Academic literature on the topic 'Canada – Politics and government – 2006-2015'

City Politics, Canada, James Lightbody, Peterborough: Broadview Press, 2006, pp. 576.Scholarly research on Canadian urban politics has never been extensive, and the few who teach in the field have had to make do with a limited range of textbooks, mostly focused on the institutions of local government. Those wanting to extend their coverage to deal with such issues as the importance of globalization, social movements, race and ethnicity, social inequality, urban political culture, regional governance, the media, and federal policy, have been forced to rely on an assemblage of diverse materials. As well, the politics of, and role played by, the suburbs is often marginal to most texts, focused as they are on the politics of the largest central cities.

References are the most political of cases, almost always involving high profile public policy issues. Frequently, references are brought to obtain rulings on the relationship between the federal government and the provinces. Less frequently, references involve questions of interbranch relations, that is, between two or more of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government. The Senate Reform Reference was one of the rare cases that featured each of these three elements. This article analyzes the Senate Reform Reference on several political levels. First, it situates the reference in terms of megaconstitutional politics, the long-held Canadian practice of attempting to resolve constitutional issues through formal and often high-profile negotiations between the federal and provincial governments. Such interactions have been anathema to the Harper government which has preferred unilateral political action to negotiated political agreement. The article then examines interparty politics or the relationship between the Harper government and the opposition parties during the period of minority government (2006–2011). This is the period during which one would have expected the government to bring a reference because of its inability to obtain support from the other parties in the House of Commons and the Senate for its proposed legislation on the Senate. However, it did not. This leads to an examination of the third issue: intra-party politics or the politics within the governing party, the Conservative Party of Canada. Finally, the article discusses legal politics and how the government of Québec essentially forced the federal government’s hand by bringing its own reference to the Québec Court of Appeal. The overarching framework of interbranch politics—the relationship between the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government—is examined throughout the article.

AbstractThis article examines the presence of geographically targeted spending in the allocation of infrastructure projects in Canada. Building on formal models of distributive politics, we expect government districts, core government districts and swing districts to be advantaged in terms of infrastructure projects. We also investigate whether characteristics of Members of Parliament (MPs), such as seniority or holding a cabinet position, influence the distribution of infrastructure projects. Empirically, we analyze the amount of funding allocated by Infrastructure Canada across non-urban federal electoral districts between 2006 and 2018. Our results indicate that non-urban governmental districts receive, on average, more money than opposition districts, and that this is even more the case for core government districts. In contrast, we found little evidence that cabinet ministers or senior MPs are able to attract more funding to their constituencies compared to other representatives.

The goal of the article is to analyze certain aspects of Canada’s immigration policy in the context of contemporary realities, considering the concept of multiculturalism. In the paper, there are outlined the main stages of Canadian immigration policy and its impact on the politics of multiculturalism. The author emphasizes that the policy of multiculturalism, proclaimed by the Government of Canada in its modern interpretation in the late 1980s, has transformed in the first decades of the 21st century. It was caused by such factors as the rise of terrorist attacks, illegal migration and the widening of migration from South-East Asia. It was shown that Canadian immigration policy evolved to more open and liberal since the end of World War II, but at the beginning of the 21st century, the situation radically changed. This trend was especially noticeable during the activities of the conservative governments of S. Harper (2006-2015). Conservative government policy was marked by the introduction of restrictive immigration laws and the extension of bureaucratic procedures. In particular, some provisions of the «Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act» of June 19, 2014, were analyzed. It was emphasized that this legal action had been crushed by the Bar Association of Canada, as well as in the Open Letter of 60 well-known scholars and community members to the Prime Minister of Canada. Another trend of last developments in Canadian multicultural society was influenced by American negative attitudes towards Muslims. Today, the Government of Canada must review and substantially add a policy of multiculturalism. However, it should not become a hostage to the political struggle between liberals and conservatives in the contemporary difficult realities. The escalation of feelings of danger and intolerance, based on the dialectical thе «еnemy-friend» opposition, no longer works in a society. But people are looking for effective democratic dialogue in order to normalize relationships in the multicolored society of the early 21st century.

