They just finished their Convention.
Whither the Green Party of Canada?
Whither the Green Party?
Tue, 2010-08-24 05:56
#1
Whither the Green Party?
Tue, 2010-08-24 05:57
#2
My own take on this question is going to be purely strategic: coming out of their Convention, and looking at the road ahead, what are their prospects for the election and beyond.
I'm sure others will do the usual the GPC is terrible/doomed, and the GPC is what hope there is. And maybe a little even handed analysis of their 'substantive direction'.
Tue, 2010-08-24 06:29
#3
A few facts and observations first.
The GPC has for all of 2009 been on a severe austerity program, and will remain on it into the election- even if that is a year away. They got rid of all of their organizers that weren't working in May's SGI campaign [who therefore already werent doing any broad basic party organizing]. And there have been other cuts.
It looks like the austerity program has at least been able to stem the dangerous downward financial spiral- unless someone is seriously cooking the books, which is pretty unlikely. But spending in the next election will probably be less than half what it was in the 2008 campaign. And coming up to the campaign there are ever fewer ridings even minimaly active, or registered with elections Canada. The vast majority of them will have considerably less money to spend in the election. And without field organizers there will be less of the kind of low keyed local activity [at least sprinkling around signs] that on the aggregat boosts a small party's national vote share.
The austerity program of course does not extend to May's SGI campaign. Quite the contrary. At least until the Spring they wer spending $20,000 to $30,000 per month, plus GPC paid saleries and the expenses of moving May to BC and setting her up there. Apparently, in Spring the transfers from the GPC were stopped. But they had a considerable cash stash and I will bet anything that they will soon be back to getting the same monthly I.V. feed, whether through transfers or the SGI EDA nationaly fundraising from the GPC donor list.
There is close to unanimous consent that May's riding is THE focus, but a lot of grumblimg even among May supporters that it is the ONLY thing going on in the party.
As well as there being no building in the ridings except the handful that were always autonomously inititaed [and fewer even of those], May has dissappeared off the national radar. The media ignores her. Most of the few exceptions to that are when the media reports turmoil or flakiness. May got a few more puff pieces around the Convention, which is pretty thin.
While the GPC has more or less held up in the polls- the polls are notoriously fickle predictors of how much the GPC vote will drop from there on voting day. It dropped substantially in 2008 when May had a high profile in the debates and went into the campaign riding over a year of strong and uncritical if not fawning media coverage.
Campaigns are where you get delayed reactions to the fundamentals that existed going into the campaign. If the GPC dropped substantially in 2008 with very favourable fundamentals, what is going to happen when they go in to the next election with very weak fundamentals, considerably less of a campaign on all levels, and May no longer the fresh new thing that tips a lot of undecideds?
Tue, 2010-08-24 11:22
#4
The Greens just went through a several month roil of whether to have their consitutionally required leadship election this year. In the GPC the Leader has [had] terms. There are a number of commitment to grassroots democracy reasons for that.
The May camp is the only cohesive 'bloc' in the party, and carries the rest along by default. [Elizabeth walks on water. Not quite any more. But there is plenty of residual of that.] And they decided that a leadership race didnt fit in with their plans. Bogus arguments it might fall with an election, rather than sitting down to schedule it when it could not cnflict... which just happened to be when they were going to have a Convention anyway.
Bogus arguments and attempts to get a quick rubber stamp from governing Council aside, it wasnt just the May camp that did not want a race... even if it could be scheduled with little real chance of coming up against a general election. So this got kicked around for months, past the good date for a leadership election [would have finished now], and a whirl of proposals were out there. The final and predictable result of May getting what she wanted was rife with blatant manipulation that members of no other party would stand for. But truth be told- I doubt the end result would have been much different without it.
Becasue the only appetite for a leadership race before the leadership election was from people who think May is killing the GPC, and for declared leadership hopefull Sylvie Lemieux. Lots of overlap in those two groups, but not the same. Many of the strong critics of May and her leadership do not want a leadership race now- looks like at least a majority even of those.
Lemieux introduced a resolution that would have required the leadership race be started now. Her resolution got enough votes in the pre-Convention voting to come in alive [barely]. And she continued to call for a leadership race now. Its a different crowd that comes to Convention [its actually a BGM, bi-annual general meeting], with a higher representation of activists in general, and of those quite displeased with May's leadership. But May's 'favoured' resolutions got essentially the same level of support at the Convention vote.
