focus on not only on political action, but also on social movements such as the feminist movement to influence the values that may well be feeding the march to the right.
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no subject
Date: 2004-10-17 02:40 pm (UTC)This can be interpreted as both a call to action and a call to stop activist work to placate the right. Can you clarify and, if you think action is important, what do you suggest? What about the backlash against feminists that enables people to blame the "erosion of values" on elusive women's rights? I'm concerned that feminism itself, however misunderstood, becomes the tool and fuel of the right under some circumstances.
One point about Lakoff is that he has a pretty homogeneous model of the family upon which to base his political ideas. You've got another binary of authoritarian/nurturing parenting styles that could bear a reality check. I personally think that social movements that advocate choices among the broad range of parenting/family structures that exist (absent, single, nuclear, extended, intentional, etc.) would be a place to motivate change in public consciousness and take us beyond that dichtomy into some real choices. I also think that valuing parenting as a fulltime job with salary and benefits would raise parenting style consciousness.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-17 04:18 pm (UTC)I don't presume to voice a call to action to Americans - as much as I worry deeply about the effects that political events in the U.S. have on the rest of the world, it's up to Americans to decide what kind of government they want. That said, in any situation, I would never suggest placating the right, and particularly the kind of right that seems to be taking hold in the U.S. - one that is not just capitalist and imperialist (as if that isn't enough, but also destructive of human rights and freedoms - religious, sexual, reproductive, political, civil and just about any other category I can think of.
If there is a link of any kind between the upsurge of patriarchal and authoritarian values in American society, and the dominance of right-wing ideology in American politics, then it seems to me that if one wants to reverse the right-wing political trend - and I would be delighted to see this happen - then action is required not only within the political arena, but also in ways that challenge patriarchal and hierarchical systems and values wherever they are found in society.
By suggesting that (given that there is something to Lakoff's views and that there is in fact a link between patriarchal values and right-wing politics) American left-wing political activists might need "to influence the values that may well be feeding the march to the right," I mean that challenging patriarchal systems and beliefs with the intent of creating both a wider definition of families, and a more egalitarian approach to family roles in all family models, might also weaken the need to have that father figure holding the reins of government. I don't know enough about American society to suggest potential strategies, but I suspect there are many levels on which such activism can occur, from public education to offering new images through popular cultural products to reviving the consciousness-raising techniques of second-wave feminism to supporting pagan mother-based religions and so on. And of course, all of that comes in conjunction with political activism on both local and national fronts.
I am not certain what part the feminist backlash (which seems to be worst in the U.S.) plays in this. Again, the available data is not suffiecent to say whether the feminist backlash is a result of an increase in patriarchal values, or if both are indications of something else going on in American society. But, going back to the topic of framing, blaming feminism for an "erosion of values" begs the question - which I rarely see addressing in such debates - of whose values, and whether it might not be a good thing that those particular values are in fact eroding - if they are - to allow the development of a more just and egalitarian society.
I suspect the right has mounted such an attack on feminism because they know that feminism (sidestepping the issue of feminisms for now) has the potential to undermine the belief system they depend on to keep their soldiers, in and out of uniform, in line.
You make a good point about the binary oppositions of strict father/nurturant parent in Lakoff's models. I suspect it's part and parcel of what you have said elsewhere about the binary aspects of political thought in the U.S. - the model assumes two and only two family forms because the politics assumes two and only two political stances. So even though it's not a good model of real-life families, it may still work as a model within the political sphere.
Which leads me to what you say here: I personally think that social movements that advocate choices among the broad range of parenting/family structures that exist (absent, single, nuclear, extended, intentional, etc.) would be a place to motivate change in public consciousness and take us beyond that dichtomy into some real choices.
I think you're absolutely right, and this is indeed one of the kinds of activism that I think can be an approach to changing the patriarchal/authoritarian/right-wing trend in American politics and society.