This paper examines how the Harper Government of Canada (2006-2015) shut down both debate about threats and research into environmental risk, a strategy that Canadian scientists characterized as the “death of evidence.” Based on interviews with scientists who research risks to the marine environment, we explore the shifting relationship between science and the Canadian government by tracing the change in the mode of risk calculation supported by the Harper administration and the impact of this change. Five themes emerged from the interviews: erosion of science research capacity, resulting limitations in understanding risk, declining influence on policy and regulation, redirection of public science funds to support the private sector, and the need to broaden the science knowledge base. The Canadian death of evidence controversy represents a challenge to science and technology studies (STS) scholars who wish to maintain a critical and reflexive perspective on the scientific enterprise without supporting attacks on evidence. While subsequent Canadian governments may simply return science to an unreflexively privileged knowledge status, we view this as equally damaging to broad risk calculation and democratic science. We suggest instead that a broader gathering of matters of concern will always be essential to risk assessment.

“Kill the Indian in the Child.” On cultural genocide and transitional justice in Canada. Kate Korycki in an interview by Anna ZawadzkaThis is an interview with Kate Korycki on the reparations for the native population in Canada for what the Canadian government defined as “cultural genocide.” Kate Korycki was born in Warsaw and has lived in Toronto for 25 years. Until 2006 she worked for the Canadian Government in a ministry delivering federal social programs, like unemployment insurance and pensions. Her last job involved the implementation of the Common Experience Payment. This was the largest government program to offer reparations for the wrongs suffered by the indigenous population in Canada in residential schools, which were run for 150 years by the Catholic and Unitarian Churches. The schools have recently been characterized as sites of cultural genocide.Kate Korycki is completing her doctorate in political science at the University of Toronto. She holds an MA in Political Science from McGill University. Her broad research agenda concerns the politics of identity, belonging, and conflict. In her doctoral work she is concentrating on the politics of identity in time of transition. „Zabić Indianina w dziecku”. O kulturowym ludobójstwie w Kanadzie i sprawiedliwości tranzycyjnej z Kate Korycki rozmawia Anna ZawadzkaAnna Zawadzka przeprowadza wywiad z Kate Korycki na temat odszkodowań przyznanychrdzennym mieszkańcom w Kanadzie za to, co rząd kanadyjski określił mianem „kulturowego ludobójstwa”. Kate Korycki urodziła się w Warszawie i mieszka w Toronto od 25 lat. Do 2006 roku pracowała dla rządu kanadyjskiego, w ministerstwie spraw społecznych, takich jak bezrobocie czy emerytury. Jej ostatnia funkcja polegała na wdrożeniu „Zadośćuczynienia Wspólnego Doświadczania” (Common Experience Payment). Ten program był najszerszym gestem władz federalnych w postaci rządowych reparacji za krzywdy wyrządzone w szkołach rezydencyjnych wobec rdzennych mieszkańców w Kanadzie. Szkoły te były prowadzone przez 150 lat przez Kościół katolicki i unitariański. To właśnie działalność tych szkół została określona mianem kulturowego ludobójstwa.Kate Korycki pisze doktorat z nauk politycznych na Uniwersytecie w Toronto, po magisterium na Uniwersytecie Mcgill. Jej zainteresowania skupiają się na polityce tożsamości, przynależności i konflikcie.

Rural Women's Leadership in Atlantic Canada: Firsthand Perspectives on Local Public Life and Participation in Electoral Politics, Louise Carbert, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006, pp. 177, index.In her latest work, Louise Carbert peers beneath the surface of formal electoral processes to explore how rural, female community leaders in Atlantic Canada view politics. She focuses on this group to explain a curious pattern: rural women are much less likely to secure public office than women located in urban areas, and this holds true at all three levels of government. Through interviewing women representing the typical recruitment pool from which political parties draw candidates, the author aims to identify the presence of barriers to female electoral participation specifically salient to rural women. This is no easy task in part because such an objective necessitates sifting through the inconsequential details of grassroots politics to locate and interpret underlying patterns of power. Carbert's approach is innovative and provocative, and many scholars will appreciate this work's inductive method and rich anecdotal basis. At the same time, readers scouting for clear answers may be left frustrated by the work's complex set of conclusions concerning exactly why few rural women successfully navigate the “slushy intersections” of politics, family life and the economic environment in pursuit of a political career.

