Canada's Balkanization Crisis: causes, symptoms, solutions

Fri, 2008-12-26 22:25

gram swaraj

Caissa wrote:
Canda has been a confederation of regions since the beginning. I don't see it any more so now than it has at any other time since 1867. I think the angst is unwarranted.

Is the glass half-full or half-empty?

We agree on the existence of regionalism in Canada. Your reasoning is that Canada has stuck together despite its regionalism, and may continue to do so. I'm saying this confederation will always be unwieldy because of its regionalism. I think we're both right.

To answer Sven, if Quebec goes, I really don't see western Canada wanting to hang around with the eastern fragments for long (and yeah, an independent western Canada would be even more heavily dominated by conservative ideology). Quebec separation would be a "rupture" of confederation - this is what some Quebecers themselves call it. Rupture: something exploding and ripping apart from the inside. As Charles Doran noted in his article (link posted above) Quebec separation could well lead to a series of weakened states north of the US border. With the "glue of confederation" gone, Canada would rip apart along its seams.

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Fri, 2008-12-26 22:43

#53

gram swaraj

Brian White wrote:
Canada is in great danger. People have this dopey idea that we are
too pure and our system is too strong for this to happen to us.

The dopey, doped-up "people" you speak of have bread to eat and video games to play. And all is well in Rome.

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Fri, 2008-12-26 22:59

#54

gram swaraj

Here's an article that I think is becoming a classic:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&lr=&q=info:GTqnoltmuV0J:scholar....

Will Canada Unravel? by Charles F. Doran, Foreign Affairs, 1996

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Fri, 2008-12-26 23:06

#55

gram swaraj

skarredmunkey wrote:
The roots of regionalism - or balkanization - in Canada, are so much more complex. To attribute Canada's entire party system or its regional fragmentation to a pissant prime minister who's been in power for under 3 years, or to the electoral system, or to George W. Bush, is so effing silly that it boggles the mind.

I'm not attributing regionalism to one man who's been PM for 3 years, or to the electoral system alone. One person is not the powder keg, but could be the fuse that sets it off. There may not be a "balkanization crisis" in Canada at the moment, but the potential for fragmentation and break-up lurks beneath the Canadian fabric.

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Sat, 2008-12-27 00:43

#56

martin dufresne

I find it really funny how you folks manage to discuss Quebec as if it weren't in the room. (Thanks Fidel for your apocalyptic vision of our future without the civilizing influence of the ROC...)

Sat, 2008-12-27 00:58

#57

Fidel

Quebec elites will sell you all down the Mississippi same as the ROC establishment. You'll be speaking American and paying through the nose for your own hydro in good time.

Sat, 2008-12-27 12:12

#58

gram swaraj

martin dufresne wrote:
I find it really funny how you folks manage to discuss Quebec as if it weren't in the room.

Don't feel lonely, martin. To most western Canadians, anything east of the Manitoba-Ontario border feels "out of the room." And I'm sure western Canada is spoken of as being "out of the room" in Ontario, Quebec and the Maritimes. And then there's the north, the forgotten attic, gaining some notice (much of it avaricious no doubt) now that the ice is melting. It's a big country.

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Sat, 2008-12-27 13:37

#59

George Victor

The WHOLE POINT of this thread, however, should be to ascertain the DEGREE of alienation ("balkanization") ...otherwise, it is just another exercise in CREATING that condition. And the postings, above, demonstrate this.

Is it grass roots, or media directed, etc. etc.

Sat, 2008-12-27 19:45

#60

Fidel

And marauding multinational energy companies, the IMF and WTO etc wouldnt even have to put in for a hit on us thru NATO. No austerity programs or Gladio needed in our case, because they've given half of it away already since 1985. The oil fields and natural gas were safely in their hands decades ago. Canadians are reduced to servicing ridiculous amounts of debt owed to private banksters and begging our colonial administrators to sell off what's left in hopes that foreign billionaires will actually share our own wealth with us, if our own democratically elected governments will not. And that, my friends, is a pathetic dream.

Wed, 2008-12-31 13:37

#61

saga

Just a thought ...

No one has mentioned Aboriginal Rights to the land. Everyone assumes the land and resources belong to 'Canada' or whatever it splits up to become.

As Quebec has already learned, we cannot 'split up' what does not belong to us. A split up of Canada would result in a massive grab for resources, with the US coming up the middle to grab total control. The only feasible defence would be by Indigenous Nations, as Canada would be too polarized to effectively defend itself, imo.

Perhaps we'd end up as regions split along the lines of the traditional Indigenous Nations ... hmmm ...

I think if we get rid of Harper, we can deal with the polarization. Turns out the west didn't just want "in", they wanted it all. (oops! possibly a divisive statement? Please feel free to tell me how I am wrong.)

Wed, 2008-12-31 16:54

#62

Fidel

saga wrote:

Just a thought ...

No one has mentioned Aboriginal Rights to the land. Everyone assumes the land and resources belong to 'Canada' or whatever it splits up to become.

Aboriginal rights simply do not fit in with the Anglo-American view of globalization and deregulation, and "free markets." Observe the dearth of aboriginal rights in that country since Europeans came and "pioneered" a new world, Iow's, they committed genocide and took over already existing native land and settlements, many with crops ready for harvest at the time of first contact. And successive Canadian governments have gained worldwide notoriety for abusing indigenous people with policies for physical and cultural genocide, and with current governments still encouraging theft of valuable property rights by marauding transnational energy companies and foreign capital. And Latin America's indigenous people have suffered physical elimination by despotic governments friendly to the US for a long time and ongoing. Canada has been extremely cooperative to a US economic and political plan throughout the world that has been described as a modern day equivalent of British style enclosure.

Sat, 2009-01-03 22:54

#63

gram swaraj

Fidel wrote:
Canada has been extremely cooperative to a US economic and political plan throughout the world that has been described as a modern day equivalent of British style enclosure.

And Canada has been extremely cooperative to this plan on Canadian soil. It's one of the ties that binds, eh?

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Sat, 2009-01-03 23:13

#64

gram swaraj

George Victor wrote:
The WHOLE POINT of this thread, however, should be to ascertain the DEGREE of alienation ("balkanization") ...otherwise, it is just another exercise in CREATING that condition. And the postings, above, demonstrate this. Is it grass roots, or media directed, etc. etc.

It would be foolhardy to ignore Canada's inherent regionalism.

Ce que j'aimerait CREER, c'est un Canada unie et democratique, un pays pour les peuples, pas pour les interets des corporations.

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Sun, 2009-01-04 01:47

#65

Fidel

"I think it would be a good idea." -- Gandhi, when asked what he thought of Western civilization

Canada's Balkanization Crisis: causes, symptoms, solutions

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