1 Duverger, Maurice, Political Parties, trans, by Barbara, and North, Robert (New York: Wiley, 1954), xxvii.Google Scholar

2 For further discussion and critique of contagion in party organizations, see Epstein, Leon, Political Parties in Western Democracies (New York: Praeger, 1967). 126–27.Google Scholar

3 Insecurity has typically been the implicit motivational basis for the widely tested relationship between party competition and public policy as in the American state analyses. See, for example, Dawson, Richard E. and Robinson, James A., “Inter-party Competition, Economic Variables, and Welfare Policies in the American States,” Journal of Politics 25 (1963), 265–89CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Dye, Thomas R., Politics, Economics, and the Public: Policy Outcomes in the American States (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1966)Google Scholar; Sharkansky, Ira and Hofferbert, Richard I., “Dimensions of State Politics,” American Political Science Review 63 (1969), 867–79CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Cnudde, Charles F. and McCrone, Donald J., “Party Competition and Welfare Policies in the American States,” American Political Science Review 63 (1969), 858–66CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Fry, Brian and Winters, Richard, “The Politics of Redistribution,” American Political Science Review 64 (1970), 508–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar It is explicitly formulated in the comparative study of Ames, Barry, “Political Support Maximizing Models: Public Spending in Latin America,” paper delivered at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, San Francisco, 1975.Google Scholar Ames hypothesizes that “insecurity encourages expanded budgets, because administrations reward favoured sectors while avoiding punishment for opponents” (9).

4 Elsewhere I have explored some of the characteristics of provincial governments involving the relative competitive position of governing parties and the significance of such party system traits for the innovativeness of governments. See “Party Systems and Public Policy in the Canadian Provinces,” paper presented at the annual meeting of the Southern Political Science Association, New Orleans, November 1974.

5 Clearly contagious effects need not always be from the left. Contagion from the right takes place where governments of left-wing origins come to pursue the politics of the status quo. It is reflected by an excess of left-wing, radical rhetoric and ideological fervour at election time followed by a politics of opportunism and defense of the regime as these groups come to power. More generally, it is found in the process of embourgeoisement, a condition universally feared by ideologues of the left. The French Radicals of the Third and Fourth Republics are probably the classic examples. The Bad Godesberg programme of 1959 and the later grand coalition strategy of the German SPD illustrate the same phenomenon. Many would also argue that today the Italian Communists in search of an “historic compromise” have been similarly affected.

6 On consociational models see Lijphart, Arend, The Politics of Accommodation: Pluralism and Democracies in the Netherlands (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1968).Google Scholar and McRae, Kenneth (ed.). Consociational Democracy (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart. 1974)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, passim. Note Jürg Steiner's observations on the ineffectiveness of opposition and the relative lack of policy innovation in consociational situations where proportional rather than majoritarian decisional rules apply (McRae [ed.]. Consociational Democracy. 98–106). Strategies based on cooptation as an alternative to policy contagion may apply to the provincial coalition governments in British Columbia and Manitoba during the 1940's and early 1950's.

7 Pinson, Koppel S., Modern Germany (New York: Macmillan, 1954), 245.Google Scholar

8 Beer, Samuel H., British Politics in the Collectivist Age (New York: Knopf, 1966), 69–70, 91–92.Google Scholar

9 McKenzie, R. T. and Silver, Allan, “Conservatism, Industrialism and the Working-class Tory in England,” in Rose, Richard (ed.), Studies in British Politics (London: Macmillan, 1966), 21–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For more on this theme and on the importance of social deference to this style of politics, as originally noted by Bagehot, see Nordlinger, Eric A., The Working-class Tories, Authority, Deference and Stable Democracy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967), 34–43, 109.Google Scholar