And in my personal opinion, that would be a very good thing.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-17 04:51 pm (UTC)There has been much talk recently about Canada and Australia converging again after many years of marching off in different directions. It's hard to determine, though, not the least because Canadians are not so well-informed about the rest of the world as Americans are (and, Lord knows, that's a pretty tragic story in itself) and therefore it is difficult to discuss the matter.
That a group with a leader is more capable than one without, even if the leader is incompetent, is pretty basic and I would place the dissenters in a bucket with the folks who are uncertain as to whether the world is round.
That Americans are a highly regimented society has been obvious for as long as I can remember. And the more educated they are, the more conformant and unthinking they become. I would say that the Bush Administration certainly does represent a reflection of where American society is and where it is headed, subject once again to the caveat that the country is large and diverse, although not so much as Canada.
The part on family sits oddly, as George W. Bush has a nurturative rather than conservative outlook on family. Moreover, the "conservative" translation of that into government is not what we are seeing at the present time at all! In fact, it seems more like the "Nanny State" running rampant. Similar to the notion that a "conservative" government will not run up a large budget deficit. It seems to me more like another one of those false dichotomies that we used to construct just for the purpose of debunking in the next paper.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-17 11:14 pm (UTC)I believe it is available in the U.S., because there have been American reviews and some Americans of my Internet acquaintance have mentioned reading it. You’re probably correct in that it’s unlikely to be available in Australia.
The idea that Canada and the United States are diverging is an intriguing one. Determining what direction a country as diverse and fragmented as Canada is moving in (aside from apart) would be a daunting challenge.
Obviously, the social values analysis goes beyond the national level and looks at regional trends, in both Canada and the U.S. For instance, on the patriarchy item discussed above, the Canadian numbers in the six regions we look at range from 15 percent agreeing in Quebec to 21 percent agreeing in the Prairies, while in the U.S., the numbers range from 29 percent agreeing in New England to 71 percent agreeing in the Deep South. Looking at either country, one can find similar regional spreads on all 300-odd items that we track in this research.
With respect to Canada (where we have been tracking these trends for a longer period of time), while it is true that not all regions are moving at the same speed on all trends, overall, they are in fact moving in the same overall directions. We may have a number of political problems to solve at the moment, but there is not as much fragmentation at the social values level as one might think.
That a group with a leader is more capable than one without, even if the leader is incompetent, is pretty basic and I would place the dissenters in a bucket with the folks who are uncertain as to whether the world is round.
I think it really all depends on what kind of group it is and what it’s doing. I’ve been in a number of groups that functioned well without leaders. However, the particular item tracked above does not ask people to chose between a single leader and no leader, but between a single leader and a fluid approach to leadership – if you and I are part of a group that has several things to do, and I know more about doing X while you know more about doing Y, then it might be appropriate for you to take charge when we work on Y and for me to take charge when we work on X. Or if you have excellent people skills while I’m good at logistics, we might make a good set of co-coordinators. That’s what we mean by fluid leadership in that particular tracking item. And besides, the earth isn’t round – it’s squashed very slightly at the middle. ;-)
The part on family sits oddly, as George W. Bush has a nurturative rather than conservative outlook on family. Moreover, the "conservative" translation of that into government is not what we are seeing at the present time at all! In fact, it seems more like the "Nanny State" running rampant.
I’m certainly not an expert on American culture – I’ve never lived there, and though I’ve visited frequently, I don’t think that really gives one a “feel” for the culture. So I really don’t know if Lakoff’s model is a more-or-less accurate reflection of what is happening politically or not. But based on what I see peeking down from the north, I would not call Bush and his administration nurturant – toward the family or toward the state. In his approach to taxation and funding social programs, he seems to be clearly in line with Lakoff’s description – the rich are the good children, who should be allowed to do whatever they want with as little interference as possible, while a disciplinary or punitive approach of cutting funding is applied to those who don’t make the grade.
I’m not sure what you mean by ‘Nanny State,’ but if you mean to suggest that most people in the U.S. are being coddled or are receiving more benefits than they need from the state, that doesn’t fit in with what I’m reading and hearing. Would you care to expand on your thoughts on this point?
no subject
Date: 2004-10-18 04:35 pm (UTC)Okay I confess. This is a reference to this article (http://209.157.64.200/focus/f-news/1065064/posts) which was subject of a lot of discussion a few months back.
