Sunday, February 23, 2020

Dangerous Territory



The anger which overtook the United States four years ago is drifting north. Susan Delacourt writes:

Large-scale rail shutdowns, Indigenous blockades, a new flutter of Western separatism from elected MPs in the House of Commons — a running theme throughout is the idea of governance itself as optional.
Grievances and strikes aren’t new in this country; neither are air crashes or disease outbreaks — just a couple of the other issues on which Trudeau offered updates at his “that’s enough” news conference on Friday.
What’s new in the array of issues confronting Trudeau in this early part of 2020 is an emerging set of doubts about whether government can broker differences and come to any kind of middle ground.

And we now have numbers behind the burgeoning grievances:

Ekos pollster Frank Graves has been doing some major research into populism and whether it exists in Canada in 2020. He told me on Friday, as we were waiting to see what Trudeau would say at his news conference, that some of the indicators he’s seeing are disturbing.
Canadians are increasingly settling into polarized views around education, science, climate change and immigration, for instance. The poles have deepened and grown farther apart in just four years too, between Trudeau’s first election and his recent re-election. But Graves doesn’t think this is a Trudeau problem as much as it is a potential crisis for the very idea of governance.
“We are approaching fundamental legitimacy crisis points on some of these issues,” Graves said.

Yesterday, I wrote about the legitimacy crisis in the United States. We appear to be headed in the same direction. We are, in short, in dangerous territory.

Image: World Nomads Journal

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Canadians are increasingly settling into polarized views around education, science, climate change and immigration, for instance

The above sentence is part of the problem. It erases the actors who are TELLING Canadians that climate change is not a problem and that immigration and education are. It erases and refuses to challenge the lies being peddled by politicians and pundits. It's just more of the typical media "view from nowhere" that pretends that things just happen, Canadians just become polarized, without naming and shaming the liars that cause these changes. There's no shame in lying anymore because there are no consequences for doing it. People become polarized when they don't share a common factual underpinning, when lies go unchallenged, And the media are a big part of the problem.

Cap

Owen Gray said...

When we accept the notion that there are "alternative facts," Cap, we're doomed.

The Disaffected Lib said...


We knew this was gaining a toe hold in Canadian society. In 2004 Henry Giroux wrote "The Terror of Neoliberalism: Authoritarianism and the Eclipse of Democracy."

"Neoliberalism, too commonly regarded as an economic theory, is a complex of values, ideologies and practices that work more broadly as a "cultural field." Giroux argues that its cultural dimensions erode the public participation that is the very foundation of democratic life. Under neoliberal policies, Giroux shows, populations are increasingly denied the symbolic, educational and economic capital necessary for engaged citizenship. He assesses the impact of neoliberalism on the language of democracy, race, education and the media, offering alternatives necessary to restore democratic institutions."

I haven't read Giroux' book but there have been a few scholarly articles published more recently that come to the same conclusion - the decline of democracy and the rise of authoritarianism as, in essence, 'late stage' neoliberalism. The neoliberal order, ideology, culture is a revolutionary process that we failed to see until it was probably too late.

As democracy wanes, social cohesion fails and what had been a more or less harmonious society succumbs to tribalism. It leads to an "us versus them" society that, as it splits, weakens and becomes easy prey for guys like Trump, Orban, Bolsonaro, Erdogan and many others of their ilk. To those of us who don't drift to the far right this looks like a nightmare because it is.

When I set up my blog 14 years ago I dedicated it to the "restoration of progressive democracy." There's been little sign of democracy rebounding in the meantime. For all the valid arguments against it, electoral reform is the key to arresting this slide. If we reject it, we reject representative democracy in a multi-party state and the alternative is the one we're experiencing now.

Unfortunately Justin is no philosopher prince. He embraces neoliberalism and rejects electoral reform/democratic restoration. There's not a lot he can do for Canada wearing those blinders. He certainly cannot arrest the atrophy of democracy in our country. He can't steer us away from the day we might have a Trump of our very own.

John B. said...

Wait a minute.

If the press were to expose the lies and liars, it would be showing a decidedly left-wing bias. We must maintain a balanced perspective.

The liars must be heard from and must not be molested. The thieves are entitled to similar consideration.

Owen Gray said...

When people realize that their votes don't count, Mound, they first become apathetic -- and then they get angry.

Owen Gray said...

We have developed a vast industry, John, dedicated to the protection of liars.

John B. said...

I guess I should have understood this before, but I'll thank Mound for my monthly epiphany.

"the decline of democracy and the rise of authoritarianism as, in essence, 'late stage' neoliberalism"

They built this bughouse.

Owen Gray said...

Indeed, John. We are reaping what we sewed fifty years ago.