Download or read book Fixing Canadian Democracy written by Fraser Institute (Vancouver, B.C.) and published by The Fraser Institute. This book was released on 2003 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Democracy in Canada written by Donald J. Savoie and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2019-09-02 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Canada's representative democracy is confronting important challenges. At the top of the list is the growing inability of the national government to perform its most important roles: namely mapping out collective actions that resonate in all regions as well as enforcing these measures. Others include Parliament's failure to carry out important responsibilities, an activist judiciary, incessant calls for greater transparency, the media's rapidly changing role, and a federal government bureaucracy that has lost both its way and its standing. Arguing that Canadians must reconsider the origins of their country in order to understand why change is difficult and why they continue to embrace regional identities, Democracy in Canada explains how Canada's national institutions were shaped by British historical experiences, and why there was little effort to bring Canadian realities into the mix. As a result, the scope and size of government and Canadian federalism have taken on new forms largely outside the Constitution. Parliament and now even Cabinet have been pushed aside so that policy makers can design and manage the modern state. This also accounts for the average citizen's belief that national institutions cater to economic elites, to these institutions' own members, and to interest groups at citizens' own expense. A masterwork analysis, Democracy in Canada investigates the forces shaping the workings of Canadian federalism and the country's national political and bureaucratic institutions.
Download or read book How to Fix Canada s Broken Democracy written by Norm Bazinet and published by Library and Archives Canada. This book was released on 2024-02-14 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Federal power in Canada has been concentrated in the office of an unaccountable Prime Minister. This problem developed in two steps. This first step occurred when political parties allowed the party membership to select their leader at a leadership convention. This put the party leader in charge of the caucus rather than the caucus in control of the leader. Originally, the caucus elected the party leader as required under the British Westminster model. To seal this process, Pierre Trudeau modified the Canada Elections Act to require that a political candidate must have their application signed by the party leader. The second step occurred when politicians circumvented the constitutional conventions that form part of the Canadian Constitution. These conventions were adopted from Great Britain and form the governing principles under which Parliament operates. The conventions are unwritten and cannot be enforced in the courts. The British have never allowed this to happen in their country. In addition, our politicians adamantly maintain the first-past-the-post electoral system that yields fake majorities in more than 50% of elections with only 38% of the popular vote. To fix our broken democracy, Canada should adopt electoral reform and concordance democracy. These changes would put governance back under the rules of the Westminster model. Government would become accountable and less confrontational. The country would be more united and everyone's vote would count. These changes can be added to our existing political system without any constitutional amendments. Ideally, an elected Senate (which would require a constitutional amendment) would also bring an additional element of democracy to the table. An implementation procedure is proposed that activists can use to bring these changes forward.
Download or read book Imperfect Democracies written by Patti Tamara Lenard and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2012-10-01 with total page 361 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Canada and the United States are consistently ranked among the most democratic countries in the world, yet voices expressing concern about the quality of these democracies are becoming louder and more insistent. Critics maintain that the two countries suffer from a “democratic deficit,” a deficit that raises profound questions about the legitimacy and effectiveness of their democratic institutions. Imperfect Democracies brings together Canadian and American scholars to compare how the democratic deficit plays out in the two nations. An important contribution to the field of democratic theory and the study of democratic institutions, this timely book will spark debate on both sides of the border.
Download or read book Charlie Foxtrot written by Kim Richard Nossal and published by Dundurn. This book was released on 2016-12-10 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Defence procurement in Canada is a mess, with hundreds of millions of dollars being routinely wasted, despite which the Canadian Armed Forces is woefully underequipped and lacking crucial capacity. Charlie Foxtrot shows why past governments failed so spectacularly to efficiently equip and manage the CAF, and how to change that.
Download or read book Whatever Happened to the Music Teacher written by Donald J. Savoie and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2013 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An insightful account of the forces that shape Ottawa's expenditure budget and the relations between politicians and public servants.