"There has always been a tension in conservatism between those who favor more liberty and those who want more morality. But what's indisputable is that Bush's "compassionate conservatism" is a move toward the latter — the use of the government to impose and subsidize certain morals over others. He is fusing Big Government liberalism with religious-right moralism. It's the nanny state with more cash. Your cash, that is. And their morals."
no subject
Date: 2004-10-19 11:01 am (UTC)What Sullivan is describing, even though he calls it a nanny state, is more along the lines of a government lurching toward theocratic and corporatised fascism. The Bush government's attempts to impose a particular moral perspective on the American people is, I think, not a result of so-called "compassionate conservatism" but rather a pandering to the influential Christian fundamentalist movement in the U.S. It has always been a truism that "ya dance with them what brung ya", and the fundamentalists were a significant element in the rightist coalition that currently serves as the electoral base of the American Republican Party.
As for some of the other actions that Sullivan ascribes to "nanny statism", many are actually measures adopted to satisfy the Republican Party's other main support base - corporations. Banning of certain herbal remedies, for example, is not really about protecting the consumer, it's about limiting alternatives to the product base of the influential pharmaceutical industry. The same reason lies behind aspects of the Bush administration's recent medicare bill, which actually limits consumer options available to seniors and ensures that they will have less opportunity to seek out competitve prices for pharmaceutical products.
I would argue that the Bush administration is neither compassionate nor truely conservative in the old-school sense of adhering to principles of fiscal responsibility. And it's certainly not liberal - classical liberal theory being associated with the freedoms of individuals to dissent, particularly in political and religious arenas, and to engage in free use of property.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-19 06:12 am (UTC)Did that question explain what is meant by "fluid leadership"? I had no idea what you meant by the term until you explained it, so I doubt if the people surveyed would understand what it means.
Also, I wonder if a better term could be used. "Rotating leadership" is only one form of fluidity, so that's not a good choice. "Flexible leadership" is better, until you think that it could mean there's one leader who is flexible. "Adaptable leadership"? Maybe it needs to be reframed altogether. I do see why a thinktank is needed -- a group of intelligent people who can discuss and work through ideas together (and bounce them off one another and thrash them out and all those other sports-related or fighting-related metaphors).
BTW, I would suggest that one problem that all too many left intellectuals suffer from is an addiction to polysyllabic words and convoluted, turgid syntax. I'm not innocent of it myself -- and reading your post, Morgan, neither are you. This is meant as a reminder of a place where both of us can improve and something both of us need to be aware of. I'm thinking in particular of the last two paragraphs of your post, from "I do not argue a causal link here" on. I know myself I retreat into formal, intellectual language when I'm feeling threatened; whether you do the same thing you've never told me.
However, there's an extremely important point you make in the next-to-last paragraph: "Adams presents evidence supporting the view that an increasing number of Americans find the 'strict father' family model to be comfortable – and perhaps even comforting." Yes, I believe that's true. And one thing progressives need to get across is that the nurturing parent model can be far more comfortable and comforting. The phrase "social safety net," for instance, is a good example of progressive framing. It implies that life is adventurous and potentially dangerous, but also exciting and enjoyable -- and that there's a safety net there to catch you if you fall, so it's okay to take a few risks when you want to.
One other thing we need to be aware of, though, is one appeal of the "strict father" model, at least to men: the fact that they will have the chance to become the strict father, the rulemaker, the authority figure, themselves. That's the big motivation for putting up with the punishment -- well, that and the hope of winning the approval of the authority figure.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-19 11:31 am (UTC)Yes, it did. You have to realise that I have to walk a thin line here in talking about this research, which is proprietary. If a particular item wording has been released to the public, as the question on the father being the master of the house has been, then I can quote it exactly. Michael has not, AFAIR, specified the wording on the leadership item in his public writings, so I’m limited to using his language when discussing the issue in public. The actual question wording is precise with respect to the meaning of what Michael calls fluid leadership in the book.
