The Politics of the Census: Lessons from Abroad
I late June, Minister of Industry Tony Clement announced the government’s decision to eliminate the mandatory long form of the 2011 Census and replace it with a voluntary survey to be sent to one-third of Canadian households. The decision was reportedly made by Prime Minister Stephen Harper last December and has largely been framed by Conservative cabinet ministers as an important change to safeguard the privacy of Canadians. They maintain that the state has no business in the bedrooms of society, or, more specifically, that the state has no business asking Canadians how many bedrooms they have in their places of residence. The Prime Minister ’s Office has stated, “The government made this decision because we do not believe Canadians should be forced, under threat of fines, jail, or both, to disclose extensive private and personal information” (Valpy 2010). Clement, the minister responsible for Statistics Canada, argued before a parliamentary committee on 27 July that though the information gathered in the long form is “valuable,” a “balance must be drawn” between collecting data and the privacy rights of Canadians.
Counting on the census? : race, group indentity, and the evasion of politics
Since the U.S. Constitution first instructed that a slave be counted as only three-fifths of a person, the census has been caught up in America's racial dilemmas. Today it is torn by controversies over affirmative action, evolving racial identities, and minority undercounts. In Counting on the Census? Peter Skerry confirms the persistence of minority undercounts and insists that racial and ethnic data are critical to the administration of policies affecting minorities. He rejects demands that the census stop collecting such data. But Skerry also rejects the view that the census is a scientific exercise best left to the experts, and argues that it is necessarily and properly a political undertaking. To those advocating statistical adjustment of the census, Skerry insists that the consequences of minority undercounts have been misunderstood and exaggerated, while the risks of adjustment have been overlooked. Scrutinizing the tendency to equate census numbers with political power, Skerry places census controversies in the broader context of contemporary American politics and society. He traces our preoccupation with minority undercounts to the pervasive logic of an administrative politics that emphasizes the formal representation of minority interests over minority political mobilization and participation. Rather than confront the genuine social and political problems of the disadvantaged, political elites turn to adjustment to tweak outcomes at the margin. In such a context, where ordinary Americans already feel bewildered by and excluded from politics, the arcane techniques of adjustment would undermine public confidence in this most fundamental function of government. Finally, in a society where racial and ethnic identities are more fluid than ever, Skerry calls for greater realism about the limited accuracy of census data --and for greater tolerance of the untidy politics that accompanies the diversity we have come to value.
[Characteristics of an Effective Statistical System]: Discussion
Le systeme statistique national vise a fournir des donnees pertinentes, completes, exactes et objectives (qui sont a l'abri de l'ingerence politique). Cette information contribue a la realisation de nombreux objectifs; avant tout, elle permet de suivre l'evolution de la conjoncture economique et sociale du pays, de planifier et d'evaluer les programmes et les investissements dans les secteurs public et prive, de tenir des discussions sur les politiques et de les defendre, ainsi que de voir a ce que le public soit toujours bien renseigne. Dix criteres generaux d'evaluation des systemes statistiques nationaux seront analyses dans l'expose: 1. le cadre general, entre autres le volet juridique et la place occupee par le statisticien en chef; 2. les valeurs professionnelles fondamentales; 3. l'objectivite non politique et les mesures prises pour l'assurer; 4. les systemes et les methodes servant a evaluer et respecter les priorites federales; 5. les systemes et les methodes servant a evaluer et respecter les priorites des Etats (provinces); 6. les systemes et les methodes servant a evaluer et respecter les priorites d'autres utilisateurs; 7. les mecanismes de coordination du systeme statistique; 8. la mise en equilibre des priorites en fonction des ressources disponibles; 9. la satisfaction des besoins de differents groupes de clients; 10. la creation d'un environnement favorable.