Download or read book The Second written by Carol Anderson and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2021-06-01 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the New York Times bestselling author of White Rage, an unflinching, critical new look at the Second Amendment and how it has been engineered to deny the rights of African Americans since its inception. In The Second, historian and award-winning, bestselling author of White Rage Carol Anderson powerfully illuminates the history and impact of the Second Amendment, how it was designed, and how it has consistently been constructed to keep African Americans powerless and vulnerable. The Second is neither a “pro-gun” nor an “anti-gun” book; the lens is the citizenship rights and human rights of African Americans. From the seventeenth century, when it was encoded into law that the enslaved could not own, carry, or use a firearm whatsoever, until today, with measures to expand and curtail gun ownership aimed disproportionately at the African American population, the right to bear arms has been consistently used as a weapon to keep African Americans powerless--revealing that armed or unarmed, Blackness, it would seem, is the threat that must be neutralized and punished. Throughout American history to the twenty-first century, regardless of the laws, court decisions, and changing political environment, the Second has consistently meant this: That the second a Black person exercises this right, the second they pick up a gun to protect themselves (or the second that they don't), their life--as surely as Philando Castile's, Tamir Rice's, Alton Sterling's--may be snatched away in that single, fatal second. Through compelling historical narrative merging into the unfolding events of today, Anderson's penetrating investigation shows that the Second Amendment is not about guns but about anti-Blackness, shedding shocking new light on another dimension of racism in America.
Download or read book Making Politics Work for Development written by World Bank and published by World Bank Publications. This book was released on 2016-07-14 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Governments fail to provide the public goods needed for development when its leaders knowingly and deliberately ignore sound technical advice or are unable to follow it, despite the best of intentions, because of political constraints. This report focuses on two forces—citizen engagement and transparency—that hold the key to solving government failures by shaping how political markets function. Citizens are not only queueing at voting booths, but are also taking to the streets and using diverse media to pressure, sanction and select the leaders who wield power within government, including by entering as contenders for leadership. This political engagement can function in highly nuanced ways within the same formal institutional context and across the political spectrum, from autocracies to democracies. Unhealthy political engagement, when leaders are selected and sanctioned on the basis of their provision of private benefits rather than public goods, gives rise to government failures. The solutions to these failures lie in fostering healthy political engagement within any institutional context, and not in circumventing or suppressing it. Transparency, which is citizen access to publicly available information about the actions of those in government, and the consequences of these actions, can play a crucial role by nourishing political engagement.
Download or read book Reconsidering the Institutions of Canadian Federalism written by J. Peter Meekison and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2004 with total page 527 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beginning with an examination of the role of traditional institutions such as Parliament, Cabinet, the Supreme Court, and political parties, Canada: State of the Federation 2002 affirms the long-held belief that these bodies do not provide effective forums for interregional bargaining, creating a void that has been filled at least in part by executive federalism. Contributors conclude that the performance of traditional institutions, taken as a whole, has deteriorated over the last several decades, placing more pressure on the processes of executive federalism.
Download or read book Fixing the Future written by Bruce Little and published by University of Toronto Press. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bruce Little explains the CPP overhaul and shows why it stands as one of Canada's most significant public policy success stories, in part because it demanded an almost unparalleled degree of federal-provincial co-operation.
Download or read book Winning and Keeping Power in Canadian Politics written by Jason Roy and published by University of Toronto Press. This book was released on 2020 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this work, the authors employ a series of experiments to assess the strategies used to win elections and stay in power once elected.
Download or read book Price Fixing by Government in Foreign Countries 1926 1939 written by Annie Murray Hannay and published by . This book was released on 1940 with total page 650 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Daily Plebiscite written by David R. Cameron and published by University of Toronto Press. This book was released on 2021-11-17 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Daily Plebiscite offers a multi-faceted analysis of Canada's national unity crisis from the perspective of someone who lived through it all.