If I was a Green, the outcome I would have thought best was for Lemieux to put in a good showing, in the course of which she made concrete just what a weakened state the GPC is in. Good showing, but lose the fight for a leadership race now- which no one except her supporters thought she might win anyway.
When May almost inevitably loses in SGI, the Green vote share nationaly probably goes down somewhat from 2008 levels, and with the party organization just dead.... Lemieux would be established as the only one who had opposed May, and be poised to pick up the pieces after beating a field of lackluster contenders who said nothing when it was happening about what May's "leadership" was doing to the party.
Instead, Lemieux seems to have had little impact, and the ferociously thick headed membership didnt get the knock to the head it needs if its to lay blame where it belongs when things dont go well. There will be all sorts of excuses for that, and even with May not trying to hang on to the leadership, virtually no understanding of the seriousness of the GPC's systemic problems.
The GPC is an incredibly immature organization for the time its been around, at the level it is. The number of activists with some political sense about how to foster an organization of any kind is VERY small. [And this is not just "they dont know how to run a contending electoral party"... not an argument that they dont know how to be like the other party's... too thin a group of savvy people to support ANY kind of organization the size of the GPC.] So the prospects arent good for responding well to the deep dissapointment on the way.
As poorly positioned and prepared as they are for the national election- anything can happen and they may fluke into doing reasonably well [keeping their 2008 vote share]. But its going to take a hell of a lot more than flukes and lucky breaks for May to win in SGI... no matter how much money they spend there.
And all the eggs are in that basket. If they manage to keep something cose to their 2008 vote share, then that will limit the moral and fiancial damage when May falls short in SGI.
But they only MIGHT do decently in the national vote share. And thats looking to be the less likely outcome. The morale effects of even a modest downturn on the heels of May's personal defeat will be devestating in themselves. Plus, they will take a hit in their main revenue source- the per vote subsidy. That plus already flat fundraising that even while it keeps from going south has all the indicators of the donor fatigue that is due to hit all at once.
Tue, 2010-08-24 11:39
#5
And no debate for her next election.
Tue, 2010-08-24 12:20
#6
Persoanlly, I'm not so sure of that. People with contacts in the media tell me that she wont be getting an invite.
But we'll see.
At any rate, since she has been little heard from [and there are no adults in GPC "communications"], being in the debates isn't going to save the Green campaign. Not being in them, and getting a firm rejection, will just make matters worse.
Tue, 2010-08-24 12:27
#7
If May somehow cannot pull off a victory in SGI with the Greens becoming an elect-Elizabeth-May party, then any residual authority she has is gone. Rivals will be emboldened, party faithful will get disheartened, and the party goes into a tailspin.
SGI's numbers are not favourable to the Greens. Okay, they did well in 2004, but the numbers have declined considerably since then. The Liberals will be pushing hard to boot Lunn, and dealing a potential death-blow to a pesky rival is a bonus. The NDP could reclaim third or second place if they actually run a proper campaign next time, and might well send EMay home with a fourth-place finish. But I can see it being a close race, maybe even as close as Saskatoon-Humboldt a couple of elections ago.
If the Greens are betting that EMay's name and throwing every penny they can at the riding is going to work, I think they may well be in for a nasty shock on 41 E-Day.
Tue, 2010-08-24 12:33
#8
May set the bar pretty high in her recent interview with Evan Solomon. She said categorically that she will win her seat, and that they will run 308 candidates. If either of those two does not come to pass, she will lose any remaining credibility with the national media ... the quality for which Greens originally elected her as Leader.
I think the dissidents are wrong to say that building should be going on in all 308 ridings, but it should certainly be going on in more than 1. Guelph would indeed have been the better seat for May, but was impossible for all the well-known reasons of bridge-burning with that particular riding association. Nevertheless, there just does not seem to be any linkage between the riding association who are doing well financially, and the ones who have a realistic shot at growing their vote to within a winnable range.
However, the party's latent "brand" support will continue to erode the Liberal Party's support, as a middle-class protest vote, that will continue to be misinterpreted by the Green leadership as a growth in support for what their party is doing.
The party will be due for a big rethink after the next election, and I don't believe May is the leader best equipped to take them through that.
Tue, 2010-08-24 12:44
#9
I dont think the dissidents mean more than literally when they say pursue all the 308 ridings. They say and mean what you do: there should be a LOT more ridings pursued.
