1. Democracy & Canadian Government

2. At its heart democracy is based on the idea of “rule by the people, for the people.”  the authority to rule comes from the people  “the will of the people”
There is free & open competition amongst various individuals and groups
Leaders and those in formal positions of power must be accountable to the people.
Democratic values include: political freedom, gov’t accountability, peaceful change, political participation, and many other values associated with individualism.

3. Requirements for Democracy:
Citizens must be able to remove leaders through elections at frequent, guaranteed intervals
Must be true choice between different candidates and parties  multi-party systems (Canada and most of world) provide this better than the two party system in USA
Elections must be free of fraud, bribery, intimidation, and conducted by secret ballot
Universal suffrage (right of every adult citizen to vote) must be guaranteed.

4. Citizens must have freedom to associate with any political group they choose
Every citizen must have equal political & legal rights
Judiciary must be independent (judges free from political control)
Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, protection of minority rights, freedom from arbitrary arrest and prosecution must be guaranteed.

6. Types of Democratic Systems
Direct Democracy – ancient Athens, all decisions are made by all citizens, everyone votes on every decision.
- Plebiscites and referendums may be held on single issues and are a form of direct democracy
- Major problems: Highly impractical unless population is very small, often the problems voted on are too complicated for all to understand or simply too numerous.
Representative Democracy – the common form of democracy in the modern world, solves problems of direct democracy, citizens elect representatives who make decisions on their behalf (in their interests, in theory)

7. These gentlemen may be participating in a form of direct democracy…

8. Canadian Gov’t
Federal system: 1 federal gov’t, 10 provincial governments, 3 territorial governments
Both federal and prov. levels of gov’t have 3 branches: executive, legislative, judicial.
Executive: - responsible for enforcing or executing laws
Legislative: - responsible for making laws
Judicial: - responsible for interpreting the laws

10. The separation of powers between executive, legislative, and judicial branches of gov’t divides responsibilities between different people to ensure accountability and responsible government
Confidence motions are important bills or votes in the House of Commons where if the gov’t loses the vote they must resign and a new election will be held.
(In theory) this ensures accountability because the opposition parties hold the governing party responsible for their actions.
Canada is divided into ridings or constituencies of approx. 100,000 people  each elects a single representative to the House of Commons in Ottawa  system is known as single-member constituency

12. Representation by population – “rep by pop” – each citizen gets one vote, and each elected rep should serve the same number of citizens.
First Past the Post (FPTP) – the person with the most votes wins, even if they have less than 50% of the votes.
EXAMPLE OF FPTP:
Harley Harwood 34% of votes in one riding
Greg Dempsie 13% of votes in one riding
Alex McKay 18% of votes in one riding
Kaitlyn Miller 35% of votes in one riding
Who wins the seat for the 30-1 riding? (Everyone else gets nothing!)

13. EXAMPLE OF PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION:
Proportional Representation – seats are equal to a party’s total percentage of the popular vote
EXAMPLE OF PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION:
If there were 100 seats total in the WGM House of Commons:
United Brandt Movement – 29% of vote = 29 seats
New Duke Party (NDP) – 33% of vote = 33 seats
Seguin Solidarity – 4% of vote = 4 seats
Machacek Party – 34% of vote = 34 seats
Under FPTP it is unlikely Tristan’s party would have won any seats, but under proportional representation they at least get a small number.

14. Proportional rep. helps out smaller parties and results in more minority government situations or coalition governments where two parties must work together.
The Conservatives were a minority gov’t from and needed at least one other party to vote with them for any bill to pass.
FPTP usually leads to majority government situations, where one party has at least 50% of the seats, and can therefore pass bills and make laws more quickly and easily.
(like Harper and Conservatives have right now).

16. Major political parties in Canada:
Conservative Party
Liberal Party
New Democratic Party (NDP)
Bloc Quebecois (BQ)
Green Party
Generally speaking the Greens, Bloc and NDP tend to place more emphasis on the left-wing value of economic equality while the Liberals tend to be slightly right of center and the Conservatives are more right-wing.

17. Governor General
Canada is technically a parliamentary democracy and also a constitutional monarchy
We have an elected House of Commons, but an appointed Senate and Governor General.
The Queen is technically Canada’s head of state, the GG is the Queen’s representative in Canada and acts as head of state.
GG is largely a ceremonial or symbolic role  not much actual power on a day-to-day basis.
Main duty: - signing off on bills (giving “Royal Assent”) that have been passed, officially making them law.
Serves as a representative of Canada at important ceremonies, on trips to other countries, meeting foreign leaders, etc.

18. GG is chosen by Prime Minister and then appointed by the Queen.
GG can be seen as going against principles of liberal democratic ideology because:
Appointed not elected
Position doesn’t do much and can be very expensive for taxpayers
Represents ties to a hereditary monarchy
Each province also has a lieutenant-governor who does the same thing as GG but on provincial level

19. The Senate
105 members appointed officially by the Governor-General, but in reality named by the P.M.
Based on regional representation NOT rep. by pop.
The Senate approves all bills passed by the House of Commons, can vote not to approve them but this doesn’t happen much.
After senate approval and the Gov-Gen’s official signing, a bill becomes a law.

20. Members of Senate stay there until age 75
Attendance of senators and extremely high salaries and expenses has been a concern
Senators are partisan (still practice party solidarity)  P.M. can “stack” the Senate with political allies and friends (this is called patronage)
Proposed changes:
Abolish senate totally
Elect senators democratically
Limit terms of service for Senators (8 years max for example)

21. Party solidarity – elected representatives from each party are expected to vote according to their party’s official position (ideology) except when there is a free vote.
Lobby groups – also called interest groups, special interest groups – try to influence the decisions of parties and elected reps.  usually focused on ONE specific issue (ex: protecting environment, equal rights for LGBT people, etc.)
Consensus decision making – may also be used to make decisions based on group discussion rather than voting, used mostly by First Nations groups

22. ADVANTAGES Gov’t is more likely to serve the interests of the people
Best form of gov’t for protecting people’s freedoms
Democracy leads to better citizens: self-governing, confident, inquiring, intelligent, responsible  this is b/c the use of force is replaced by logical debate.
Open society where ALL (citizens, media, politicians) are allowed to have a say.

23. DISADVANTAGES
Rule by majority can end in abuse of minority rights, known as “tyranny of the majority” Example: the white majority in the U.S. approved of slavery
Representatives are now dealing with problems beyond their understanding & abilities.
Democracy is sometimes too slow/inefficient in its decision making.
Lobby groups and media can gain too much influence.
Political apathy (voter turnout) is a major threat to democracy, when you have a significant % of the population that doesn’t participate, democracy functions poorly.

24. One possible opinion of democracy…