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CCF-NDP Popularity and the Economy*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2009

Lynda Erickson
Lynda Erickson
Affiliation:
University of British Columbia
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Extract

This note examines the impact of changing economic conditions on the popularity of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation-New Democratic party from 1954 to 1984. Using a form of aggregate analysis to test hypotheses developed from the literature, the study finds considerable variability over time periods, especially in the effects of income and inflation. It is suggested this may be a result of the brokerage party system and the minority status of the CCF-NDP in that system. More consistent results were evident for unemployment but the impact of unemployment was negative and therefore contrary to that hypothesized. The importance of this factor in NDP popularity, however, seems to have declined in the last decade.

Résumé

Cette note de recherche étudie l'impact des fluctuations de l'éonomie sur la popularité du CCF-Nouveau parti démocratique de 1954 à1984. À partir d'une analyse globale cherchant à vérifier les hypothèses déjà émises par des études antérieures, cette étude montre que l'impact du revenu et de l'inflation varie considérablement d'une période à I'autre. Ces données suggérent en outre que les variations peuvent être dûes au système de marchandage des partis et au statut minoritaire du CCF-NPD dans le système. Les résultats sont encore plus probants dans le cas du chômage, quoique négatifs et en sens inverse de l'hypothèse énoncée. L'impact de ce facteur sur la popularité du parti néo-démocrate semble diminuer depuis 1970.

Type
Notes
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 21 , Issue 1 , March 1988 , pp. 99 - 116
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 1988

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References

1 Young, Walter D.The Anatomy of a Party: The National CCF (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1969).Google Scholar

2 See, for example, Cross, M. (ed.), The Decline and Fall of a Good Idea: CCF-NDP Manifestoes 1932 to 1969 (Toronto: New Hogtown Press, 1974);Google Scholar and Zakuta, Leo, A Protest Movement Becalmed (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1974).Google Scholar Alan Whitehorn argues that the usual picture of deradicalization of the party after its early years may overemphasize the socialist character of the party in the 1930s and underemphasize the continuity of its commitment to socialist principles. See Alan Whitehorn, “The CCF-NDP: Fifty Years After,” in Thorburn, Hugh G. (ed.), Party Politics in Canada (5th ed.; Scarborough: Prentice-Hall, 1985), 192–204.Google Scholar

3 These data were collected as part of a larger project on the economy and party popularity in Canada undertaken by the author with Kristen R. Monroe. Since earlier results on the CCF-NDP posed a number of unresolved questions, the data from the earlier analysis were temporally extended and reanalyzed using categories especially relevant to the CCF-NDP. For a discussion of the larger project and our earlier results, see Monroe, Kristen and Erickson, Lynda, “The Economy and Political Support: The Canadian Case,” Journal of Politics 48 (1986), 616–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4 Young, , Anatomy of a Party, 124–25.Google Scholar

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6 The party's representation in the House of Commons dropped from 25 to 8 seats.

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11 Although the Conservatives were responsible for establishing a number of public corporations and have traditionally accepted a public/private mix in the economy, in the late 1970s they became more critical of state ownership and began to advocate privatization of a number of these enterprises.

12 This disagreement stems in part from the difficulties of determining policy differences in a system in which party rotation in office has been rare. For 24 of the 30 years from 1954 to 1984, the Liberals were in office. As a result, Conservative party positions on issues were often determined simply by the need to oppose the government. It is, in this context, difficult to determine “real” Conservative preferences.

13 For this position, see Monroe, and Erickson, , “The Economy and Political Support: The Canadian Case,”Google Scholar and Irvine, William P., “The Canadian Voter,”Google Scholar in Penniman, Howard R. (ed.), Canada at the Polls, 1979 and 1980: A Study of the General Elections (Washington: American Enterprise Institute, 1980), 55–85.Google Scholar

14 See, for example, Johnston, Richard, “Economic Factors in Recent Canadian Elections: Some Survey Evidence,” paper presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association, Vancouver, 1983. Janine Brodie has argued that it was only in the late 1970s that the major parties' policies became distinctly different on economic issues. She contends it was then that “the Progressive Conservatives became the party of free enterprise and decentralization while the Liberals became the party of state intervention in the economy and federal power.”Google Scholar See Brodie, M. Janine, “Tensions From Within: Regionalism and Party Policy in Canada,” in Thorburn (ed.), Party Politics in Canada, 74.Google Scholar

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19 Goldthorpe et al., The Affluent Worker, chap. 1.

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23 Ibid..