AbstractPrevious literature suggests that economic performance affects government approval asymmetrically, either because voters are quicker to blame incompetence than to credit ability (grievance asymmetry) or because they understand that the degree to which policy-makers can affect the economy varies depending on economic openness (clarity of responsibility asymmetry). We seek to understand whether these asymmetries coexist, arguing that these theories conjointly imply that globalization may have the capacity to mitigate blame for bad outcomes but should neither promote nor reduce credit to policy-makers for good economic outcomes. We look for evidence of these asymmetries in three survey experiments carried out in the USA and Canada in 2014 and 2015. We find ample experimental evidence in support of the grievance asymmetry, but our results are mixed on the impact of economic openness on blame mitigation, with some evidence of this phenomenon in the USA, but not in Canada.

During the Harper years (2006–2015), Canada significantly reduced the training, preparation, and deployment of military personnel for United Nations (UN) peacekeeping. Now, despite the Trudeau government’s pledge to lead an international peacekeeping training effort, Canada’s capabilities have increased only marginally. A survey of the curricula in the country’s training institutions shows that the military provides less than a quarter of the peacekeeping training activities that it provided in 2005. The primary cause of these reductions was the central focus on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s Afghanistan operation and several lingering myths about peacekeeping, common to many Western militaries. As the Trudeau government has committed to reengaging Canada in UN operations, these misperceptions must be addressed, and a renewed training and education initiative is necessary. This paper describes the challenges of modern peace operations, addresses the limiting myths surrounding peacekeeping training, and makes recommendations so that military personnel in Canada and other nations can once again be prepared for peace.

Since the ‘Orange Wave’ of the 2015 election in Alberta, women within and outside of the NDP caucus have experienced incredible levels of harassment from both ideological opposition and within their own parties. This harassment occurs towards the government demonstrative of the most success in formal representation women have ever had in Albertan politics. This uptick in the frequency and severity of harassment online, in protest, and in traditional political channels such as party leadership contests lead some to question the role Alberta’s political culture played in it’s occurrence, and the impact such a culture may have in the future. Examined using theory of gendered electoral violence and in the larger context of women’s political leadership in Canada, this paper proposes that a further critical eye should be turned towards this phenomenon rather than including it as a part of the job of doing politics as a woman.

This thesis studies the discursive behaviour of Canadian federal political parties with regards to immigration and integration issues. It seeks to test the empirical acuity offered by brokerage and issue ownership theories to explain the parties' electoral strategies in these domains. It examines the evolution of partisan discourse in relation to these themes over time, with special attention paid to the merger of right parties. It also studies the impact of certain real-world events, such as the referendum on Quebec secession in 1995 and the terrorist attacks of September 2001, on party positions. It thus proposes a quantitative and qualitative content analysis of five major parties' discourse, focusing on the various positions held by each of them on the issues of immigration and integration in their respective 1993, 1997, 2000, and 2004 election platforms.