[And this time there will be no money sprinkled around as in 2008, as well as no advance field work since there are no organizers.]
Filling in 308 paper candidates SHOULD not be that hard. But from my observation, it takes a tremendous amount more work than one would think. It seems to be VERY time consuming. [And people keep changing their minds, or not giving real answers about whether they will do it, backing out close to filing deadlines, etc.]
I think there is a good chance they will far short on that.
And of course she says she WILL win. But the GPC has a better chance of significantly exceeding expectations in the national vote, than are May's chances of winning her seat.
Albeit the strongest odds are falling short on BOTH those counts.
Tue, 2010-08-24 12:50
#10
The ONLY chance May has to pull off a squeeker in SGI is to do an INCREDIBLE job of voter identification and get out the vote on SGI. Its questionable whether they are capable of that even given 2 years and a million dollars spent.
But even if they can do a really good job on that, two can play that game. As well as being the incumbent, the core Conservative vote is very stable, very large, and the Conservatives HAVE the data they need to do the same thing. They arent just GETTING it like the Greens. With a fraction of what the Greens spend [even though they dcan easily match if they need to], and with only a one or two month of starting to seriously do the ground campaign [unlike the year or two for the May campaign], Lunn's campaign wont have to break a sweat to match and surpass and identification and E-day work the May campaign does.
Tue, 2010-08-24 14:15
#11
Greg Morrow just wrote a longish blogpost on May and SGI, along with her weekend comments saying that membership numbers are not an indicator of anything. He says that for all the money they've shovelled into SGI, they've identified 3500 marks, i.e., 3250 less than they got votes in 2008. To me you might not expect to have identified your E-day quotient this early, but you'd probably know who most of your core vote was. And 6750 would have to be called the core, as that's who they kept last time, even with prominent Greens calling on people to vote for Liberal Briony Penn. Certainly, it's a good 20,000 or so away from having the marks to win.
Tue, 2010-08-24 14:40
#12
If she has 3500 ID'd that means she may have about 10,000 on e-day, which is still short. To be in the zone you need 7,000+ ID'd.
Tue, 2010-08-24 17:43
#13
3,500 check marks would mean they have spent well past $70 each on getting them.
Campaigns I've been in have ranged from under $4 to an outlier at $7 per check mark.
At that rate, they'll need the entire annual GPC budget left after paying the salaries of May and those close to her to have a good crack at winning.
Tue, 2010-08-24 18:02
#14
Correction: they've spent more than $300,000 in SGI up until the beginning of the month. So thats more than $80 per check mark.
Tue, 2010-08-24 18:09
#15
I don't think May can win in Saanich-Gulf Islands. Not if both the NDP and Liberals run candidates. In order for her to win, all the non-Conservative votes would have to concentrate almost entirely behind her. Even with the NDP candidate basically out of the race in 2008, and most NDP voters supporting Briony Penn and the Liberals, it still wasn't enough to beat Lunn.
Now part of that may be because the Liberal vote collapsed in B.C. to dismal levels, but it still shows how difficult it can be. The Green Party is also not the Liberals or the NDP. It is not yet considered a mainstream party by many voters and many people who would vote Liberal or NDP would not necessarily vote Green.
May probably should have run in Guelph or Bruce-Grey-Owen-Sound where the Green Party received much higher numbers than it has in SGI.
Tue, 2010-08-24 21:36
#16
Greg's written in greater depth tonight, and concludes pretty much the same as all of us: Elizabeth May likely won't win in Saanich-Gulf Islands, and will probably wind up in 3rd place.
Tue, 2010-08-24 21:36
#17
I think the Green's will take Grey/Bruce/Owen Sound.
Tue, 2010-08-24 21:47
#18
I think the Green's will take Grey/Bruce/Owen Sound.
Not unless the Conservative vote falls significantly. The Cons won there by 20 points in 2008.
Tue, 2010-08-24 21:51
#19
I think Miller is going to be defeated, it is just a personal feeling.
Tue, 2010-08-24 21:56
#20
I think the Green's will take Grey/Bruce/Owen Sound.
Really? I find that hard to believe. The new Green candidate is a nice young woman from the sounds of it, but she is no Dick Hibna or Shane Jolley. If the Conservatives fall in BGOS I think it far more likely be to to Kimberly Love who is working like dog in that riding these days.
Tue, 2010-08-24 21:59
#21
I am placing my bet on Hogbin, I am sure she will do better the Love. Love seems like a nice person however I do not think she is part of the riding like Hogbin is.
