Political Thought of Lord Durham

Political Thought of Lord Durham PDF Author: Janet Ajzenstat
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0773561544
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 152

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Book Description
While the standard interpretation has portrayed Durham as prejudiced and ignorant about French Canada, Ajzenstat shows that, on the contrary, the assimilation proposal follows from Durham's consideration of ways of opening the widest political and economic opportunities for French Canadians. She argues that far from being "racist," as so many historians have suggested, Durham's proposals reflect the tolerance at the heart of liberalism which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, origin, or creed. To illuminate the Report's argument, Ajzenstat draws on Durham's speeches, letters, and dispatches, as well as material on Canada which he consulted before arriving at his final proposals. One of his sources, she argues, was Tocqueville's Democracy in America. She compares Durham's position on political reform in Britain and in the colonies and concludes that his ideas on reform, empire and revolution, political constitutions, nationality, and political culture form a single forceful theory. Ajzenstat suggests that Durham's argument clarifies what she sees as a present dilemma for Canada: that legislation intended to protect cherished minority traditions necessarily erodes liberal rights that those minorities hold equally dear.

Political Thought of Lord Durham

Political Thought of Lord Durham PDF Author: Janet Ajzenstat
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 0773561544
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 152

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Book Description
While the standard interpretation has portrayed Durham as prejudiced and ignorant about French Canada, Ajzenstat shows that, on the contrary, the assimilation proposal follows from Durham's consideration of ways of opening the widest political and economic opportunities for French Canadians. She argues that far from being "racist," as so many historians have suggested, Durham's proposals reflect the tolerance at the heart of liberalism which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, origin, or creed. To illuminate the Report's argument, Ajzenstat draws on Durham's speeches, letters, and dispatches, as well as material on Canada which he consulted before arriving at his final proposals. One of his sources, she argues, was Tocqueville's Democracy in America. She compares Durham's position on political reform in Britain and in the colonies and concludes that his ideas on reform, empire and revolution, political constitutions, nationality, and political culture form a single forceful theory. Ajzenstat suggests that Durham's argument clarifies what she sees as a present dilemma for Canada: that legislation intended to protect cherished minority traditions necessarily erodes liberal rights that those minorities hold equally dear.

Political Thought of Lord Durham

Political Thought of Lord Durham PDF Author: Janet Ajzenstat
Publisher: McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP
ISBN: 9780773506374
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 160

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Book Description
Lord Durham's Report on the Affairs of British North America is usually discussed only in terms of its historical context - the events that brought Durham to Canada and the consequences of the Report's reform proposals. In a markedly different approach, Janet Ajzenstat treats the Report as a text in modern political thought. She develops Durham's underlying arguments and assumptions, demonstrating the essentially liberal character of his recommendations and revealing a tough-minded argument about political freedom and the place of national minorities in a free society.

Canadian Conservative Political Thought

Canadian Conservative Political Thought PDF Author: Lee Trepanier
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 100085888X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 234

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Book Description
This book corrects an imbalance in Canadian political literature through offering a conservative account of Canadian political thought. Across 15 chronologically organized chapters, and with a mixture of established and rising scholars, the book offers an investigation of the defining features and characteristics of Canadian conservative political thought, asking what have Canadian conservative political thinkers and practitioners learned from other traditions and, in turn, what have they contributed to our understanding of conservative political thought today? Rather than its culmination, Canadian Conservative Political Thought will be the beginning of conservative political thought’s recovery and will spark debates and future research. The book will be a great resource for courses on Canadian politics, history, political philosophy and conservatism, Canadian Studies, and political theory.

Political Thought in Canada

Political Thought in Canada PDF Author: Katherine Fierlbeck
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 1442604255
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
What, if anything, makes Canada's political identity unique? Pollsters can measure values, but they cannot explain how these values arose over time, why they changed, or how people have attempted to make sense of them within a changing social and political environment. By examining the history of political ideas in Canada, we can better understand why Canada takes the shape that it does. In this book, Katherine Fierlbeck looks at the legacy of ideas taken from (or shaped in reaction to) the nations that have been most influential to Canada's development: the United Kingdom and the United States. The first section looks specifically at the nature of toryism, constitutional liberalism, and market liberalism. Then she examines the evolution of social justice in Canada. Does the country have, as J.S. Woodsworth hoped, a definitive "third way"? The final section focuses upon debates over cultural identity and minority rights. Contemporary political discussions in Canada are very much based upon the expressions of French-Canadian nationalism that have existed as long as, and perhaps even longer than, the country itself. How have these ideas influenced current thinking about culture and accommodation? The experiences;characterized by Canadian political thought also provide insight and ideas for nations around the world as their citizens struggle with similar questions. The political dynamics of the present are a product of how Canadians have viewed their country, or a vision of their country, in the past. These ideas of Canada, in history and in myth, provide a way of thinking about politics that may provoke and inspire Canadians—and others—to reflect upon their future.

