Limits on deliberative democracy in Canada: a study of political culture and how attitudes towards the United States shape Canadian public policy debates
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2008
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Abstract
Theorists of deliberative democracy point to a number of factors that can affect the potential for deliberation: lack of wealth, marginalization of one sort or another, and insufficient interest in the public good. However, such theorists have ignored another possible influence on deliberation: political culture, itself a result of various factors including historical events, political leadership, and elite and popular discourse. That political culture, including a dominant narrative, will have an effect upon whether a polity is open to a wide-ranging deliberative discussion. If the discourse is self-limiting in some way, say for reasons of a religious taboo on a subject, then deliberation is circumscribed from the outset. In this thesis, I add to the literature on deliberative democracy in four ways: first, I show that the existing literature mistakenly posits private interest as opposite to public interest when the latter is instead a continuum of the former; second, I note how discourse in Canada is rife with references to the United States ( often negative) and how that prevents more thorough deliberation of an issue or policy; third, the narratives of Ontario and Alberta are examined and explored for the possibility that the dominant Canadian narrative (Ontario's survivalist-garrison narrative) was triumphant in the past due to historical events, the subsequent reality of a significant population base and the attendant advantages that brought vis-a-vis the rest of Canada, and political considerations; fourth, I note the prevalence of anti-American discourse in Canada both in history and in the present but conclude that while chronic references to the United States will likely always be part of Canadian discourse, a weakening of the dominant Ontario narrative may produce two results: less consequential anti-American policy (in contrast to past actions), and a more deliberative national discourse as ideas and policies are considered on their merits.
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Bibliography: p. 253-276
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Milke, M. (2008). Limits on deliberative democracy in Canada: a study of political culture and how attitudes towards the United States shape Canadian public policy debates (Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/2081