We will see in time, I might be wrong.
Tue, 2010-08-24 22:08
#22
Emma Hogbin is a great candidate and would make a fine MP. I hope she wins. It would be a real shame I think if she won and then passed her seat over to EMay.
Tue, 2010-08-24 22:15
#23
So is there a nomination battle going on between the Green candidates then?
Tue, 2010-08-24 22:20
#24
No, she won the nomination last weekend. I doubt she would turn the riding over to May.
Tue, 2010-08-24 22:26
#25
Shouldn't the Greens have kept Dick Hibma as their candidate?
Tue, 2010-08-24 22:35
#26
Shouldn't the Greens have kept Dick Hibma as their candidate?
Nice. slam good NDP candidates for running again and then slam a Green for not running again. Cute as well as nice.
Tue, 2010-08-24 22:58
#27
I met her in early 2008 and I think she was living in Owen Sound at the time. I know that she organized 2 technology conferences IN Owen Sound, in 2007 and 2008, which is quite the feat:
Here's her blog: http://www.emmajane.net/
I think she may be more engaged in the riding than you think.
I know that she is a hyper-intelligent woman working in Open Source, successful in a fast paced male-dominated environment, while living in a rural area, and spends her time building systems for people to communicate.
I don't care for the Green party, but I think Hogbin is a candidate worth supporting.
Tue, 2010-08-24 22:59
#28
Life, the univ..... I never heard of Love until BA told me about her just a few months ago.
I rather see Hogbin win because she for the most part as lived and worked in Owen Sound compared to Love.
It will be interesting to watch this riding because of the large number is women trying to defeat Miller.
Tue, 2010-08-24 23:06
#29
I am sure she is a great person. I am talking about political reality. She might be a superstar within a certain group, but as far as being generally know, no. I am pretty plugged in politically and know the riding well, and yet she is a farily unknown name. Love by the way was too, but has really worked to remove that. Hogbin might be able to do that to, but right now the only candidate with a chance is Love- although I recognize that might change. Hibma was a well known and popular city Councillor and Jolley's from an old local well-known family and did an amazing amount of work. Both had a much bigger head start in terms of visibility than Hogbin. There is simply no way to make the case that Hogbin has anywhere near that profile. I have nothing against her, but if an election was held this fall I have difficulting believing the Green vote would hold. Could be very wrong, but that just seems like the reality to me.
Tue, 2010-08-24 23:14
#30
Life, the univ..... I never heard of Love until BA told me about her just a few months ago.
I rather see Hogbin win because she for the most part as lived and worked in Owen Sound compared to Love.
It will be interesting to watch this riding because of the large number is women trying to defeat Miller.
Rather see her win is different than what I was responding too. Given the two choices I might lean that way too. But lets be honest anyone would be an improvement over Mr. Ingnoramous. Voters in that riding will have two great women to choose from. I just hope the vote doesn't spilt too much.
Anyway on to May. As I have mentioned before I was a very early Green and helped to get riding assocications started in a number of riding -including the old riding of Bruce Grey in the 80-90s when Jim Garrity and Don Cianci ran. I left over the rightward drift under Harris. I was disappointed when the party went to May as it was clearly a style over substance choice. I see nothing in what has happened to see that that perspective should change.
Tue, 2010-08-24 23:18
#31
He wasn't interested apparently. I don't think Hogbin can be said to be 'a part of the riding' maybe Owen Sound, but I only live next door in Huron-Bruce and I had never heard of her until the Sun Times story. I'm no Liberal, but the only one with a chance at this time in BGOS is Love from where I am sitting. Two things are clear though defeating Miller will be no easy task and the NDP will be a non factor, unlike here in Huron-Bruce where we have exciting NDP news and a real chance to take out Lobb.
Sorry for the thread drift.
Tue, 2010-08-24 23:30
#32
Life, the univ..... I am not new to the riding however I am only recently in the last few years to follow the politics of the riding.
I agree with and understand your posts.
Wed, 2010-08-25 01:34
#33
Shouldn't the Greens have kept Dick Hibma as their candidate?
Nice. slam good NDP candidates for running again and then slam a Green for not running again. Cute as well as nice.
It's not the same situation. Hibma has only run once so far from what I can tell, not multiple times. And he hasn't been in office and then been defeated and tried to return to it. And I wasn't "slamming" a Green for doing anything. I was asking whether it wouldn't be beneficial to have their candidate from last time run again.