RésuméCette thèse s’intéresse à l’impact du genre, de l’âge et de l’ethnicité des chef·fes de partis au Canada sur la réception de leur candidature par les électeur·rices. La perception sociale est intrinsèquement relationnelle et met autant en scène l’identité du/de la candidat·e que de l’électeur·rice. Par conséquent, cette thèse s’attarde à la fois au profil sociodémographique des chef·fes de partis et des électeur·ices qui sont appelé·es à les évaluer. Ce faisant, elle contribue aux champs des études électorales et de la psychologie politique.Trois méthodes complémentaires sont employées. La première partie de la thèse s’appuie sur une analyse quantitative de données électorales fédérales (1988-2015) ainsi que dans trois provinces canadiennes (Québec (2012-2014), Alberta (2012) et Colombie Britannique (2013)). Elle s’intéresse à l’évaluation des chef·fes de partis ainsi qu’aux intentions de vote en fonction du profil sociodémographique des leaders politiques et des électeur·rices en ancrant fermement l’analyse dans le contexte social et politique canadien. Pour finir, un dernier chapitre présentant une analyse quantitative de démocraties occidentales (l’Allemagne (2017), la Nouvelle-Zélande (2017), la France (2017) et les États-Unis (2016)) permet de mettre les conclusionstirées au sujet du Canada en perspective. La seconde partie de cette thèse présente deux expériences, l’une réalisée en laboratoire à l’Université Laval et l’autre en ligne. Basées surdes élections fictives mettant en scène des candidat·es varié·es en termes de genre, d’âge etd’ethnicité, ces expériences s’attardent à la teneur de la relation causale entre l’apparencede candidats et le comportement politique des électeur·rices. La dernière partie de la thèse consiste, quant à elle, en l’analyse de données qualitatives recueillies lors de six groupes de discussion ayant eu lieu entre 2018 et 2019 à l’Université Laval. Trois d’entre eux ont été réalisés avec des personnes ayant participé à l’expérience en laboratoire, et trois autres suites à un appel de volontaires. L’étude de ces discussions met en lumière le mécanisme causal à l’étude en identifiant la teneur des stéréotypes politiques basés sur le genre, l’âge et l’ethnicité au Québec ainsi que la façon dont des stéréotypes sont employés, réprimés, pensés et remis en question par l’électorat. En particulier, cette section de la thèse s’attarde à la possibilité d’inférence de valeurs et d’idées politiques en fonction du profil et de l’apparence d’un·e candidat·e. La principale conclusion de cet ouvrage est le caractère conditionnel, mais bien réel, des comportements politiques pouvant être qualifiés d’affinitaires (liés a l’appui politique de candidat·es partageant des caractéristiques sociodémographiques avec des électeur·ices) au Canada et basés sur l’apparence des candidat·es politique. En d’autres mots, les électeurs sont bel et bien au courant des narratifs sociaux entourant la présence de personnes issues de groupes historiquement marginalisés dans l’arène politique, et ils emploient et questionnent les notions préconçues liées à certains groupes sociaux à différents degrés. Bien que les stéréotypes associés à l’"outsider" politique s’avère parfois nettement divergents du profil du politicien dittypique, cette déviation face à la norme politique n’est pas systématiquement sanctionnée.Dépendant du profil de l’électeur, des idéologies qu’il porte et de l’offre politique en place àun moment donné, cette marginalité peut être activement recherchée, car associée à la per-formance de "la politique autrement" ou encore à une meilleure représentation politique d’ungroupe social auquel l’électeur peut s’identifier. Un survol de l’état de la question dans d’autresdémocraties occidentales soulève cependant la question des règles du jeu politique. Il révèleque ces comportements politiques au Canada en contexte électoral ressemblent davantage auxphénomènes observés lors d’élections présidentielles que lorsqu’il est question d’autres régimesparlementaires s’appuyant quant à eu sur un mode de scrutin proportionnel mixte.
RésuméCette thèse s’intéresse à l’impact du genre, de l’âge et de l’ethnicité des chef·fes de partis au Canada sur la réception de leur candidature par les électeur·rices. La perception sociale est intrinsèquement relationnelle et met autant en scène l’identité du/de la candidat·e que de l’électeur·rice. Par conséquent, cette thèse s’attarde à la fois au profil sociodémographique des chef·fes de partis et des électeur·ices qui sont appelé·es à les évaluer. Ce faisant, elle contribue aux champs des études électorales et de la psychologie politique.Trois méthodes complémentaires sont employées. La première partie de la thèse s’appuie sur une analyse quantitative de données électorales fédérales (1988-2015) ainsi que dans trois provinces canadiennes (Québec (2012-2014), Alberta (2012) et Colombie Britannique (2013)). Elle s’intéresse à l’évaluation des chef·fes de partis ainsi qu’aux intentions de vote en fonction du profil sociodémographique des leaders politiques et des électeur·rices en ancrant fermement l’analyse dans le contexte social et politique canadien. Pour finir, un dernier chapitre présentant une analyse quantitative de démocraties occidentales (l’Allemagne (2017), la Nouvelle-Zélande (2017), la France (2017) et les États-Unis (2016)) permet de mettre les conclusionstirées au sujet du Canada en perspective. La seconde partie de cette thèse présente deux expériences, l’une réalisée en laboratoire à l’Université Laval et l’autre en ligne. Basées surdes élections fictives mettant en scène des candidat·es varié·es en termes de genre, d’âge etd’ethnicité, ces expériences s’attardent à la teneur de la relation causale entre l’apparencede candidats et le comportement politique des électeur·rices. La dernière partie de la thèse consiste, quant à elle, en l’analyse de données qualitatives recueillies lors de six groupes de discussion ayant eu lieu entre 2018 et 2019 à l’Université Laval. Trois d’entre eux ont été réalisés avec des personnes ayant participé à l’expérience en laboratoire, et trois autres suites à un appel de volontaires. L’étude de ces discussions met en lumière le mécanisme causal à l’étude en identifiant la teneur des stéréotypes politiques basés sur le genre, l’âge et l’ethnicité au Québec ainsi que la façon dont des stéréotypes sont employés, réprimés, pensés et remis en question par l’électorat. En particulier, cette section de la thèse s’attarde à la possibilité d’inférence de valeurs et d’idées politiques en fonction du profil et de l’apparence d’un·e candidat·e. La principale conclusion de cet ouvrage est le caractère conditionnel, mais bien réel, des comportements politiques pouvant être qualifiés d’affinitaires (liés a l’appui politique de candidat·es partageant des caractéristiques sociodémographiques avec des électeur·ices) au Canada et basés sur l’apparence des candidat·es politique. En d’autres mots, les électeurs sont bel et bien au courant des narratifs sociaux entourant la présence de personnes issues de groupes historiquement marginalisés dans l’arène politique, et ils emploient et questionnent les notions préconçues liées à certains groupes sociaux à différents degrés. Bien que les stéréotypes associés à l’"outsider" politique s’avère parfois nettement divergents du profil du politicien dittypique, cette déviation face à la norme politique n’est pas systématiquement sanctionnée.Dépendant du profil de l’électeur, des idéologies qu’il porte et de l’offre politique en place àun moment donné, cette marginalité peut être activement recherchée, car associée à la per-formance de "la politique autrement" ou encore à une meilleure représentation politique d’ungroupe social auquel l’électeur peut s’identifier. Un survol de l’état de la question dans d’autresdémocraties occidentales soulève cependant la question des règles du jeu politique. Il révèleque ces comportements politiques au Canada en contexte électoral ressemblent davantage auxphénomènes observés lors d’élections présidentielles que lorsqu’il est question d’autres régimesparlementaires s’appuyant quant à eu sur un mode de scrutin proportionnel mixte.