BTW, I would suggest that one problem that all too many left intellectuals suffer from is an addiction to polysyllabic words and convoluted, turgid syntax. I'm not innocent of it myself -- and reading your post, Morgan, neither are you.
To quote Neil Young, “It’s my sound, man.” Even when I’m being colloquial, I tend to convoluted syntax and endless qualifications and disclaimers. ;-) The more important the topic is to me, the more academic, polysylIabic and convoluted I tend to become in my discourse, because while it may be difficult, academic language can also define more precisely (of course, whether I succeed in using it precisely is another question, but that's my goal, at least). Colloquial language is often vague, and direct language, for me at least, often lacks nuance, and I live for nuance. Plus, I figure that if I can’t use my own natural styles in my own Live Journal, then I’m really in trouble. I can’t speak to why other left intellectuals use high-falutin’ language.
One other thing we need to be aware of, though, is one appeal of the "strict father" model, at least to men: the fact that they will have the chance to become the strict father, the rulemaker, the authority figure, themselves. That's the big motivation for putting up with the punishment -- well, that and the hope of winning the approval of the authority figure.
A very good point. That would indeed be part of the reasoning behind any argument that – again assuming that this link between authoritarian family structure and right-wing political positioning is valid – opposition at a political level to right-wing administrations in the U.S. would benefit from revitalised progressive social movements such as feminism.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-19 05:52 am (UTC)Are you meaning that Canadians are not so well-informed about the rest of the world as *Australians* are? I don't think Canadians are less well-informed than Americans; rather the reverse.
That a group with a leader is more capable than one without, even if the leader is incompetent, is pretty basic and I would place the dissenters in a bucket with the folks who are uncertain as to whether the world is round.
I have no idea where you would place me (nor do I care very much) but I disagree with you. I would say that a group with a competent, honest, responsible, and ethical leader is more capable than the same group without a leader is likely to be. But with an underhanded, dishonest, unethical leader, the group is going to go firmly and rapidly in a direction few if any of the members of that group would wish to go. And with an incompetent leader, the group will do little but navel-gazing, or spin off madly in all directions. (I have no idea why I want to use these cliches here, but apparently I do.)
That Americans are a highly regimented society has been obvious for as long as I can remember. And the more educated they are, the more conformant and unthinking they become.
Highly regimented, conformant, and unthinking, yes. It has been so for a long time, accompanying it with a nasty mythology of being freedom-loving and nonconformist. But I don't think it's true that the more educated Americans are worse in that respect. The universities have long (at least since the '60s) been centres of liberalism and radicalism, of progressive thought and of analysis of what's wrong with the American system as it is.
The part on family sits oddly, as George W. Bush has a nurturative rather than conservative outlook on family.
Are you crazy?
No, I doubt if you're crazy, but you must be using a very odd definition of "nurturant" when you apply it to GW Bush. He nurtures the large corporations and his own cronies, true, and perhaps those families that conform to his own views on what families should be*, but who else does he nurture?
*That automatically leaves out all poor families. By the conservative "strict father" model George Lakoff describes, if a family is poor its father is not a responsible man and therefore not deserving of any kind of government assistance -- and of course if there is no father, then it's not a proper family at all.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-19 04:40 pm (UTC)No, that is exactly what I meant. My experience with Canada comes from first hand experience of the country, the people and your news media. This has considerable limitations; in particular it is skewed towards Western Canada. I was rather hoping that some real data was available, perhaps in the aforementioned book.
And that experience is that Canadians are woefully informed about their own country and the world at large. There was constant confusion about the political system and Canada's role in international affairs.
At the moment, this completely frustrating the "engage Canada" movement here.
But I don't think it's true that the more educated Americans are worse in that respect. The universities have long (at least since the '60s) been centres of liberalism and radicalism, of progressive thought and of analysis of what's wrong with the American system as it is.