Wed, 2010-08-25 11:03
#34
It's not the same situation. Hibma has only run once so far from what I can tell, not multiple times. And he hasn't been in office and then been defeated and tried to return to it. And I wasn't "slamming" a Green for doing anything. I was asking whether it wouldn't be beneficial to have their candidate from last time run again.
You say you are innocent of any hidden messaging. Sure I believe that because you told me. I'll ignore even the "subtle" one of dissing a woman for running to regain her seat and supporting a man to rerun to try to win after already being a loser once. Lets see Bell bad NDP woman candidate for running to often. Hogbin bad Green woman candidate because she will not let a good man run again.
I get it the patterns are simply coincidental.
Thu, 2010-09-16 10:32
#35
remind
Actually given that she knows how COns think, she might be onto something.
Thu, 2010-09-16 10:41
#36
Heh, a story on Elizabeth May that isnt completely obscure.
The Greens' funky leader sees a Harper election plot
An example of the 180 shift since 2007 and 2008 how the media view May.
And an example of her 'limited wisdom'. Her ideas arent kooky; but talk about them in this contaxt, and shes guaranteed to get this result.
How many opprtunities does she get anymore to talk to the first rank of the Hill journalists? And she uses it like this.
Shows how much she puts into being the national leader.
For that matter, this thread is a reflection of that. All the apples being in the SGI race, it gets a fair bit of babble discussion. While this thread about the GPC as a national party, hasnt been posted in for weeks. And also ends up being a lot about the SGI race.
Fri, 2010-09-17 05:44
#37
I think May was quite astute in analyzing one aspect of Harper's strategy. That is suppressing the overall vote numbers by making people cynical about politics. And then relying on his base to turn out because of the bones he has been throwing to them.
May is naive, however, in ignoring another major part of Harper's strategy. That is counting on the Greens to split the vote and elect an extra dozen or so Conservatives like what happened in the last two elections.
Fri, 2010-09-17 06:45
#38
I dont know how astute- its common knowledge.
And its just dumb to bring it up the way she did.
Fri, 2010-09-17 08:39
#39
remind
May is naive, however, in ignoring another major part of Harper's strategy. That is counting on the Greens to split the vote and elect an extra dozen or so Conservatives like what happened in the last two elections.
Don't think she is naive at all, think she wants the vote split, as I have maintaned all along.
Fri, 2010-09-17 13:16
#40
Yes.
May's presence in Central Nova in 2008 caused the Conservative vote to go up and the NDP vote to go down. Will she have the same effect in Saanich-Gulf Islands?
Sun, 2010-09-19 04:41
#41
Ryan1812
My opinion is that the next election will see zero GPC MP's elected and Elizabeth May ousted as party leader. I'm sorry, but the GPC is too fringe in Canada and has not made serious inroads. The support is too spread out and our first-past-the-post system does them no favors. Some will disagree and tell me they are trending higher in the polls. My counter to that is that they always have polled higher before elections. When it's crunch time, their supporters go to the bigger national parties. Sorry Greens. You are doomed in Canada until we get PR.
Sun, 2010-09-19 07:07
#42
Yes.
May's presence in Central Nova in 2008 caused the Conservative vote to go up and the NDP vote to go down. Will she have the same effect in Saanich-Gulf Islands?
The reason why the NDP vote went down in 2008 is because the previous 2-time candidate who came close to beating MacKay, Alexis MacDonald, wasn't the candidate, and the only reason why the Conservative (and Green?) vote went up is because the Liberals ran no candidate.
I'm convinced that E. May took her orders from her Liberal Party puppet masters to run in ridings where the NDP stood the best chance of defeating Conservatives, to prevent the NDP from gaining more seats, and thus becoming a greater threat to the Liberal lust to return to power.
Sun, 2010-09-19 17:44
#43
I'm convinced that E. May took her orders from her Liberal Party puppet masters to run in ridings where the NDP stood the best chance of defeating Conservatives, to prevent the NDP from gaining more seats, and thus becoming a greater threat to the Liberal lust to return to power.
I think you're getting a little carried away with that theory. It seems your dislike of the Liberals is clouding your objectivity.
It's unlikely that the Green Party prevented the NDP from winning many seats, although it did take away some votes from them, as it did from the Liberals.