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26 There is a burgeoning literature on government popularity and the economy. Although initially focussed on the United States it has expanded to include a number of countries with both parliamentary systems and socialist or social democratic parties. For a review of the literature which includes many of the studies from outside the United States, see Paldam, Martin, “A Preliminary Survey of the Theories and Findings on Vote and Popularity Functions,” European Journal of Political Research 9 (1981), 181–99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

27 Kiewiet, , Macroeconomics and Micropolitics, 8.Google Scholar

28 This notion of policy voting does not rely upon a fixed, inverse relationship between inflation and unemployment. Rather, politicians need only see that policies which give attention to one of these problems pose difficulties for the other. See Ibid.

29 Two exceptions with regard to the NDP in Canada are the studies by Richard Johnston and by Kristen R. Monroe and Lynda Erickson discussed in the next section.

30 For aggregate effects, see Goodman, Saul and Kramer, Gerald H., “Comments on Arcelus and Meltzer: The Effect of Aggregate Economic Conditions on Congressional Elections,” American Political Science Review 69 (1975), 781–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For micro-level evidence, see Kiewiet, , Macroeconomics and Micropolitics, chap. 4.Google Scholar

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32 Ibid.

33 Rosa, , “Economic Conditions and Elections in France.”Google Scholar

34 Declining incomes, increasing unemployment and rising inflation are used here as simply three different indicators of deteriorating economic conditions.

35 Monroe, and Erickson, , “The Economy and Political Support: The Canadian Case.”Google Scholar

36 Morton, , NDP: The Dream of Power, 8.Google Scholar

37 Young, , Anatomy of a Parly, chap. 5;Google Scholar and Surich, Jo, “Purists and Pragmatists: Canadian Democratic Socialism at the CrossroadsGoogle Scholar,” in Penniman, Howard (ed.), Canada at the Polls: The 1974 Election (Washington: American Enterprise Institute, 1975), 121–48.Google Scholar

38 Brodie, Janine and Jenson, Jane, “The Party System,”Google Scholar in Whittington, Michael S. and Williams, Glen (eds.), Canadian Politics in the 1980's (2nd ed.; Toronto: Methuen, 1984), 261–64.Google Scholar

39 Ibid., 262.

40 Johnston, “Economic Factors in Recent Canadian Elections.” The economic variables used in this analysis included personal unemployment, respondent's material satisfaction, the year-over-year real income change in the respondent's region of residence and, for 1979, views about unemployment and inflation policy.Google Scholar

41 Monroe, and Erickson, , “The Economy and Political Support: The Canadian Case,” 637.Google Scholar

42 The Gallup Poll 235-486 [machine-readable files and accompanying codebooks] Roper edition (Toronto: Canadian Gallup, 1954 through 1984).

43 Given the large number of undecided respondents in many of the surveys, the party support variable was calculated both including and excluding them from the denominator. The data set was then analyzed using both versions of the variable. Since results for the two sets of calculations were similar, only those using the former version were included here.

44 The question of which economic indicators should be used to measure the impact of the economy is a subject of debate in the literature on the economy and party popularity. To some extent, however, differences stem from different research agendas. For some like this author, research is prompted by the simple question of whether economic circumstances affect voters' support for various parties. For others, the aim is to develop more sophisticated models of voter response to various economic conditions. For the former research agenda, straightforward economic indicators such as those used here would seem most appropriate. For the latter, more sophisticated measures involving, for example, time lags, economic trade-offs and differentials over different administrations are more appropriate.

45 The model was also tested using a political variable to take into account the effects of election campaigns on party popularity. Since the results were similar to those using the original model, they have not been included here.

46 See White, Kenneth J., “A General Program for Econometric Methods–Shazam,” Econometrica 46 (1978), 239–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

47 But see Archer, , “The Failure of the New Democratic Party.”Google Scholar

48 Kiewiet, , Macroeconomics and Micropolitics, chap. 5.Google Scholar For evidence that Canadians are generally more averse to inflation than unemployment, see Johnston, Richard, Public Opinion and Public Policy in Canada, vol. 35,Google ScholarResearch Report for the Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press for Supply and Services Canada, 1986), chap. 4.Google Scholar

49 For a comparative description of the instability of the economy-popularity relationship, see Alt, James E. and Chrystal, K. Alec, Political Economics (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983), 150–52.Google Scholar

50 Ibid. The role of the media in focussing public attention on the economy may also complicate this relationship.

51 As with other survey-based analyses, measurement and sampling error may also introduce an element of instability into the results.