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The Geography of Class and Religion in Canadian Elections Revisited*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 September 2006

Paul Bélanger  and
Munroe Eagles
Paul Bélanger
Affiliation:
United Nations Economic Commission for Africa
Munroe Eagles
Affiliation:
University at Buffalo— The State University of New York
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Abstract

Abstract. Almost two decades ago, Richard Johnston advanced a provocatively counter-orthodox interpretation of the Canadian party system when he contended that “…far from lacking a social base, [it] is profoundly rooted in tribal loyalties.” Specifically, he argued that where Catholics appeared in significant numbers, the party system tended to be socially grounded in the religious cleavage (Catholic/non-Catholic divisions in party choice), whereas class politics (union/non-union partisan divisions) prevailed in areas where Catholics constituted no more than a small minority. Johnston argued that religious cleavages took priority over material cleavages because of the tendency of voters to cast strategic ballots when their preferred party was rendered locally uncompetitive by the concentration of Liberal-voting Catholics. Our analysis extends that of Johnston by using multilevel methods to examine the impact of provincial and constituency-level densities of Catholics on the voting behaviour of individuals in the 2000 election. This approach enables us to simultaneously capture the interactive effects of class and religion across different levels of spatial aggregation. Our analyses suggest that religious affiliations continue to structure vote choice for all pan-Canadian parties except the NDP. We also find that these individual-level relationships are conditioned by the religious composition of the electoral district. We do not, however, uncover evidence to suggest that the religious and class cleavages interact over territory such that there are pockets where each cleavage dominates. As such, to the extent that tribal loyalties anchor the Canadian party system, they appear to be those of religious communities rather than those of class.

Résumé. Il y a presque deux décennies, Richard Johnston a lancé un pavé dans la mare de l'orthodoxie en proposant une interprétation inattendue du système partisan canadien lorsqu'il a affirmé que “… [celui-ci], loin d'être dénué d'une base sociale, est profondément enraciné dans des fidélités tribales.” Il avançait, plus précisément, que lorsque le nombre de catholiques est assez élevé, le système de partis a tendance à reposer sur des clivages sociaux fondés sur la religion (la division catholique-non catholique détermine le choix du parti), alors que la classe (syndiqué/non-syndiqué) est le facteur déterminant dans les régions où les catholiques ne constituent qu'une petite minorité. Johnston affirmait que les clivages religieux l'emportaient sur les clivages économiques parce que les électeurs ont tendance à voter stratégiquement lorsque leur parti préféré n'est pas compétitif au niveau local en raison d'une forte concentration de catholiques libéraux. Notre analyse prolonge celle de Johnston en utilisant une méthode multivariée pour examiner l'impact de la densité de population catholique, au niveau des provinces et des comtés, sur le comportement électoral individuel lors de l'élection de l'an 2000. Cette approche nous permet de capturer simultanément les effets d'interaction entre classe et religion à divers niveaux d'agrégation spatiale. Notre analyse suggère que les affiliations religieuses continuent de structurer le vote pour tous les partis pancanadiens, à l'exception du NPD. Nous constatons aussi que la composition religieuse de la circonscription électorale influe sur la relation entre vote et religion au niveau individuel. Nous n'avons cependant pas découvert d'interaction territoriale classe-religion qui créerait des enclaves où l'un ou l'autre clivage prédomine. Ainsi, s'il existe des loyautés tribales à la base du système partisan canadien, celles-ci se situent au niveau de l'affiliation religieuse plutôt que de l'appartenance de classe.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 39 , Issue 3 , September 2006 , pp. 591 - 609
Copyright
© 2006 Cambridge University Press

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