Evaluating Prime Ministerial Leadership in Canada: The Results of an Expert Survey
This article reports the results of the largest survey of expert opinion on prime ministerial leadership in Canada, conducted in 2011. The top-rated prime ministers were, in order, Laurier, King, Macdonald and Pearson, who were preferred because of their creative records of achievement and capacity to see the country whole, champion its unity and make for positive change. Survey respondents valued transformational leadership that altered the country, but did so in a cautious way that did not threaten national cohesiveness. The article makes frequent reference to the international literature on leadership, allowing for comparisons across a range of countries.
Political Time in a Westminster Democracy: The Canadian Case
ABSTRACT Stephen Skowronek’s idea of political time is tested by applying it to Canada. Skowronek identified a recurring cycle in US presidential politics, in which a coalition was forged around a distinctive set of ideas, dominated the political scene, and then crumbled, making way for a new coalition; a president’s ability to act as an agent of change depended on his place in this cycle. The concept of political time offers insights for the study of Westminster democracies, but Skowronek’s typology cannot be transplanted from the US to the Canadian context. A political orthodoxy cannot be easily identified in Canada, and prime ministers cannot be clearly labeled as affiliated with or opposed to the ideas of a given era. Some seem determined to play a corrective role, accepting much of the orthodoxy but reconstructing some elements of it. This problem of classification is amplified by the very short term of some prime ministers, by the very long term of others, and by a multiparty system, which has meant that Canadians often end up with prime ministers who are out of synch with the dominant ideas of their age. When applying Skowronek’s ideas to Canada, they emerge as overly structural and not sensitive enough to the possibility that leaders can fail to perform according to type.
The alcohol-aggression stereotype: a cross-cultural comparison of beliefs.
University students (N = 1,008) in eight countries participated in a survey aimed at mapping cross-cultural alcohol expectancies. Multisample structured means analysis was applied to compare changes in aggressive behaviors believed to occur in connection with drinking after "many" alcoholic drinks. Most subjects expressed the belief that intoxication was associated with greater aggressiveness, but there were significant national differences unrelated to self-reported alcoholic beverage preference, frequency of drinking to intoxication, or rates of personal involvement in episodes of alcohol-related aggression. Thus, the expectation that drinking leads to aggression may be determined to a significant extent by contextual factors and cultural traditions related to alcohol use.