Canadian Political Science Research Articles

Replicating “Language Matters”: Taking Baselines into Account

Abstract This study evaluates the visibility of French-speaking scholars in Canadian political science by analyzing the reading materials assigned in Canadian politics courses. Extending Daoust et al.'s (2022) research, we establish a baseline for their calculations and build an original dataset gathered from all political science departments’ websites and Google Scholar. Our analysis based on three assumptions about the expected academic representation of francophones—Canada's linguistic composition, the makeup of political science departments and faculty members’ productivity—reveals a discrepancy favouring anglophone scholars by up to four percentage points. Our findings extend Daoust et al.'s (2022) contribution by highlighting a similar language-based bias in overall citation practices among Canadian scholars, with French-speaking authors being significantly under-cited compared to their English-speaking counterparts despite demonstrating higher levels of overall productivity. Implications for the future of the discipline are also discussed.

The Gender Gap and Academic Publishing in Political Science: Evidence from Canada

ABSTRACT The underrepresentation of women-authored scholarship in political science journals remains a persistent issue. Studies confirm that a gender gap exists in many leading American and European journals and that a key contributing factor is the lack of supply from women authors. To what extent is this gap present in the Canadian Journal of Political Science (CJPS), given the Canadian Political Science Association’s efforts to promote gender equality? To answer this question, we analyze an original dataset of CJPS submissions from 2008 to 2022. We find that a modest gender gap does exist; women tend to submit fewer manuscripts and publish fewer articles in the CJPS relative to men. On the other hand, we find no evidence of bias against women authors during the review process. In fact, they fare as well or better than men across editorial teams and regardless of the handling editor’s gender.

Capitalist political economy and the political economy of capitalisms: 2022 Rik Davidson/Studies in Political Economy Book Prize

In 2022, Heather Whiteside of the University of Waterloo was recognized with the Rik Davidson/Studies in Political Economy Book Prize for her book Capitalist Political Economy: Thinkers and Theories (Routledge, 2020). This article is an edited version of the book prize talk that she delivered at the Canadian Political Science Association’s 2023 Annual Meeting, held at York University in Toronto. Professor Whiteside summarizes the book briefly and presents some recent works on the political economy of capitalisms, specifically regarding proprietary settler colonialism and Coast Salish capitalism.

“Une pièce d’étoffe que nous aurons à faire”: Louis Riel's Utopia: Between Prophecy and Politics

AbstractThis article offers a re-evaluation of Louis Riel's political, philosophical and religious writings by reconstructing these writings along utopian lines. In so doing, it supplements the existing literature on Riel's writings that tends to see Riel as either a prophetic figure or a practical man of action, but rarely, if ever, both. In its reconstruction of Riel's utopian vision, this article focuses on three aspects of his writings. First, it addresses his critical conception of Métis self-government before Confederation. Second, it examines his proposals for the overthrow of what he perceived as Anglo-Canadian tyranny in the North-West. Third, it considers his visions of an ideal—that is, utopian—society in the North-West. The article concludes by examining the implications of this reading of Riel's utopian vision for his legacy in Canadian political science.

Teaching “Pays the Bills”? A Study of Doctoral Program Descriptions in Canadian Political Science Departments

ABSTRACT Teaching is an important practice in academic life, yet little scholarly research has explored the ways in which graduate education programs prepare the potential next generation of professors for this practice. This study explores the presentation of pedagogical training in the context of doctoral program descriptions offered by Canadian political science departments. By paying careful attention to the public-facing presentation of program descriptions, we can observe both the pedagogical training efforts that departments present as important for the graduate school experience as well as the different ways in which departments express the instrumental and/or intrinsic value of pedagogical practice. We find that many program descriptions present teaching roles in terms of providing financial support to graduate students, indicating an instrumental value. Others present preparedness to teach as an indirect benefit of the comprehensive examination experience. We highlight case studies of program descriptions that prioritize teaching and offer recommendations.

Merits and Challenges of Comparing the EU and Canada

In the last decades, EU studies have increasingly broadened in terms of their theoretical and methodological approaches. By now, comparative concepts and theories are an integral part of studying the EU, which aids the study of its polity, politics, and policies. Despite the indisputable peculiarity of the EU as a political system, many scholars have stressed the value of using comparative approaches to study it. This thematic issue aims to investigate a specific case—the political system of Canada—as to its merit for comparison with the EU. While both systems have been described as sui generis in the past, forming a class of political system by themselves, recently the similarities between both have been stressed. This thematic issue gathers articles that compare different aspects of these two systems—focusing on polity, politics, and policy—to reap the benefits of the comparative approach and gain new insights into the functioning of both systems. The contributions to the thematic issue show the benefits that both Canadian political science and EU studies can gain from engaging in comparative exercises.

Decolonizing Research on the Carceral in Canadian Political Science

AbstractIn Canada, there is renewed attention to the violence experienced by Indigenous peoples in residential schools, by police, through hyper-imprisonment and child removal, in hospitals, and in the contemporary education system. All of these issues are interlinked and outcomes of the carceral state—defined as the policing, monitoring, surveillance, criminalization and imprisonment of people, especially Indigenous and other racialized peoples. In this article, I define and illustrate what the carceral state looks like in Canada. I articulate the current approach to studying the carceral in political science, note the paucity of research in the Canadian context and show where attention has been cast previously. I describe an improved approach to studying the carceral, arguing that a decolonized approach to studying the carceral must be relational and abolitionist, seeking to reduce and eliminate the use of carceral interventions.