Download or read book Healing the Heart of Democracy written by Parker J. Palmer and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2014-07-31 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hope for American democracy in an era of deep divisions In Healing the Heart of Democracy, Parker J. Palmer quickens our instinct to seek the common good and gives us the tools to do it. This timely, courageous and practical work—intensely personal as well as political—is not about them, "those people" in Washington D.C., or in our state capitals, on whom we blame our political problems. It's about us, "We the People," and what we can do in everyday settings like families, neighborhoods, classrooms, congregations and workplaces to resist divide-and-conquer politics and restore a government "of the people, by the people, for the people." In the same compelling, inspiring prose that has made him a bestselling author, Palmer explores five "habits of the heart" that can help us restore democracy's foundations as we nurture them in ourselves and each other: An understanding that we are all in this together An appreciation of the value of "otherness" An ability to hold tension in life-giving ways A sense of personal voice and agency A capacity to create community Healing the Heart of Democracy is an eloquent and empowering call for "We the People" to reclaim our democracy. The online journal Democracy & Education called it "one of the most important books of the early 21st Century." And Publishers Weekly, in a Starred Review, said "This beautifully written book deserves a wide audience that will benefit from discussing it."
Download or read book A Healthy Society written by Ryan Meili and published by Purich Publishing. This book was released on 2012-04-16 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Income, education, employment, housing, the wider environment, and social supports; far more than the actions of physicians, nurses, and other health care providers, it is these conditions that make the greatest difference in our health. Drawing on his experiences as a family physician in the inner city of Saskatoon, Mozambique, and rural Saskatchewan, Dr. Ryan Meili uses scholarship and patient stories to explore health determinants and democratic reforms that could create a truly healthy society. By synthesizing diverse ideas into a plan for action based on the lived experiences of practitioners and patients, A Healthy Society breaks important ground in the renewal of politics toward the goal of better lives for all Canadians.
Download or read book What Is Government Good At written by Donald J. Savoie and published by McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. This book was released on 2015-08-01 with total page 382 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent decades have shown the public's support for government plummet alongside political leaders’ credibility. This downward spiral calls for an exploration of what has gone wrong. The questions, "What is government good at?" and "What is government not good at?" are critical ones - and their answers should be the basis for good public policy and public administration. In What Is Government Good At?, Donald Savoie argues that politicians and public servants are good at generating and avoiding blame, playing to a segment of the population to win the next election, embracing and defending the status quo, adding management layers and staff, keeping ministers out of trouble, responding to demands from the prime minister and his office, and managing a complex, prime minister-centred organization. Conversely, they are not as good at defining the broader public interest, providing and recognizing evidence-based policy advice, managing human and financial resources with efficiency and frugality, innovating and reforming itself, being accountable to Parliament and to citizens, dealing with non-performers, paying sufficient attention to service delivery, and implementing and evaluating the impact of policies and programs. With wide implications for representative democracy, What Is Government Good At? is a persuasive analysis of an approach to government that has opened the door to those with the resources to influence policy and decision-making while leaving average citizens on the outside looking in.
Download or read book After the Fall written by Ben Rhodes and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2021-06-01 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR 'A dystopian odyssey through the dark authoritarian landscape of the modern world' The Times To be born American in the late twentieth century was to take the fact of a particular kind of American exceptionalism as granted – a state of nature arrived at after all else had failed. In the span of just thirty years, this assumption would come crashing down. After the fall, we must determine what it means to be American again. In 2017, as Ben Rhodes was helping Barack Obama begin his next chapter, the legacy they worked to build for eight years was being taken apart. To understand what was happening in America, Rhodes decided to look outwards. Over the next three years, he travelled to dozens of countries, meeting with politicians, activists, and dissidents confronting the same nationalism and authoritarianism that was tearing America apart. Along the way, a Russian opposition leader he spends time with is poisoned, the Hong Kong protesters he comes to know see their movement snuffed out, and America itself reaches the precipice of losing democracy before giving itself a second chance. After the Fall is a hugely ambitious and essential work of discovery. Throughout, Rhodes comes to realize how much America's fingerprints are on a world it helped to shape: through the excesses of the post-Cold War embrace of unbridled capitalism, post-9/11 nationalism and militarism, mania for technology and social media, and the racism that shaped the backlash to the Obama presidency. At the same time, he learns from a diverse set of characters – from Obama to rebels to a rising generation of leaders – how looking squarely at where America has gone wrong only makes it more essential to fight for what America is supposed to be – for itself, and for the entire world.
