95. Canada has way more (relevant) political parties than the US, despite using first-past-the-post voting.
In the current Parliament, there are members from five different parties (Liberals, Conservatives, NDP, Bloc Québécois, and Greens). In the US, there are two.
Conversation
Because of first-past-the-post, Canadians don't actually have more choices to vote for, though. Very few ridings (districts) have more than two competitive candidates.
However, more parties does make for a very different *power landscape*, with more relevant actors at any time.
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For example, depending on the election, there might be two or maybe even three different inter-party power struggles, which does have the effect of making individual parties proportionally less powerful.
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96. Canadian politicians are much more partisan/better whipped than American ones.
In the US, it's rare that all members of a party will vote the same way. In Canada, it's rare that party members will be *allowed* to vote against the party line on an important bill.
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The main effect of this is that the party of your MP matters much more than their individual beliefs. Party platforms are more coherent and consistent.
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In combination with the point about multi-party first-pass-the-post, this means that most Canadians get to pick between two of about 5 different platforms to support, but *which* two depends on their riding.
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97. Canadian political parties select their leaders internally, rather than hosting public primaries. This tends to select for boring politicians who are good at playing party politics.
The Beaverton gets this basically right:
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This largely protects Canada from electing, say, a billionaire real estate mogul/reality TV star.
On the other hand, it somewhat reduces the already-limited executive role of the Prime Minister by restricting the role to maximally boring people.
e.g.,
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98. Canadian politics are driven by boring pragmatic issues. American politics are driven by clashes between different high-minded ideals.
On average, the Canadian government works much better than the American one. But, the US government is based on much better ideals.
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The US Declaration of Independence talks of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
The Canadian constitution has "peace, order, and good government" as the closest equivalent.
I like peace and order, but they're not quite as inspiring as liberty and happiness?
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99. These differences (🇨🇦 pragmatism, 🇺🇸 idealism) have real, measurable consequences.
For example:
The US is probably the only country that seriously protects free speech. This has an enormous cost, as most strong principles do. Most Canadians don't think it's worth it.
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However, the strength of American principles means that the actual, real, in-the-world US government can never actually achieve them.
The real world Canadian government does a better job of actually implementing the principles it has.
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100. Across all the areas I've talked about, I think there's a common theme:
Canadians care about the median, rather than the extreme. They prefer pragmatism over idealism.
Americans care about being #1, median be damned. They'll insist on their ideals, not matter the cost.
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Americans are dreamers in a way that Canadians aren't, and frankly don't want to be.
But dreaming can be a distraction when you have real problems to solve. How useful is it reach for goals you'll never achieve?
And yet, if you don't dream, how do you know where to go?
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I think appreciating both of these perspectives has been useful for me.
If you find yourself drawn to one or the other, I think it's fun to try on the other for size, and maybe travel to the right place might help you do that.
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And there it is! 100 thoughts on differences between Canada and the US, just barely squeezed into 2021.
Happy Threadapalooza! 🎉
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