You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
A collection of the 18 essays presented at a 1991 conference held in honor of the well-known Canadian political scientist John Meisel. Contributors explore key issues in Canadian politics including governance, Quebec's place in Canada, French-English relations, multiculturalism, the party system, electoral processes, the regulatory function, and aspects of culture and social science. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Media, Elections and Democracy examines campaign communication in selected industrial democracies. Klaus Schoenbach, Karen Siune, Doris Graber and a host of authors around the world contribute critical overviews of the systems in their countries. The studies deal with a wide range of issues in modern communication, including the principles and practices of news and public affairs coverage and the impact of new technologies.
The two studies in Interest Groups and Elections in Canada explore the nature and influence of special interest groups. They consider different aspects of the question, "In the context of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, how can the laws intended to secure a fair electoral process be reconciled with freedom of expression?" Janet Hiebert reviews the limits on interest groups adopted in 1974 and amended in 1983, profiles the groups involved int he 1988 federal election, and discusses relevant legislation and jurisprudence in the provinces and abroad. She concludes that spending limits for parties and candidates will only be effective if there are also restrictions on independent expenditures during elections by groups and individuals. Brian Tanguay and Barry Kay assess the influence attributed to locally oriented interest groups, including by members of Parliament, and conclude that these organizations have less influence on the political process than is the popular view. The authors conclude that dissatisfaction is a key variable explaining the role of these interest groups and their activities during elections.
Do Conventions Matter? provides a complete overview of national party conventions in Canada, from 1919, when the first convention was held, to 1993, including the selection of Stanfield, Trudeau, Broadbent, Clark, Mulroney, Turner, McLaughlin, Chrétien, Campbell, and Manning. Courtney compares leadership selection practices in Canada with those in the United States, Britain, and Australia, and shows that Canadian conventions remain a distinctive means of choosing party leaders. Focusing on modern developments in the convention process, Courtney highlights changes in representation over the last thirty years, addresses criticisms about costs and delegate selection practices, and examines the role of the media. He concludes with an examination of the future of conventions in the context of Canadian democracy, given sky-rocketing costs, the movement to reform political parties, and the push towards a universal membership vote. He argues convincingly that the objectives of greater representation and greater democracy explain both the emergence of conventions to choose the leaders of federal parties and their possible demise in the near future.
This book is one of 23 volumes of research commissioned by the Royal Commission on Electoral Reform and Party Financing, and one of five volumes within this series dealing specifically with party and election finance. Because the issue of money in elections is as old as democracy, the experience of other countries is instructive. The studies in this volume offer Canadians information about approaches to funding political parties and elections in the United States and Western Europe. The studies by Herbert Alexander and Robert Mutch exmaine how the United States has approached issues such as contribution limits and the disclosure of election finances. The latter study provides explicit compar...
Media And Voters In Canadian Election Campaigns
Written by a major international team of authors, this new study features twelve chapters on both new and established parliaments, including Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. It tests the latest theories about women's political representation within Westminster style assemblies and is clearly organized into three key sections.
Group Politics and Social Movements in Canada, Second Edition updates and expands its exploration of a wide range of organized group and social movement activity in Canadian politics. Particularly distinctive is the inclusion of Quebec nationalism and Aboriginal politics. Many other areas of collective activity are also included: the Occupy movement and anti-poverty organizing, ethnocultural political mobilization, disability, lesbian and gay politics, feminism, farmers and organized interests in agriculture, Christian evangelical groups, environment, and health movements. Contributors to the collection employ a number of theoretical perspectives from political science and sociology to describe the evolution of organized groups and movements and to evaluate successes in exercising influence on Canadian politics. Each chapter provides an overview of the group or movement along with an account of its main networks and organizations, strategies, goals, successes, and failures.
Following significant increases in women’s electoral representation in the 1980s and 90s, progress has stalled. Today, there are only a few more women in Canada’s parliament and legislatures than a decade ago. What has happened to the representational gains for women and why does gender parity remain so elusive? To answer these questions, Stalled provides a detailed roadmap of women’s political representation as candidates, office-holders, cabinet ministers, party leaders, and as representatives of the Crown at all levels of government across Canada. Comprehensive and accessible, this volume makes clear that women are far from achieving equality in sites of formal political power.
Even though the Portuguese are relatively new to Canada, they have made major contributions to the cultural mosaic of the country. Containing many new essays, this second edition of The Portuguese in Canada updates the work that filled a gap in the scholarly literature of multiculturalism in Canada. The contributors come from a variety of disciplines - anthropology, geography, history, literature, linguistics, sociology, and urban planning - and are from Portugal, Canada and the United States. Essays examine the history of the Portuguese diaspora, the Portuguese presence in Newfoundland and its fisheries, language and identity, urban experiences (especially in Montreal and Toronto), and history and literature. This second edition of The Portuguese in Canada conveys the multi-faceted contributions the Portuguese have made to Canada and considers possible future growth and development of Portuguese-Canadian culture and heritage.