This thesis examines the impact of the gender, age, and ethnicity of party leaders in Canada on the way these candidates are received by electors. Social perception is intrinsically relational and puts as much emphasis on the identity of the candidate as the voter. Consequently, this thesis focuses on both the socio-demographic profile of party leaders and the electors who are called upon to evaluate them. In doing so, she contributes to the fields of electoral studies and political psychology. To do this, three complementary research methods are employed. The first part of the thesis is based on a quantitative analysis of federal electoral data (1988-2015) as well as three Canadian provinces (Quebec (2012-2014), Alberta (2012) and British Columbia (2013)). It looks at the evaluation of party leaders and votes intentions according to the socio-demographic profile of political leaders and voters. The analysis is firmly anchored in the Canadian social and political context. However, a last chapter presenting a quantitative analysis of Western democracies (Germany (2017), New Zealand (2017), France (2017) and the United States (2016)) provides a different perspective on the conclusions drawn in about Canada. The second part of thist hesis presents two experiments, one done in a laboratory at Université Laval and the other online. Based on fictitious elections featuring diverse candidates in terms of gender, age and ethnicity, these experiments focus on the content of the causal relationship between the appearance of candidates and voters’ political behaviour. The last part of the thesis consists in the analysis of qualitative data collected during six discussion groups held between 2018 and 2019 at Université Laval. Three of them were done with people who had participated in the lab experiment, and three others after a call for volunteers. The analysis of these discussions highlights the causal mechanism under study by identifying the content of political stereotypes based on gender, age, and ethnicity in Quebec as well as the way stereotypes are used, repressed, thought out, and questioned by the electorate. In particular, this section of the thesis focuses on the possibility of inferring values and political ideas based on the appearance of a candidate. The main conclusion of this work is the conditional, but very real, occurrence of political be-haviours that can be described as affinity-based (linked to the political support of candidates sharing socio-demographic characteristics with electors) in Canada. In other words, voters are well aware of the social narratives surrounding the presence of people from historically marginalized groups in the political arena, and they use and question preconceived notions related to these groups to different degrees. Although a particular set of characteristics maybe associated with the political "outsider", this deviation from the political norm is not systematically sanctioned. Depending on the profile of voters, the ideologies they carry and the political offer in place at a given moment, this marginality can be actively sought, because associated with the performance of "politics differently" or the better political representation of a social group to which the elector can identify. An overview of the state of affairs in other Western democracies, however, raises the question of the rules of the political game. It reveals that these political behaviours in Canada are more similar to the phenomena observed in pres-idential elections than when we look at other parliamentary systems using mixed proportional voting.
This thesis examines the impact of the gender, age, and ethnicity of party leaders in Canada on the way these candidates are received by electors. Social perception is intrinsically relational and puts as much emphasis on the identity of the candidate as the voter. Consequently, this thesis focuses on both the socio-demographic profile of party leaders and the electors who are called upon to evaluate them. In doing so, she contributes to the fields of electoral studies and political psychology. To do this, three complementary research methods are employed. The first part of the thesis is based on a quantitative analysis of federal electoral data (1988-2015) as well as three Canadian provinces (Quebec (2012-2014), Alberta (2012) and British Columbia (2013)). It looks at the evaluation of party leaders and votes intentions according to the socio-demographic profile of political leaders and voters. The analysis is firmly anchored in the Canadian social and political context. However, a last chapter presenting a quantitative analysis of Western democracies (Germany (2017), New Zealand (2017), France (2017) and the United States (2016)) provides a different perspective on the conclusions drawn in about Canada. The second part of thist hesis presents two experiments, one done in a laboratory at Université Laval and the other online. Based on fictitious elections featuring diverse candidates in terms of gender, age and ethnicity, these experiments focus on the content of the causal relationship between the appearance of candidates and voters’ political behaviour. The last part of the thesis consists in the analysis of qualitative data collected during six discussion groups held between 2018 and 2019 at Université Laval. Three of them were done with people who had participated in the lab experiment, and three others after a call for volunteers. The analysis of these discussions highlights the causal mechanism under study by identifying the content of political stereotypes based on gender, age, and ethnicity in Quebec as well as the way stereotypes are used, repressed, thought out, and questioned by the electorate. In particular, this section of the thesis focuses on the possibility of inferring values and political ideas based on the appearance of a candidate. The main conclusion of this work is the conditional, but very real, occurrence of political be-haviours that can be described as affinity-based (linked to the political support of candidates sharing socio-demographic characteristics with electors) in Canada. In other words, voters are well aware of the social narratives surrounding the presence of people from historically marginalized groups in the political arena, and they use and question preconceived notions related to these groups to different degrees. Although a particular set of characteristics maybe associated with the political "outsider", this deviation from the political norm is not systematically sanctioned. Depending on the profile of voters, the ideologies they carry and the political offer in place at a given moment, this marginality can be actively sought, because associated with the performance of "politics differently" or the better political representation of a social group to which the elector can identify. An overview of the state of affairs in other Western democracies, however, raises the question of the rules of the political game. It reveals that these political behaviours in Canada are more similar to the phenomena observed in pres-idential elections than when we look at other parliamentary systems using mixed proportional voting.