10 On comparative policy issues generally see Rose, Richard,“Comparing Public Policy: An Overview,” European Journal of Political Research 1 (1973), 67–94CrossRefGoogle Scholar; King, Anthony, “Ideas, Institutions and the Policies of Governments: A Comparative Analysis: Parts I, II and III,” British Journal of Political Science 3 (1973), 291–313, 409–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Peters, B. Guy, “Economic and Political Effects on the Development of Social Expenditures in France, Sweden and the United Kingdom,” Midwest Journal of Political Science 16 (1972), 225–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Important comparative analyses of the relationship between party systems and policy include Alt, James E., “Some Social and Political Correlates of County Borough Expenditures,” British Journal of Political Science 1 (1972), 49–62CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Fried, Robert C., “Communism, Urban Budgets, and the Two Italies: A Case Study in Comparative Urban Government,” Journal of Politics 33 (1971), 1008–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

11 Ames, “Political Support Maximizing Models.”

12 Ibid., 31.

13 Engelmann, Frederick C. and Schwartz, Mildred A., Canadian Political Parties: Origin, Character, Impact (Scarborough: Prentice-Hall, 1975), 209–11Google Scholar; Schwartz, Mildred A., Public Opinion and Canadian Identity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967), 146–58.Google Scholar

14 The class basis of Canadian party politics has been explored in considerable depth at the federal level but less fully within provinces. The bulk of the evidence drawn from federal election and survey analyses shows comparatively low partisan division along class lines. Important analyses include: Meisel, John, Working Papers on Canadian Politics (2nd ed.; Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1975)Google Scholar; Regenstreif, Peter, The Diefenbaker Interlude: Parties and Voting in Canada (Toronto: Longmans, 1965), 84–106Google Scholar; Regenstreif, Peter, “Some Aspects of National Party Support in Canada,” Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science 29 (1963), 59–74CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Alford, Robert, Party and Society (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1963), 250–86Google Scholar; Alford, Robert, “The Social Bases of Political Cleavage in the 1962 Election,” in Meisel, John (ed.), Papers on the 1962 Election (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1965). 203–34Google Scholar; Schwartz, Public Opinion, 172–86. Courtney, John C., Voting in Canada (Scarborough: Prentice-Hall, 1967)Google Scholar, includes federal and provincial analyses. For alternative views of class voting, see Wilson, John, “Politics and Social Class in Canada: The Case of Waterloo South,” this Journal 1 (1968), 288–309Google Scholar, and Chi, N. H., “Class Voting in Canadian Politics,” in Kruhlak, O. M.et al., The Canadian Political Process (Toronto: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1970), 226–47.Google Scholar A comprehensive analysis of the social and economic basis of provincial and regional electoral politics is in Schwartz, Mildred A., Politics and Territory (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1974).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

15 Cairns, Alan, “The Electoral System and the Party System in Canada, 1921–1965,” this Journal 1 (1968), 55–80Google Scholar, identifies an alternative explanation for the weakness of contagion effects within federal politics in the accentuation of appeals to distinct regional subgroups. Contagion assumes a competitive appeal by at least two parties to the same group. Regional appeals minimize this competition.

16 On third-party movements, see Pinard, Maurice, The Rise of a Third Party, A Study in Crisis Politics (enlarged ed.; Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1975)Google Scholar; Macpherson, C. B., Democracy in Alberta: Social Credit and the Party System (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1950)Google Scholar; Morton, W. L., The Progressive Party in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto, 1950)Google Scholar; White, Graham, “One-Party Dominance and Third Parties: The Pinard Theory Reconsidered,” this Journal 6 (1973), 399–421.Google Scholar

17 Major works on the CCF-NDP include Lipset, S. M., Agrarian Socialism, The Cooperative Commonwealth Federation in Saskatchewan (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Anchor Edition, 1968)Google Scholar; Young, Walter, The Anatomy of a Party: The National CCF, 1932–1961 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1969).Google ScholarZakuta, L., A Protest Movement Becalmed: A Study of Change in the C.C.F. (Toronto: University of Toronto, 1964)Google Scholar; Caplan, Gerald L., The Dilemma of Canadian Socialism. The CCF in Ontario (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1973).Google Scholar

18 Engelmann and Schwartz, Canadian Political Parties, 271–72.

19 It is important to note that it is entirely possible that instances of Liberal, Conservative or Social Credit oppositions may meet the distinctiveness criterion. However, unlike the CCF-NDP opposition cases, we have neither an a priori basis nor any evidence (see Table 1) for presuming such distinctiveness.

