Rituals of Rhetoric and Nationhood: The Liberal Anti-Deficit Campaign (1994-1998)

Abstract

In 1993, the Liberals came to power on a platform of job creation. Yet soon after their ascendancy, their election promise to invest in more jobs faded; deficit reduction became their foremost preoccupation. In spite of their altered political priorities, and in spite of their announcement that deep cuts in government expenditures were imminent, the Liberals won substantial public support for their fiscal actions. Like all moments of crisis, Canada’s accruing debt in 1994/1995 was potentially double edged; it could well have incurred a political disaster for the Liberals. Instead, it was exploited as an opportunity. The deficit crisis of the 1990s became a significant moment of Canadian consensus-building in which the Liberal Party, once known for its Keynesian posture, sought to redefine the national economic psyche in function of a rising monetarist trend. This essay seeks to account for the success of this ideological venture, and argues that the Liberals’ “marketing strategy" can be analysed in terms of a symbolic language of nationalism—a discourse whose persuasive power resides in its archetypal narrative of sacrifice and redemption.