The most famous example is from this period. President Nixon made an announcement of a total backflip over Vietnam in 1971. Pollsters then charted the shift in public opinion as Americans moved to the new Party Line. This was most profound among the educated. The more educated, the more allegiance they had to the system and the more likely they were to shift their opinions to conform.
The part on family sits oddly, as George W. Bush has a nurturative rather than conservative outlook on family.
The problem with this metaphor is that it can be taken literally. The first image that came to my mind was his real-life family rather than any metaphoric one.
"Compassionate" has definitely become an Orwellian term while "conservative" seems to be fast losing all meaning whatsoever, becoming, a generic American political term for "good".
I may have misunderstood "nurturative" but if it means using government intervention on a broad and grand scale to encourage certain social outcomes, then the Bush administration is indeed nurturative.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-20 12:19 am (UTC)Some of what you perceive as being ill-informed may be actually be due to the fact that Canadian political systems and and our ideas about our role in international affairs are currently in a state of some flux, and the West is where a lot of the changes are happening. We have been struggling for some time to find political frameworks that can encompass both Quebec and Western nationalism, and that struggle continues. We are also beginning the process of looking for ways to make our parliament more representative. The political right in Canada is very divided, another source of turmoil that is strongest in the West.
We are at the moment even more obsessed with the U.S. than usual - for obvious reasons, at least in my opinion - and are torn between the need to find effective ways of dealing with our very large and militarily powerful neighbour and largest trading power, while at the same time feeling more and more that we want to be quite distinct from the U.S.
Internationally, we want to believe in the image of Canada as a peacekeeping and humanitarian nation that is the legacy of Lester Pearson, while not wanting to spend a dime on providing the military and international service infrastructures to carry out the work that has to underlie that image.
Just to mention a few of the things that are making Canada rather confused about itself right now.
I think we are in general just as informed as Americans, if not moreso, about events in the world outside of North America, but receive little information from our media about the context and possible meaning of those events. We suffer at times from a blend of both the British and the American forms of insularity, and the chance workings of history that made us the uncomfortable bedmate of a powerful imperialist power mean that when we do look beyond our borders, we most often look south, and not much further.
I may have misunderstood "nurturative" but if it means using government intervention on a broad and grand scale to encourage certain social outcomes, then the Bush administration is indeed nurturative.
Based on my own reading of Lakoff, I think you may be missing some of what he seems to be including in his "nurturant pparent" construct. The government as nurturant parent does indeed appear to imply government intervention to encourage social outcomes, but so do some forms of the government as strict father construct. It is the nature of the social outcomes, and the goals of the interventions, that determine whether the government is acting as a strict father or a nurturant parent. Lakoff says in this article (http://www.alternet.org/story/16947) that:
Nurturing has two aspects: empathy (feeling and caring how others feel) and responsibility to take care of oneself and others for whom we are responsible. These two aspects of nurturance imply family values that we can recognize as progressive political values: From empathy, we want for others: protection from harm, fulfillment in life, fairness, freedom (consistent with responsibility), open two-way communication. From responsibility there follows: competence, trust, commitment, community building, and so on.
I don't see much of what the Bush administration has done fitting into any of these categories. There really isn't even a commitment to protect citizens from harm - if there were, the U.S. would be taking port security much more seriously. But that would slow down the import of goods, and that's not something that corporate America really wants (unless, of course, it's goods that would be too competitive in the U.S. market, in which case the government is only too glad to impose tariffs and stifle competition).
no subject
Date: 2004-10-20 03:21 pm (UTC)What sort of reforms are we talking about here? Abolish the monarchy? Change the Senate to be more like ours? Compulsory voting? Multi member electorates?
It seemed to me that Canadian government was more devolved that the US or Australia - more was done at lower levels.
We are at the moment even more obsessed with the U.S. than usual - for obvious reasons, at least in my opinion - and are torn between the need to find effective ways of dealing with our very large and militarily powerful neighbour and largest trading power, while at the same time feeling more and more that we want to be quite distinct from the U.S.
The whole world is probably more concerned with the US than usual. Here, the events of 9/11 have drawn us much closer to the US, and concerns about cultural imperialism have abated.