20 On rare occasions the CCF-NDP in Nova Scotia has shown the beginnings of popular support but has been able to gain more than 10 per cent of the vote only twice (1945 and 1974).

21 The Alberta CCF-NDP has shown spurts of popular support as in 1944 (24.9%) and 1948(19.1%). After a sharp decline during the 1950's, the party has received over 10 per cent of the vote in the last three provincial elections, but it has not been capable of mobilizing a serious opposition threat with any regularity.

22 An equally interesting question, of course, is whether systematic policy directions can be associated with parties forming governments. As with the notion of contagion, there are good reasons to expect a special policy distinctiveness to be associated with socialist parties in power. There may, however, be a counter-effect, that is, a contagion from the right, which acts to minimize this distinctiveness. That question deserves its own analysis and will not be dealt with here.

23 It is true, of course, that Canadian socialism has never obtained nationally the levels of support of the German SPD or British Labour party. Still, it has achieved the status of governing party in three provinces as well as often constituting the official opposition in these provinces and in Ontario. It has also secured for itself a critical place in federal politics by holding a balance of power where minority governments are necessitated by the lack of one-party parliamentary majorities.

24 Englemann and Schwartz, Canadian Political Parties, 198.

25 Ibid., 313–14. On regional political distinctiveness see Schwartz, Politics and Territory, chaps. 10 and 11; Wilson, John, “The Canadian Political Cultures: Towards a Redefinition of the Canadian Political System,” this Journal 7 (1974), 438–83Google Scholar; and Blake, Donald E., “The Measurement of Regionalism in Canadian Voting Patterns.” this Journal 5 (1972), 55–81.Google Scholar

26 “British Columbia, the Politics of Class Conflict,” in Robin, Martin (ed.), Canadian Provincial Politics, the Party Systems of Ten Provinces (Scarborough: Prentice-Hall, 1972), 40, 56.Google Scholar

27 Sherman, Paddy, Bennett (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1966).Google Scholar An alternative characterization of political styles in this province is found in Black, Edwin R., “British Columbia: The Politics of Exploitation,” in Mann, W. E. (ed.), Social and Cultural Change in Canada (Toronto: Copp Clark, 1970), vol. 1, 112–29.Google Scholar

28 In Pillars of Profit: The Company Province 1934–1972 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1973), Robin, Google Scholar provides valuable historical evidence on the role of the CCF-NDP as an opposition threat, e.g., 50–62. On the relationship between the growth in popular support for the CCF and governmental response, he writes, for example, “… the Hart government, composed of intelligent conservatives and sensible politicians was not unmindful of the new wants indirectly registered in the rising popularity of the C.C.F.; Red baiting was the negative side of the coalition assault on the C.C.F.; the positive thrust was a reform program calculated to assure the voter of the government's benign solicitude” (77).

29 Smith, Denis, “Prairie Revolt, Federalism and the Party System,” in Thorburn, Hugh G. (ed.), Parly Politics in Canada (2nd ed.; Scarborough: Prentice-Hall, 1967), 189–200.Google Scholar

30 Macpherson, Democracy in Alberta. 237ff. On the Alberta party system, see also J. A. Long and F. Q. Quo, “Alberta, One Party Dominance,” in Robin (ed.), Canadian Provincial Politics, 1–26.