This thesis expands upon the concept of the global culture wars in sub-Saharan Africa from a Canadian perspective, focusing on the growing division within Canada between conservative, religious values and liberal, progressive ones (Caplan, 2012). This division led to a political and cultural realignment alongside the increased visibility and leadership of religious and faith communities in Canadian public and political life. Amidst this polarization, Conservative Party leader Stephen Harper was elected Prime Minister in February 2006. Under his leadership, a conservative, pro-family agenda was established. This agenda, which advocates a traditional understanding of family life and structure, in particular refers to a legally married, heterosexual couple with children. It was supported by the evangelical Christian population in Canada, which grew from a united religious community in Canada into a significant constituency of the Conservative Party. Harper’s tenure, coupled with the increased visibility and leadership of faith and religious communities significantly affected domestic and international policies during his tenure as Prime Minister, from 2006 to 2015. This thesis examines the Muskoka Initiative on Maternal, Child, and Newborn Health (Muskoka-MNCH) and shows how this initiative, which fostered anti-abortion rhetoric abroad, was utilized to appease the evangelical community’s anti-abortion position in Canada.

Canada's immigration policy radically shifted under Stephen Harper's federal Conservative Party government, which ruled from 2006 to 2015. The Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) is one key example of how migrants are increasingly entering Canada through a racially structured hierarchy of citizenship that privileges whiteness, while increasing the precarity of racialized migrants as they live, work, and contribute to the Canadian economy. This chapter offers a detailed policy analysis of Canada's TFWP, focusing on how the program marginalizes migrant workers as “un-Canadian” by placing them in racial, gender, and class hierarchies of belonging. This paper will discuss and outline recent changes and developments in Canada's TFWP, specifically those related to migrants classified as ‘lower-skilled' workers. While some labour needs in Canada can be read as truly temporary (for example, where workers were required to construct venues for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympic Games or other short-term construction projects), the lack of accountability within the TFWP in Canada has led to some occupations being misleadingly framed as ‘temporary', thereby creating a class of migrant workers who are “permanently temporary.” I will argue that the labeling of racialized migrants as “temporary workers” offers employers a structural incentive to keep wages systematically low and maintain poor working conditions, all couched under a guise of “competitiveness.” In this light, “temporary” work becomes synonymous with low-wage exploitation, and continues to strengthen a historic racist nation-state project in Canada. Further, this paper will argue that giving temporary status to migrant workers, rather than permanent residency, serves to limit access to social rights and services, only deepening their levels of exploitation. Finally, I argue that recent increases in TFWs is a symptom of a global trend towards the neoliberalization of citizenship, which has seen the unethical individualization of rights and the privatization of services across many fields.

