The Liberal identity crisis

National Post ^ | 2006-04-08 | Andrew Coyne

[Clive]

Something strange and wonderful is happening to Canadian politics. After decades of trolls and main-chancers, politics is suddenly, miraculously, fit work for decent people again. We have been governed by rogues, of one kind or another, for so long. Now at last dignity, integrity and gravitas are back in fashion.

It is remarkable enough that circumstances should have conspired to place Stephen Harper at the helm of the Conservative party: for all his faults, he is the most talented political leader to come along since Trudeau. Now the same thing is in danger of happening to the Liberals.

I don't know whether any of the current or prospective candidates for Liberal leader would make a good prime minister, or even party leader. That is what leadership races, and elections, are for. But in the emerging "big five" -- Michael Ignatieff, Stephane Dion, Gerard Kennedy, Bob Rae and Ken Dryden (assuming they all run) -- the party shows some impressive bench strength. Their positions on the issues, their political skills, their records -- these remain to be assessed. But as individuals, they are among the best our public life has to offer: thoughtful, eloquent and passionate.

Even longshots like John Godfrey and Martha Hall Findlay raise the bar. They are exactly the sort of people we should want in politics, running for all the right reasons. With the Belinda Stronach silliness mercifully at an end -- maybe now Scott Brison will take the hint -- there is a real chance of the leadership race igniting a serious debate among Liberals on their party's direction.

God knows they need it. It would be hard to overstate the fix the Liberals are now in. Beyond the wounds left by the decade-long war between the Chretien and Martin camps, the party is untold millions in debt. Its fundraising capacity, atrophied from years of disuse -- in power, the party ran less a fundraising campaign than a shakedown operation, relying on a relatively small number of large corporations to finance its activities -- is vestigial at best.

Little remains of the Liberals' once-mighty organization in Quebec, while large parts of the West are the same no-go zone they have been for nearly 60 years. Even Ontario is no longer the stronghold it once was. And they have lost their last remaining tactical advantage: the Conservatives are no longer divided, no longer unknown and no longer in opposition. The fear factor has lost its sway.

All of which amounts to something of an existential crisis for the Natural Governing Party. Others have commented on the threat posed by the loss of Quebec to the party's historic raison d'etre, as the bridge between English and French Canada. But it's worse than that. Since Laurier's time, whatever else the Liberal party has been, it has been the party of power, the conveyor belt into office for ambitious pols of all stripes, who weren't too hung up on questions of ideology or principle. If it is not going to be that any more -- if it can no longer be sure of winning three elections in every four, but must submit to the vagaries of two- or even three-party politics -- then what will it be instead? How will it define itself, having succssfully eluded definition for so long? What is a Liberal Party nowadays?

Previous generations of Liberal leaders never had to answer that question; many of the more established candidates chose not to run this time rather than do so themselves. But the question cannot be avoided. The party has some tough choices to make, choices that will in turn condition its choice of leader. Such as:

Left or Right? Does it try to round up self-described "progressive" voters of various hues, NDP, Greens and others, in a grand coalition of the left? Or does it play to the centre, in a bid to peel off moderate Conservative voters?

Old or New? It is generally agreed that under Paul Martin, the party had slipped its moorings, cut loose from whatever beliefs it once professed. Does it renew its commitment to traditional Liberalism, as the party of Pearson and Trudeau, or strike out in some wholly new direction?

East or West? The most immediate danger is in Quebec, where the Conservatives are threatening to displace the Liberals as the champion of federalist voters. But if the party does not start to rebuild in Western Canada, it has no future. The days when it could put together majorities entirely out of central Canada are over.

In or Out? The Liberals have historically been the party of "insiders," those who were comfortable with federal power, and wanted to harness it to their own ends. Can it still appeal to them? Or must it start to assemble a coalition of the "outs," as the Conservatives did for many years?

It will be fascinating to watch the Liberals debate. Having lost the world, the party may yet regain its soul.

[Clive]

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[saganite]

He shouldn't worry too much about the fate of the liberals in Canada. Their conservatives will morph into liberals soon enough just as our Republicans have morphed into Democrats. /sarcasm/

[goldstategop]

The Liberals were once upon a time Canada's great "catchall" party. They appealed to East and West, to French and English and straddled the divides between ideologies with skill and finesse. That's how it earned itself the pride of place as Canada's Natural Governing Party. For virtually the entire century since Wilfried Laurier, the Liberals embodied Canada. That era came to a close with the defeat of Paul Martin in this winter's parliamentary election and it underscored the reality the Liberals are no longer not only a governing party, they no longer represent the breadth and width of Canada. If the party cannot rebuild itself across the country and appeal to a new generation of voters, it has no future. Time will tell if its able to find its soul again and chart a new course back to the halls of power in Ottawa on Parliament Hill.

(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie. Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")

[fanfan]

[Fair Go]

Sounds like a long stay in the wilderness is what they need.

[fanfan]

40 years would work for me.

;-)

[Heatseeker]

I hate to be a spoilsport, but I've heard this before - remember 1984? In particular I'm not convinced that Quebec will continue to punish the Liberals as memory of adscam recedes into the public's memory.

I think Harper has 2 years at most before Layton pulls the plug.

[Candor7]

Liberal Identity Crisis? Liberals may have problems identifying themselves but I have no problem identifying liberals.

You will now see why Canadian liberals cannot identify themselves and why they are quite easy to spot: