The Polite Revolution: Perfecting the Canadian Dream
Dec 2011 · Sold by McClelland & Stewart
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288
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About this ebook
From one of this country’s best and most controversial political writers, a searing blueprint for the Next Canada.
Five years into the twenty-first century, Canada is viewed as one of the most desirable nations in the world in which to live. Despite the worries of many Canadians — our country’s regional and linguistic divisions, our frequent identity crises — Canada, it seems, has a lot of good things going for it.
The federal election of 2004, however, revealed new cracks in an already flawed political system. John Ibbitson argues that we have entered a new political era, that Canada has become a nation of solitudes — the West, the English Centre, the French Centre, the East — each of which has its own cultural and economic concerns, none of which are being sufficiently recognized by the major political parties. If we cling stubbornly to old methods of governance, he says, we risk losing all that the Confederation has achieved in its first 138 years.
In this compelling, and ultimately hopeful book, John Ibbitson dismantles the old ways of thinking about Canada’s immigration, free trade, social, and defence policies. His ideas for the future of this country are daring — a devolution of power and dollars from the federal to the provincial level, a revamping of medicare, a refashioning of the electoral system. They amount to no less than a revolutionary plan for the creation and defence of a new national dream.
Five years into the twenty-first century, Canada is viewed as one of the most desirable nations in the world in which to live. Despite the worries of many Canadians — our country’s regional and linguistic divisions, our frequent identity crises — Canada, it seems, has a lot of good things going for it.
The federal election of 2004, however, revealed new cracks in an already flawed political system. John Ibbitson argues that we have entered a new political era, that Canada has become a nation of solitudes — the West, the English Centre, the French Centre, the East — each of which has its own cultural and economic concerns, none of which are being sufficiently recognized by the major political parties. If we cling stubbornly to old methods of governance, he says, we risk losing all that the Confederation has achieved in its first 138 years.
In this compelling, and ultimately hopeful book, John Ibbitson dismantles the old ways of thinking about Canada’s immigration, free trade, social, and defence policies. His ideas for the future of this country are daring — a devolution of power and dollars from the federal to the provincial level, a revamping of medicare, a refashioning of the electoral system. They amount to no less than a revolutionary plan for the creation and defence of a new national dream.
About the author
JOHN IBBITSON is one of Canada’s best known and most respected journalists and authors. Since arriving in 1999 at the Globe and Mail, he has served as Washington bureau chief, Ottawa bureau chief, chief political writer and, since 2015, writer-at-large. He co-authored Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline, which has been translated into nine languages and is sold around the world, as well as the national bestseller The Big Shift, both with Darrell Bricker. He is also the author of Stephen Harper, the bestselling and award-winning biography of Canada’s 22nd prime minister. His writing for fiction includes The Landing, which won the 2008 Governor General’s Award for Children’s Literature. In March 2018, on its tenth anniversary, the book was republished by Kids Can Press. John currently serves as the general editor of the "Globe History Project," a series of historical essays exploring the newspaper’s influence on Canadian history, which will be published by McClelland & Stewart in 2024. John Ibbitson lives and writes in Ottawa.
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