31 Donnelly, M. S.. The Government of Manitoba (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1963), 63–67Google Scholar; Morton, W. L., Manitoba: A History (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1957)Google Scholar, chaps. 19 and 20; Wiseman, Nelson, “The C.C.F. and the Manitoba ‘Non-partisan’ Government of 1940,” Canadian Historical Review 59 (1973), 173–95.Google Scholar

32 Wilson, John, “The Decline of the Liberal Party in Manitoba Politics,” Journal of Canadian Studies 10 (1975), 24–41, provides the most recent analysis of patterns of party system development and realignment. See also T. Peterson, “Ethnic and Class Politics in Manitoba,” in Robin (ed.), Canadian Provincial Politics, 69–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

33 On party politics in Saskatchewan, see John C. Courtney and David E. Smith, “Parties in a Politically Competitive Province,” in Robin (ed.), Canadian Provincial Politics, 290–318, and Ward, Norman and Spafford, Duff (eds.), Politics in Saskatchewan (Don Mills: Longmans, 1968).Google Scholar

34 See n. 17.

35 Ibid., 270.

36 John Wilson and David Hoffman, “A Three Party System in Transition,” in Robin (ed.), Canadian Provincial Politics, 198–239.

37 The Dilemma of Canadian Socialism, the CCF in Ontario (Toronto: McClelland Stewart, 1973) is based on evidence from the Depression years through about 1945 and therefore overlaps only marginally with the post-war data base used in this analysis. Nevertheless, Caplan's observations are directly applicable to the problem on contagion from the left.

38 Ibid., 29–33, 69, 71, 78.

39 There are a few provincial governments which, although technically meeting this condition of loss of seats, have not been categorized as insecure, because the loss was so marginal that it did not seriously influence the existing state of one-party dominance. Included in these exceptions are the Social Credit Alberta governments of 1952 and 1963 whose seat strength fell from 89.5 to 85.2 per cent and from 97 to 95 per cent respectively; and the Ontario government of 1955 which dropped from 88 to 85 per cent and that of 1963, from 72 to 71 per cent.

40 Dye, Thomas R., Understanding Public Policy (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1975), 217Google Scholar, and Sharkansky, Ira, The Politics of Taxing and Spending (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1969), 3–6.Google Scholar

41 Diffusion studies illustrate cases in which the policy question being asked predisposes the researcher toward indicators of timing and sequence of policy choices rather than their content or importance relative to other areas. In this case data on specific decisions will be preferred to budgetary indicators. See, for example, Poel, Dale H., “The Diffusion of Legislation among the Canadian Provinces: A Mathematical and Statistical Analysis,” paper presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association, Edmonton, 1975Google Scholar; Walker, Jack, “The Diffusion of Innovations among the American States,” American Political Science Review 63 (1969), 880–99CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Gray, Virginia, “Innovation in the States: A Diffusion Study.” American Political Science Review 67 (1973), 1174–85.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

42 Fry and Winters provide an important corrective to much of this work as cited in footnote 3 above (“The Politics of Redistribution”).

43 Ames notes the incrementalist bias inherent in analyses which fail to make this distinction (“Political Support Maximizing Models.” 17).

44 The calculation of the political variables is based on data in the electoral records of each province. Data for the period 1920–1960 are found in Scarrow, Howard A., Canada Votes: A Handbook of Federal and Provincial Election Data (New Orleans: The Hauser Press. 1962).Google Scholar Policy indicators are drawn from Dominion Bureau of Statistics, Provincial Government Finance (DBS-207).

45 The governing periods (identified by election years) included in this analysis are as follows: British Columbia: 1945, 1949, 1952, 1953, 1956, 1960, 1963, 1966, 1969; Alberta: 1944, 1948, 1952, 1955, 1959, 1963, 1967, 1971; Saskatchewan: 1964, 1967; Manitoba: 1945, 1949, 1953, 1958, 1959, 1962, 1966; Ontario: 1943, 1945, 1948, 1951, 1955, 1959, 1963, 1967, 1971.

