Political Elites in Canada offers a timely look at Canadian politics and how power brokers are adapting to a fast-paced digital media environment. Elite power structures are changing worldwide, and the rise and fall of political influencers permeates national headlines. In many areas, traditional elites are losing authority over prevailing social, economic, and political structures. Communication between and among elites and citizens is having dramatic implications for political institutions and governance. This volume explores the changing landscape of power brokers, the ascent of new elites, and how these groups are using digital communication to connect with Canadians in unprecedented ways. Featuring empirical studies of governmental decision makers in the public service, such as political staff and public servants, premiers, and judges, and non-governmental influence brokers, such as social media commentators and non-profit organizations, this collection is a much-needed synthesis of elite politics in Canada.

Canada’s political landscape has changed, but scholars are still grappling with the profound alterations brought about by the internet and social media. What’s Trending in Canadian Politics? examines political communication and democratic governance in a digital age. Exploring the effects of conventional and emerging political communication practices in Canada, contributors investigate topics such as the uses of digital media for political communication, grassroots-driven protest, public behaviour prediction, and relationships between members of civil society and the political establishment. This interdisciplinary volume lays robust theoretical and methodological foundations for the study of transformative trends in political communication and in the relationship between political actors, institutions, and democracy. Original and timely, What’s Trending in Canadian Politics? sheds light on digital innovations while providing a broader perspective on the online and offline dynamics of contemporary Canadian political engagement.

For almost its entire history, Canada has been run by the political, media and business elites of Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal. But in the past few years, these groups have lost their power—and most of them still do not realize it’s gone. The Laurentian Consensus, the term John Ibbitson has coined for the dusty liberal elite, has been replaced by a new, powerful coalition based in the West and supported by immigrant voters in Ontario. How did this happen? Most people are unaware that the keystone economic and political drivers of this country are now Western Canada and immigrants from China, India and other Asian countries. Politicians and businesspeople have underestimated how conservative these newcomers are making our country. Canada, with its ever-evolving economy and fluid demographic base, has become divorced from the traditions of its past and is moving in an entirely new direction. In The Big Shift, Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson argue that one of the world’s most consensual countries is becoming polarized, exhibiting stark differences between East and West, cities and suburbs, Canadianborn citizens and immigrants. The winners—in both politics and business— will be those who can capitalize on the tremendous changes that the Big Shift will bring.

Changes in technology and media consumption are transforming the way people communicate about politics. Are they also changing the way politicians communicate to the public? Political Communication in Canada examines the way political parties, politicians, interest groups, the media, and citizens are using new tactics, tools, and channels to disseminate information, and also investigates the implications of these changes. Drawing on recent examples, contributors review such things as the branding of the New Democratic Party, how Stephen Harper’s image is managed, and politicians’ use of Twitter. They also discuss the evolving role of political journalism, including media coverage of politics and how Canadians use the Internet for political discussions. In an era when political communication – from political marketing to citizen journalism – is of vital importance to the workings of government, this timely volume provides insight into the future of Canadian democracy.

A comprehensive account of the structure, process and influence of interest groups and their behaviour in the political systems of Canada and the USA.

Political parties worldwide are using marketing tools such as targeting and segmentation to win elections. Are these strategies making politicians and governments more responsive to voters’ needs, or do they pose a threat to democracy? Political Marketing in Canada, the first book to ask this question of Canada, considers the consequences of political marketing in the realms of public policy, leadership, and the government-citizen relationship. Through dynamic case studies that range from the resurrection of the Conservative Party, to media accounts of political marketing, to Tim Hortons as a political brand, the authors trace how political marketing is transforming the old system of brokerage politics into a new, distinctly Canadian model. Citizens are now viewed as consumers, and platforms and promises have been repackaged as products. Whether this trend is positive or negative, the authors argue, depends on how politicians and governments carry out political marketing – and its promises – in practice.

Winner of the Harold Adams Innis Prize, Politics and Ideology in Canada examines a period of crucial historical change in Canada, beginning in the mid-1970s when the crisis of the Keynesian welfare state precipitated a transition to a new political order based on the progressive "downsizing" of state involvement in the economy and society. Using class and ideology as key concepts, Michael Ornstein and Michael Stevenson examine this transition in terms of the nature of hegemony and hegemonic crisis and the conditions of political order and instability. These concepts guide the interpretation of three large surveys of representative samples of the Canadian public and two unique elite surveys, conducted between 1975 and 1981. The surveys cover an exceptionally broad spectrum of political issues, including social programs, civil and economic rights, economic policy, foreign ownership, labour relations, and language issues and sovereignty. A wide-ranging analysis of public and elite attitudes reveals a hegemonic order through the early 1980s, built around public support for the institutions of the Canadian welfare state. But there was also widespread public alienation from politics. Public opinion was quite strongly linked to class but not to party politics. Regional variation in political ideology on a broad range of issues was less pronounced than differences between Quebec and English Canada. Much deeper ideological divisions separated the elites, with a dramatic polarization between corporate and labour respondents. State elites fell between these two, though generally more favourable to capital. The responses of the business elites reveal the ideological roots of the Mulroney years in support for cuts in social programs, free trade, privatization, and deregulation.