Sun, 2010-09-19 23:52
#44
I see we have another typical Babble thread on the Green Party. Begin with the usual negative "analysis" about how terrible the party organization is and how poor a leader they have. Back it up with unsubstantiated "information" that came, for all we know, from a bathroom wall. But it gets better, doesn't it?
Because along comes the looney conspiracy theory crowd. May is secretly a puppet of Harper. No, wait, she's a puppet of the Liberals. Doesn't matter because of course they're all in it together - it's a grand neoconservative conspiracy. Of course, as with most conspiracy theories, the fact that it makes no bloody sense is completely irrelevant. After all, if (as it's been claimed by some around here) Green supporters are really nothing more than neocons with composters, then the Conservatives are, wait for it, splitting their own vote. Nobody ever claimed those masters of the universe were too bright, eh?
So, let's just come out and say what's really at play here. It picks your NDP asses that there are people in this world who care about the environment and poverty and equality and human rights and individual freedoms and (gasp) these people just won't see the NDP as the fount of all truth and wisdom!
So, will May win her riding? I dunno. Will any Green candidates win next election? I dunno. Will any GPC candidates ever win in Canada? I dunno. Like economics, politics is a complex system where events that might seem unthinkable one month happen the next. I can't predict interest rates in Australia or whether the pound will appreciate or depreciate relative to the ruble. And I can't predict the outcome of elections more than a month or two away. Especially with our wildcard FPTP system of electoral gambling.
But it would sure be sweet if she did win - 'cause then I could come back and reference this thread and invite all of you to eat a little crow!
Mon, 2010-09-20 00:05
#45
Personally I would agree that the conspiracy theories serve well to support any suggestion you might have that the possibility the GPC might do well rots Dippers socks. Which is a way of saying we deserve it.
Since conspiracy theories are built heavily on motives as evidence... one plausible motive is as good as another. And most motives offered look at least a little bit plausible.
But if I have to come eat some of that crow for what I did say looked like was happening and likely to happen [as opposed to things merely attributed to me].... I'll have a lot of Greens joining me for the feast.
Mon, 2010-09-20 01:49
#46
Ryan1812
The conspiracy theory stuff is wild and merely what people with little time on their hands come up with. Frankly, I'd love to see May get elected and the Greens win some seats, even enough to become an official party (is it still 12?). But the mere fact that their support is spread out so wide among Canadians makes it impossible. Any party of the grass roots that got elected in Canadian history started with a case i.e. United Farmers, Progressives, CCF etc. They had a main source, a well of support in one specific area and spread from there. My theory is then, and I don't think I'm alone in this, is that the Greens don't have a well of support to draw from. They will have to build this first from the top down, I think, by winning a seat. But Saanich-Gulf Islands? They conistantly support Gary Lunn and the Conservatives. I don't see much of a strategy here in May's choice of constituency. I guess it's the only place she feels she has a shot. But, without any Liberals giving up their candidacy for her this time, I don't think it will be any easier. Beyond May's seat, I don't see any gains or any seats being won. The landscape is Liberal and Conservative with NDP protest votes (outside of Quebec) and Bloc inside Quebec. Bringing in PR will change this, for sure, and I await that day with eagerness.
Mon, 2010-09-20 03:28
#47
I would not assume the Greens cannot win a seat-- it is a steep challenge but other than wishful thinking by those who oppose them I can't see why it absolutely could not happen.
Winning one riding is hardly a huge achievement for a party hovering around 10% in the polls with real deliverable support of at least 5%.
A good local campaign with a lucky dynamic where no other party is far in the lead and a squeeker could happen. As well the Greens can be a party that can sit on protest vote from almost any other party. What limited money the party has is concentrated in to a small number of ridings as well-- if they get the choice of which riding right then that can be a factor.
With these numbers, I'd guess the Greens have about a one in five chance of electing someone somewhere in any election -- if you consider this over 5 elections if the party manages the same sort of numbers, chances are pretty good that something flukey can happen. Then the party assumes that the added publicity and profile from a sitting member will vault them in to higher numbers, something that may or may not happen.
All this said, I think there is a reasonable chance that the person elected won't be Elizabeth May. I am not sure how she would handle that kind of result. One reason for this is that other parties will also try to defeat her.
Once the Greens elect a candidate, I suspect they may get a bit more attention-- then they better have a platform that is more robust than it is and internal policies that stand up to scrutiny. It is hard to say if they can manage that and if they don't then that single seat victory would be a flash in the pan. If they do it is hard to say what happens next. The attention the Greens get in part is because I suspect some are concerned about this.