Canadian History: Beginnings to Confederation

Canadian History: Beginnings to Confederation PDF Author: Martin Brook Taylor
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 9780802068262
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 532

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Book Description
"In these two volumes, which replace the Reader's Guide to Canadian History, experts provide a select and critical guide to historical writing about pre- and post-Confederation Canada, with an emphasis on the most recent scholarship" -- Cover.

Liberalism and Hegemony

Liberalism and Hegemony PDF Author: Jean-Francois Constant
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 1442693061
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 489

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Book Description
In 2000, Ian McKay, a highly respected historian at Queen's University, published an article in the Canadian Historical Review entitled "The Liberal Order Framework: A Prospectus for a Reconnaissance of Canadian History." Written to address a crisis in Canadian history, this detailed, programmatic, and well-argued article had an immediate impact on the field. Proposing that Canadian history should be mapped through a process of reconnaisance, and that the Canadian state should be understood as a project of liberal rule in North America, the essay prompted debate immediately upon publication. Liberalism and Hegemony assembles some of Canada's finest historians to continue the debate sparked by McKay's essay. The essays collected here explore the possibilities and limits presented by "The Liberal Order Framework" for various segments of Canadian history, and within them, the paramount influence of liberalism throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is debated in the context of aboriginal history, environmental history, the history of the family, the development of political thought and ideas, and municipal governance. Like McKay's "The Liberal Order Framework," which is included in this volume with a response to recent criticism, Liberalism and Hegemony is a fascinating foray into current historical thought and provides the historical community with a book that will act both as a reference and a guide for future research.

Empire of Political Thought

Empire of Political Thought PDF Author: Bruce Buchan
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317314646
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 261

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Book Description
A book about how European colonists in Australia represented the Indigenous peoples they found there, and the tasks of governing them within the terms of Western political thought. It emphasises how the framework of ideas drawn from the traditions of Western political thought was employed in the imperial government of Indigenous peoples.

Red, White, and Kind of Blue?

Red, White, and Kind of Blue? PDF Author: David Schneiderman
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 1442629487
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 325

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Book Description
Situated between two different constitutional traditions, those of the United Kingdom and the United States, Canada has maintained a distinctive third way: federal, parliamentary, and flexible. Yet in recent years it seems that Canadian constitutional culture has been moving increasingly in an American direction. Through the prorogation crises of 2008 and 2009, its senate reform proposals, and the appointment process for Supreme Court judges, Stephen Harper's Conservative government has repeatedly shown a tendency to push Canada further into the US constitutional orbit. Red, White, and Kind of Blue? is a comparative legal analysis of this creeping Americanization, as well as a probing examination of the costs and benefits that come with it. Comparing British, Canadian, and American constitutional traditions, David Schneiderman offers a critical perspective on the Americanization of Canadian constitutional practice and a timely warning about its unexamined consequences.

Politics, Order and History

Politics, Order and History PDF Author: Glenn Hughes
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 0567347389
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 655

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Book Description
This volume brings together critical review papers, many specially commissioned, on key themes and questions in the work of the political scientist, philosopher and religious thinker Eric Voegelin (1901-1985). Areas covered include: (1) Political science: 'Political Religions': manifestations in Nazi Germany and in contemporary European and North American nationalism; (2) International relations: the 'Cold War' in critical perspective; (3) Philosophy: Plato and Aristotle in the reading of Eric Voegelin: contemporary assessments; (4) Sociology: Correspondence of Voegelin and Alfred Schütz; (5) New Testament studies and Christology: questions and developments for Voegelin's interpretations; (6) Old Testament studies: questions and developments from Voegelin's Israel and Revelation; (7) Historical sociology: Revelation and order in axial-age societies; (8) Philosophy of history: Voegelin and Toynbee in contrast; (9) Literary studies: Voegelin in contrast with contemporary literary theory; critical readings of Milton, Greek tragedy.

Canada and the British Empire

Canada and the British Empire PDF Author: Phillip Alfred Buckner
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 019927164X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
Canada and the British Empire traces the evolution of Canada, placing it within the wider context of British imperial history. Beginning with a broad chronological narrative, the volume surveys the country's history from the foundation of the first British bases in Canada in the early seventeenth century, until the patriation of the Canadian constitution in 1982. Historians approach the subject thematically, analysing subjects such as British migration to Canada, the role played by gender in the construction of imperial identities, and the economic relationship between Canada and Britain. Other important chapters examine the history of Newfoundland, the history and legacy of imperial law, and the attitudes of French Canadians and Canada's aboriginal peoples to the imperial relationship. The overall focus of the book is on emphasising the part that Canada played in the British Empire, and on understanding the Canadian response towards imperialism. With contributions from leading scholars in the field, it is essential reading for anyone interested either in the history of Canada or in the history of the British Empire.