Internationally, we want to believe in the image of Canada as a peacekeeping and humanitarian nation that is the legacy of Lester Pearson, while not wanting to spend a dime on providing the military and international service infrastructures to carry out the work that has to underlie that image.
While we may not be quite so stingy as Canada, we don't have nearly the resources, so this sort of cancels out. But I think that the Canada-philes are misreading the situation when they equate Canada's desire to be a peacekeeping nation with our "deputy sheriff" <<insert cringe here>>.
Here's the Party Line:
Canada is a valued partner
Canada is an established partner for Australia. As one of the world's major industrialised nations, Canada is a member of several significant forums that affect Australian national interests. These include the group of the world's seven largest economies and Russia, and the group of four leading members of the WTO. Australia and Canada share underlying interests in many areas, particularly trade liberalisation, disarmament and UN reform. The Government will use regular official dialogue with Canada to develop further our cooperation in international forums. The Government initiated the Canada-Australia Dialogue in 2002 to expand cooperation on a range of public policy issues.Canada continues to be a valued partner for defence and intelligence exchanges and consular services. Canada's importance as an export market has also grown in recent years. Our goods and services exports were worth about $2.3 billion in 2001. Australian firms have invested some $3 billion in Canada's mining and transport sectors. The Government will continue to work with Australian exporters to identify new opportunities in Canada.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-30 10:50 pm (UTC)You asked:
What sort of reforms are we talking about here? Abolish the monarchy? Change the Senate to be more like ours? Compulsory voting? Multi member electorates?
Some people have been talking about abolishing the monarchy for a long time, but it's very much a minority. We'll see what happens when the next generation takes the throne. Senate change is much higher on the discussion list - ours is, as you probably know, appointed. There's a very strong move in the west for an elected Senate, and I think the idea is spreading. Whether it will happen, I can't say at this point, but it's on the discussion agenda. There is a good deal of discussion about changing the electoral system from first-past-the-post to some other form, possibly the preferential reassignment type that I believe is in use in Australia, or some form of proportional representation. It's in the early stages, but the new Prime Minister made a big deal about his desire to revitalise Canadian democracy, and he seems to have sparked a number of debates on a variety of issues by his comments.
I wouldn't necessarily say that Canadian government is more devolved, at least not as a matter of political principle. In fact, we started out by saying that anything not specifically stated to be under provincial jurisdiction was to come under the federal authority. But we have evolved a system in which the federal government has to broker deals among the provinces on a wide variety of issues, both federal and provincial in nature, because of the huge importance of equalisation payments in our country. The various provinces have widely disparate economic wealth, and so the federal government redistributes wealth via transfer payments. Naturally, the richer provinces are not always pleased about the idea of sharing their wealth with the poorer provinces - and often, when poorer provinces become rich, as has happened with Alberta, and may soon happen with Newfoundland, they don't want to see their transfer payments diminish and their monies being used to support programs in other provinces.
Because the federal government, in essence, takes most of the revenues and then gives them back under a formula that is theoretically designed to give all Canadians in all regions relatively equal access to services, this gives the federal government a lot of power over provincial areas of jurisdiction; at the same time, the constant negotiations over both transfer payments and the mechanisms of administering "equivalent" services in areas which are vastly different - physically, demographically, culturally and politically - give the provinces more influence than one would expect over areas of federal jurisdiction.
I'm afraid, though, that I don't know enough to accurately compare Canada's system to that of similar federated states, but it's always been my impression that within the U.S., the states are more independent than are our provinces.
The whole world is probably more concerned with the US than usual. Here, the events of 9/11 have drawn us much closer to the US, and concerns about cultural imperialism have abated.
It's probably the mouse sleeping with the elephant thing, but we've become further from the U.S., and more concerned about cultural imperialism. Also, we are not militarily involved in Iraq, and at the same time, the U.S. has taken actions in several issues having to do with everything from trade protectionism and tariffs to changes in border regulations that may or may not be related to our lack of involvement, but have been seen by some as payback. We have a number of very unique concerns that result from out geographical proximity, and our deeply entwined mutual trade patterns.
