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Of Customs and Coalitions: The Formation of Canadian Federal Parliamentary Alliances*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2009

Ian Stewart
Ian Stewart
Affiliation:
University of British Columbia
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Type
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Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 13 , Issue 3 , September 1980 , pp. 451 - 479
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 1980

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References

1 Webb, Eugene J., Campbell, Donald, Shwartz, Richard, and Sechrest, Lee, Unobtrusive Measures: Nonreactive Research in the Social Sciences (Chicago: Rand-McNally, 1966), 13Google Scholar.

2 In-depth interviews were personally conducted in June and July, 1975, with 35 active members of the three Canadian parties under scrutiny. An attempt was made to ensure that a particular ideological or regional wing of the party was not over-represented. In addition, a few executive and research assistants from all three parties provided some information.

3 Merkl, Peter H., “Coalition Politics in West Germany,” in Groennings, Sven, Kelley, E. W., and Leiserson, Michael (eds.), The Study of Coalition Behaviour (New York: Harper and Row, 1970), 30Google Scholar.

4 Curtis, Michael, Comparative Government and Politics (New York: Harper and Row, 1968), 160Google Scholar.

5 The only federal coalition administration since Confederation occurred in 1917 and was a response not to the hazards associated with minority parliaments, but to the national crisis of World War One. In fact, Borden's pre-coalition ministry controlled 134 of the 221 seats in the House of Commons and was in no danger of parliamentary defeat.

It should be made clear at this point that the fact that several Canadian provinces have at some time been governed by a coalition administration (for example, Manitoba between 1932 and 1950 and British Columbia between 1941 and 1952) does not alter the thrust of the argument. Ignoring the regional and municipal levels of government, Canada has eleven distinct political systems. And this distinctiveness appears whether one is examining political histories, party systems, or, as in this case, parliamentary norms. Since this article is confined to an analysis of parliamentary norms at the federal level, therefore evidence gathered from provincial experiences neither supports nor undermines the arguments presented herein.

6 In 1892, for example, Lord Salisbury met the British House of Commons as prime minister after an election in which his party received only the second largest number of seats.

7 Nicholson, Patrick, Vision and Indecision (Don Mills: Longmans, 1968), 278Google Scholar.

8 Neatby, H. Blair, William Lyon Mackenzie King: The Lonely Heights (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1963), 83–84Google Scholar.

9 Sévigny, Pierre, This Game of Politics (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1965), 70Google Scholar

10 Nicholson, Vision and Indecision, 52–53.

11 Graham, Roger, Arthur Meighen, Vol. II (Toronto: Clark, Irwin, 1963), 378Google Scholar.

12 Nicholson, Vision and Indecision, 284.

13 See Graham, Arthur Meighen, Vol. II, 372, for a discussion of the bribe allegedly received by the Progressive member, A. L. Beaubien.

14 Graham, Arthur Meighen, Vol. II, 374.

15 Ibid., 372.

16 Sévigny, This Game of Politics, 232.

17 Nicholson, Vision and Indecision, 330.

18 Before beginning the analysis, it might be wise to describe briefly the case study to be considered. The results of the 1972 federal election were notably inconclusive, and after several recounts the final standings were as follows: Liberals, 109 seats; Progressive Conservatives, 107 seats; New Democrats, 31 seats; Social Credit, 15 seats; Independents, 2 seats. Clearly, any two of the first three parties acting in concert could ensure the formation of a stable majority government. Equally apparent was the irrelevance of the Social Credit and the Independent members of Parliament. However they chose to deploy their meagre forces, they would be unable to provide the support necessary to catapault a minority party into power with stable majority backing. Popular attention, then, was focussed on the three major actors. Which two parties would make the accommodations and compromises necessary to prevent the immediate holding of another election? Eventually, the New Democratic party decided that when Parliament met, it would provide tentative support for the Liberal government.

19 Gamson, William A., “A Theory of Coalition Formation,” American Sociological Review 26 (1961), 374Google Scholar.

20 Caplow, Theodore, “A Theory of Coalitions in the Triad,” American Sociological Review 21 (1956), 489CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 Gamson, “A Theory of Coalition Formation,” 376.

22 Psathas, George and Stryker, Sheldon, “Bargaining Behavior and Orientations in Coalition Formation,” Sociometry 28 (1965), 126CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.

23 Caplow, “A Theory of Coalitions in the Triad,” 490.

24 Chaney, Marilyn V. and Vinacke, W. Edgar, “Achievement and Nurturance in Triads Varying in Power Distribution,” Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 60 (1960), 179CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.

25 In coalition theory, the two seat difference between the two major parties following the 1972 federal election (Liberals, 109; Conservatives, 107) is insignificant in comparison to the almost 80-seat gap between both major parties and the New Democrats. Hence, although we may later have cause to question this assumption, all but the most formalistic of coalition theorists would consider the Liberals and Conservatives to be equal.

26 The following choce matrix illustrates this phenomenon:

27 Abraham De Swann, “An Empirical Mode of Coaliton Formation in an N-Person Game of Policy Distance Minimization,” in Groennings, Kelley, and Leiserson (eds.), The Study of Coalition Behavior, 424.

28 Damgaard, Eric, “The Parliamentary Basis of Danish Governments: The Patterns of Coalition Formation,” Scandinavian Political Studies 4 (1969), 43CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

29 Axelrod, Robert, Conflict of Interest (Chicago: Markham Publishing, 1970), 170Google Scholar.

30 Downs, Anthony, An Economic Theory of Democracy (New York: Harper and Row, 1957), 46Google Scholar.

31 Taylor, Howard F., Balance in Small Groups (New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1970), 292Google Scholar.

32 In conversation with the author in July 1975. Unless otherwise specified, no interview excerpts will be attributed to a specific source. Hence, subsequent references of this kind will not be footnoted.

33 The Edmonton Journal, November 13, 1972, 1.

34 Riker, William H., The Theory of Political Coalitions (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1962), 126Google Scholar.

35 The Toronto Star, October 31, 1972, 1.

36 The Toronto Star, November 14, 1972, 3.

37 John Meisel's analysis of party voting support in the 1968 federal election revealed other areas of commonality between the Conservatives and the New Democrats. Although the two parties differed on the proportion of their backing by sex and length of residence in Canada, their relative support on such indicators as religion, language, and class were quite similar. See his Working Papers on Canadian Politics (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1973), 2–13Google Scholar.

38 In his study of the Conservative party, George Perlin has reached a similar conclusion. He asserts that “the less competitive the [party] system, the more likely it is that patronage-oriented activists will be concentrated in the dominant party,” while “the people attracted to activist roles in minority parties are more likely to be acting from policy or affective reasons.” Hence, Perlin concludes that “there is a kind of minority-party syndrome in which the Progressive Conservative party has been trapped.” See The Tory Syndrome: Leadership Politics in the Progressive Conservative Party (Montreal: McGill-Queen's, 1980)Google Scholar.

39 The Toronto Star, November 3, 1972, 9.

40 The Toronto Star, November 16, 1972, 3.

41 Ibid.

42 Ibid., 1.

43 The Toronto Star, November 14, 1972, 3.