Canadian political culture
Canadian political culture, in a nation-state context, can be defined as beliefs and attitudes that Canadians have of political objects (Jackson, Politics In Canada. 1994). The majority of Canadians usually hold similar political ideas that, unlike firm ideology that varies in due time, are more general and are considered foundation for political culture. It is these values and attitudes that citizens share that are the heart of Canada's nation-state political culture system. The political culture as a whole demands other strands such as regional or linguistic aspects to fully explain Canadian society and how it view politics; however, for this essay, it will only focus on similarities that Canadians share in their political attitudes of a nation-wide culture. It will also touch on the likeness of thought that distinguishes them from other countries.To understand Canada's political culture, one has to understand some of the historical events that shaped the viewpoints of those living in Canada. It is often seen as a "fragment" country, a country built on two societies (French/English); yet nonetheless there are the common ideologies that all Canadian share. Canada founded its nation through evolution, deciding to absolve itself
Canadians are more aware of class and tend to be more elitist than Americans. Despite the fact that Americans tend to hold similar ideologies for political parties, Canadians are both conservative and liberal, due to historical and geographical circumstance. Also, Canadians prefer and encourage multiculturalism so that it resembles a mosaic. In contrast, Americans believe in assimilation-the frequent ideology of a melting pot is often brought up in this case. Through multiculturalism, there are also ethno-linguistic political culture that exist, but are not touched upon in this essay. There also seems to be an efficacious attitude towards the region that people are living in. However, regional behavior often conflicts with federal interests when issues of natural resource division arises. An example of this would be the oil price ceiling the federal government placed on the mid-west. Also the government forced them to sell vast amounts of oil to the province of Ontario. The provinces who had the oil wells were not impressed by the federal system. It seems that political culture shows in some regions, some people do not appear to be too concerned with matters that do not involve them. During the referendum back in the mid 90's, surveys in B.C. showed that the issue of seperatism was not a grave concern to those people, for the matter would not seem to affect them in anyway because of the distance involved. A third ethno-linguistic division lies between Canada's native peoples and other Canadians. Through many differences, this political subculture has often been in conflict with the Canadian government, and often with non-natives. From a historical perspective, the treatment of native peoples was often poor and this has caused many natives to distrust the federal government. Canadians are ashamed of how the natives were treated, however public polls show that most Canadians disagree that the natives should receive special rights. ion in the entire region tenuous. Even with the self-government of the Inuit people, they are often neglected by the federal government; and in the process, living conditions become difficult. This all contributes to regional divisions of Canada.
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2988
Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page double spaced)
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