But I think that the Canada-philes are misreading the situation when they equate Canada's desire to be a peacekeeping nation with our "deputy sheriff" <>.
I didn't really understand what you meant here. Could you clarify for me?
no subject
Date: 2004-10-31 03:18 am (UTC)This pretty much sums up the situation in Australia, except that the constitution lists the powers of the Federal Government. The Federal government collects most of the revenue through its constitutional monopoly on excise and sales taxes and its acquired (since 1942) one on income tax. The Commonwealth Grants Commission hands the money over to the states based upon some complex formulae on (as the Constitution says) "such terms and conditions as it may see fit".
But "physically, demographically, culturally and politically" the states are not as different from each other as the Canadian provinces and as a result there is a general dislike of anything that differs from state to state.
I didn't really understand what you meant here. Could you clarify for me?
The war in East Timor led to a policy of more direct involvement in the affairs of our neighbours. The stated policy is now that they have to keep everything under control or we will move in and do it for them. As a result, Australian troops are currently active in East Timor, Papua-New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.
The Prime Minister referred to Australia's new role in the region as that of the "Deputy Sheriff". And, true to this concept, Australia has joined the US in Afghanistan and Iraq - not to curry favour with the US but in line with our own peculiar world view.
So when Canada says it wants an expanded peacekeeping role and more say in world affairs, the response of Australia is enthusiastic support for the idea of Canada fighting bad guys in our region. When Canada calls for action in the Sudan, the response is: "You're putting a posse together? Count us in mate!"
I believe that this represents a fundamental misunderstanding of Canada.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-31 01:29 pm (UTC)When Canadians talk about peace-keeping, we tend to see it very specifically as part of a U.N. sponsored action that has wide international backing.
From some of the limited reading I've done on Australian history, and culture, I have gained the impression that, like the U.S. in some ways, Australia has incorporated something of a "bringing law to the wild frontier" trope into its political and cultural bag of metaphors.
As a nation, we don't have this. (It exists in pockets, such as parts of Alberta and the Yukon, but it's not a national metaphor.) The public image of peacekeeping in Canada (I can't speak to the image of peacekeeping within the military community in Canada, as I know very little about that) is more that of sending in a bunch of polite and diplomatic but brave and resourceful policemen to separate the warring parties, care for anyone who got hurt, and get then to sit down and talk. No sheriffs, no posses.
One of our more cherished national myths is the one about half the U.S. army chasing the embattled Plains Nations north to the border, and then watching in amazement as two lone RCMP offices negotiate a peaceful entry of the fugitive Nations into Canada. (And of course, we never talk about how we betrayed those Nations after they arrived.) That's the essence of the Canadian image of a peacekeeper.
no subject
Date: 2004-11-01 11:17 pm (UTC)This was a major and important difference over Iraq between the US and Australia - the issue of UN support. Polls here showed the public divided about whether they would support the operation without UN support. Feeling on the issue was different from in the US, because the smaller group in favour of the operation supported it with or without the UN, rather than explicitly without the UN, as was the case there. Taken together though, the two added up to the largest majority in favour of any participating country.
We went into the First Gulf War without UN backing and then - probably the real watershed - into East Timor without UN support either. Since Canada participated in both operations in a small way, the assumption here was that Canada has also given up on waiting for the UN.
Australians don't have a concept of bringing law to the wild frontier. As the explorers moved past the Great Dividing Range into the interior, they found not the Great Plains but... a desert. Our character became more cynical.
The dominant concept in strategic thinking has been our isolation as an English-speaking country far from Europe and North America with distant, densely populated, culturally and racially different neighbours. So there is a conflict between our history and our geography.
The threat of invasion from these places dominated - and continues to dominate - defence planning and geopolitical thinking. We do, after all, have the world's largest Muslim nation on our doorstep.
This is really not so different from the US; during the 19th Century America built elaborate coastal fortifications to repel European invaders. However the fact that the perceived threat is so racially and culturally different imparted more urgency.