46 The SPSS ANOVA programme provides several optional approaches to analysis of variance. In this analysis the results of both the “hierarchical” approach and “classic experimental” approach were compared. In the former case alternative orderings of independent variables were tried. These comparisons were useful in demonstrating that the results found were not simply an artifact of the particular form of analysis of variance used. The data presented in Tables 3 and 4 are based on the hierarchical format. For the mechanics of this procedure see Nie, Norman H.et al., Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (2nd ed.; New York: McGraw-Hill, 1975)Google Scholar, chap. 22. On analysis of variance generally, see Blalock, Hubert M. Jr., Social Statistics (2nd ed.; New York: McGraw-Hill. 1972)Google Scholar, chap. 16.

47 Gold, David, “Statistical Test and Substantive Significance,” The American Sociologist 4 (1969), 44.Google Scholar

48 Nie et al., Statistical Package, 409–10.

49 Blalock, Social Statistics, 354.

50 Wilson, “Canadian Political Cultures”: Simeon, Richard and Elkins, David J., “Regional Political Cultures in Canada,” this Journal 7 (1974), 397–437Google Scholar; and Schwartz, Politics and Territory, chaps. 9 and 10.

51 Such interaction effects may reflect special, nonadditive relationships between socialist threat, province and social welfare spending. In this case, a breakdown of cell means of welfare spending, change by province, and categories of socialist threat, indicates that the highest mean shifts are associated with those Alberta governments where the socialist threat has been low (by Albertan standards). This analysis of what appear to be deviant cases is, however, only suggestive and cannot be taken as a definitive interpretation of interaction effects. It is important to note that measures of association are also rendered useless wherever interaction is found.

52 Simeon and Elkins, “Regional Political Cultures in Canada,” 404ff.

53 Doern, G. Bruce and Wilson, V. Seymour (eds.), Issues in Canadian Public Policy (Toronto: Macmillan, 1974), 342.Google Scholar

54 Bismarck, cited earlier as the prototype of the conservative accommodator who sought to undermine social democratic appeal through welfare programmes, also tried to break the organizational back of his opponents through repressive anti-socialist laws. Eyck, Erich, Bismarck and the German Empire (New York: Norton, 1958). 243.Google Scholar

55 Sharkansky and Hofferbert, “Dimensions of State Politics,” find a party-policy linkage in the areas of welfare and education, which seems to reflect a differentiation between politically sensitive and insensitive policy concerns similar to the results reported here. But the two studies are not entirely consistent with respect to which policy areas appear to be politically sensitive. This may, however, correspond to fundamental differences in the scope and weight of policy in the American states compared with the Canadian provinces. Health has been a controversial issue on both sides of the border. On the Canadian side, it has become one of the most important elements of all provincial budgets. It is therefore probable that the making of health policy and its decisional arenas would include both party politics and budgetary variations. On the US side in contrast, the struggle over health policy carries on unresolved and still largely outside the public sector; it is to a far greater extent the symbolic battle over “creeping socialism” rather than of budgetary allocations. The results with respect to education are also of comparative interest. That Sharkansky and Hofferbert find education to be politically sensitive is probably consistent with the central and controversial place this policy concern has traditionally had in American state politics. The corresponding Canadian data demonstrate the opposite tendency and are certainly consistent with the recent report of the OECD which states that “Canadian education policy may be one of the least ‘politicized’ in the world. Indeed, it is as if the attempt has been made in this field since the beginning to avoid party-political controversy at any cost” (quoted in The Globe and Mail [Toronto], April 6, 1976). Poel, Dale H., “Canadian Provincial and American State Policy: A Qualitative Explication of an Empirical Difference,” paper presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association, Montreal, 1972Google Scholar, using political variables comparable with those of Sharkansky and Hofferbert but different from those employed here, does not find a relationship between provincial policy levels and political factors (17–18).

56 On comparative policy patterns, see Heidenheimer, Arnold, “The Politics of Public Education, Health and Welfare in the U.S. and Western Europe: How Growth and Reform Potentials Have Differed,” British Journal of Political Science 3 (1973), 315–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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