As for those concerned in the NDP, a more successful Green party is not really such a bad thing-- an ally for PR, but more to the point another voice on the national stage criticizing the Cons. No doubt as well, a further plintering of the vote such that majorities are less likely. The government will not always be a Con Minority, at some point opposition parties will take the initiative and govern. If there is a Green in there is that a bad thing? Those so concerned in the NDP to say can never happen as if theya re so worried that they feel the need to say it over and over again till they hope it comes true, should relax. The NDP is not at risk and the Greens may appeal to those who want a new thing but the NDP has a core vote and a history the Greens do not have and the constituency is quite different. As long as the NDP has good leadership and a reasonable platform it is unlikely to go much below where it is.
Mon, 2010-09-20 05:09
#48
Ryan1812
I agree entirly with what Sean in Ottawa has to say with the exception that even 15% support spread around the country can result in zip. Our FPTP system doesn't do well when support concentration is spread so thin. Other then that, as I said, I welcome some Green MP's as they are needed. As an aside, our parliamentary system doesn't do well with four or five parties, as it favours majority government more then divided minorities. I think a major reform of our elected representation is needed so as tomove towards less partisan politics. I actually admire the American system for this, although the lobbying is just ridiculous.
Mon, 2010-09-20 10:23
#49
Ryan-- please note-- I did not say otherwise.
5% can deliver seats certainly (maybe as I said 1/5 chance)
15% can fail to deliver seats (I'd say lower than 1 in 5 perhaps 1 in 10 chance-- in other words no guarantee but 15% is perhaps 90% chance of winning at least 1 seat)
Really depends on a number of factors and we don't know what the upper limit is for the number of votes needed to guarantee a seat. If the vote is spread evenly perhaps 20% can fail to get seats.
I think we are back to making a case for PR as it is the distribution of votes not the number of them that wins seats when considered federally.
Remember the 1993 result-- Reform party 52 seats with 18.5% of the vote; BQ 54 seats with 13.5% of the vote; PCs 2 seats with 16% of the vote; NDP 9 seats with under 7% of the vote...
Another way of looking at this is this: For a time Quebec used to be famous for massive federal majorities and many people used to say that Quebec all voted the same way. In fact they did not. What did happen is the same breakdown was replicated in the vast majority of ridings where as other provinces had more regional voting patterns.
Mon, 2010-09-20 10:43
#50
I agree with all of the main thrust of your post Sean. Thats the main thing.
As far as the "sidepoints" go:
I would not assume the Greens cannot win a seat-- it is a steep challenge but other than wishful thinking by those who oppose them I can't see why it absolutely could not happen.
Winning one riding is hardly a huge achievement for a party hovering around 10% in the polls with real deliverable support of at least 5%.
With these numbers, I'd guess the Greens have about a one in five chance of electing someone somewhere in any election -- if you consider this over 5 elections if the party manages the same sort of numbers, chances are pretty good that something flukey can happen. Then the party assumes that the added publicity and profile from a sitting member will vault them in to higher numbers, something that may or may not happen.
All this said, I think there is a reasonable chance that the person elected won't be Elizabeth May. I am not sure how she would handle that kind of result.
The last point is effectively moot. If you knew anything about the state of the GPC ship now- including who the other top candiadtes are and their status- however likely or not May to win in SGI, it is here or no one. They have unwittingly made sure of that.
That said, I agree very much that the GPC can elect an MP even under FPTP conditions.
You dont expect a small party to have fantastic and focused strategy for getting that done. But the last several years have been quixotic beyond belief.
Following the logic you outlined, that given enough steady organizing [just what a small party can do], and putting one foot in front of another... it doesnt even need to take 5 elections of spread out support. If you keep running a bunch of campaigns well- one of them is going to get the right breaks. As just happened for the Greens in Brighton, England.
So barring the GPC getting exceptionally lucky with everything riding on that one egg is SGI, this is at least 90% likely to end well.
After that, the quixotic debauch will make it an organizational feat just to get back on track.
The "well. we wont try that one again" resolve will be a no brainer. What comes after that will be the question.
But I think it would be great to have the Greens around with PR. And until then, we all do what we can.
Mon, 2010-09-20 18:48
#51
Ryan1812
KenS and Sean In Ottawa
So we all agree that luck will need to be on the GPC side. I'd share my luck with them if I could, but I'm in China.