Canada's immigration policy radically shifted under Stephen Harper's federal Conservative Party government, which ruled from 2006 to 2015. The Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) is one key example of how migrants are increasingly entering Canada through a racially structured hierarchy of citizenship that privileges whiteness, while increasing the precarity of racialized migrants as they live, work, and contribute to the Canadian economy. This chapter offers a detailed policy analysis of Canada's TFWP, focusing on how the program marginalizes migrant workers as “un-Canadian” by placing them in racial, gender, and class hierarchies of belonging. This paper will discuss and outline recent changes and developments in Canada's TFWP, specifically those related to migrants classified as ‘lower-skilled' workers. While some labour needs in Canada can be read as truly temporary (for example, where workers were required to construct venues for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympic Games or other short-term construction projects), the lack of accountability within the TFWP in Canada has led to some occupations being misleadingly framed as ‘temporary', thereby creating a class of migrant workers who are “permanently temporary.” I will argue that the labeling of racialized migrants as “temporary workers” offers employers a structural incentive to keep wages systematically low and maintain poor working conditions, all couched under a guise of “competitiveness.” In this light, “temporary” work becomes synonymous with low-wage exploitation, and continues to strengthen a historic racist nation-state project in Canada. Further, this paper will argue that giving temporary status to migrant workers, rather than permanent residency, serves to limit access to social rights and services, only deepening their levels of exploitation. Finally, I argue that recent increases in TFWs is a symptom of a global trend towards the neoliberalization of citizenship, which has seen the unethical individualization of rights and the privatization of services across many fields.