Gender-Based Violence Research in Canadian Political Science: A Call to Action

AbstractGender-based violence is a prevalent and persistent societal problem in Canada that permeates all spaces, including politics. Yet sexual harassment, sexual assault and/or gender-based violence research is rarely found in mainstream political science in Canada or elsewhere. This article argues that this absence is highly problematic for a discipline that purports to centre itself on understanding power—who has it and who doesn't, and how to access it. It further argues for a normative intersectional and interdisciplinary approach, highlighting promising avenues of research in feminist institutionalism and Indigenous feminism to help achieve elusive solutions to gender-based violence in the future.

Language Matters: The Study of Canadian Politics through an Exploration of Syllabi and Comprehensive Exams

AbstractThe representation of Canada's two main linguistic groups in the teaching of Canadian politics is crucial, but we know little about it. In this article, we analyze the systemic underrepresentation of francophone authors in Canadian political science by examining the research that students are exposed to. Based on data from 351 syllabi across 42 Canadian universities, as well as data from the reading list of the doctoral qualifying field exams in Canadian politics, our findings show that francophone authors are systemically underrepresented (when not totally absent). About 38 per cent of Canadian politics courses include no francophone authors in their reading lists. Our findings suggest that Canadian politics is not an inclusive and comprehensive field. This result entails important implications not only for current professors and students but also for the profession more generally, given that the students who will make up tomorrow's faculties in Canadian universities are shaped by these biases.

Beyond the “Add and Stir” Approach: Indigenizing Comprehensive Exam Reading Lists in Canadian Political Science

AbstractHave universities heeded the call from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada and taken concrete action to integrate and promote Indigenous scholarship in their classrooms? In the field of Canadian political science, this question is vital but underanalyzed. Indigenous knowledges, histories, languages, customs, legal traditions, systems of governance and research methodologies are integral to Canadian politics, but calls for indigenization have often not been met. By analyzing comprehensive exam reading lists for Canadian politics doctoral students in programs across the country, this article argues that a fractured approach to indigenization begins early on in the training of faculty. Indigenous content remains largely underrepresented on exam lists and siloed into Indigenous- or diversity-focused sections of the political science literature. Most Indigenous politics readings engage centrally with sovereignty and the Constitution, with very few exploring the political dimensions of residential schools, gendered violence and other contemporary political issues.

Doctoral Mentorship Practices in Canadian Political Science

AbstractSupervisors shape the PhD student experience and play a critical role in students’ development. To what extent and in what ways are faculty engaged in mentorship? Are faculty mentoring more or differently now than in the past? This study of political science faculty from political science departments offering PhD programs in the English language finds that graduate supervision is changing over time, with mentorship practices becoming both more common and more varied. Supervisors do not appear to be simply replicating their own limited experience of mentorship as a PhD student. Instead, supervisors are becoming more actively and directly involved in their students’ research careers in ways that increase their students’ career opportunities. There is opportunity for institutions, at both the university and department level, to further invest in building the capacity and ability of supervisors to be effective mentors.

Party Unity and Discipline in Canadian Politics

Anyone with a passing understanding of Canadian politics is aware of the stubborn presence of party discipline in the parliamentary system. It is not a phenomenon that has been left to the stuffy corners of the ivory tower. Political actors and the media have complained about party discipline for decades. Reforms have been proposed; party leaders have promised new ways forward. As a central trait of Canadian Parliament, party discipline has driven away voters—it has even inspired the development of new political parties. What role can Canadian political science play in understanding party discipline 75 years after these familiar sentiments appeared in the predecessor to this journal: “How could this control [party discipline] be destroyed, and the individual member be made an independent critic of government and of legislation, and a responsible servant of the people” (Morton, 1946: 136)? It turns out Canadian political science has much to offer. With the publication of J. F. Godbout'sLost on Division: Party Unity in the Canadian Parliamentand Alex Marland'sWhipped: Party Discipline in Canada, 2020 has been a monumental year for the study of Canadian Parliament and political parties.

Letter to CJPS-RCSP Readers and the Canadian Political Science Community

Letter to <i>CJPS-RCSP</i> Readers and the Canadian Political Science Community

Toward a Better Understanding of Peripheral Nation-Building Strategies: A Critical Comparison of the Austro-Hungarian Ausgleich and the Canadian British North America Act (1867)

This paper addresses questions about the socio-legal context and mainstream political theories of the peripheral nation-building strategies behind the Ausgleich [viz. the Compromise] and the British North America Act of Canada, both entered into force in 1867. The importance of this research for contemporary political theorizing lies in the fact that at the outset the vocabulary of nationalism was developed in Central-Eastern Europe, and universalised by the new Canadian political science during the last decades of the twentieth century. The paper tackles the issue of the parallel vernacular national-building strategies as common denominators of Austria–Hungary and Canada as they came up in the Eastern-Central European region as well as in the North-American political community in statu nascendi, in order to determine that multicultural part of them which may be universal, and therefore available for both multi-ethnic countries. Although the Ausgleich neither substantiated the multicultural political philosophy nor restricted seriously the Hungarian self-determination, there is widespread disagreement about whether as such it was an expedient means to dismantle the nationalism in the Central-Eastern European region. The paper will maintain that the federalist idea was not applied entirely in Canada in 1867 and even less in the dual state of Austria–Hungary. It appears that nations’ rights as group rights rest on a demonstrable link between particular peoples, their traditional territories, and their living, land-based ethno-cultures in both regions of the world. Given that the Dual Monarchy collapsed after half a century, and given that the splintering was one of the direct and indirect causes of both the First and the Second World Wars, the Eastern-Central European way of dealing constitutionally with the multi-ethnic challenge is usually filed under ‘F’ for ‘Fiasco’. By contrast, ever since the BNA Act came into force, leaving aside for a moment the devastating effects of colonization on the First Nations population, the Canadian model has been one of the most attractive examples of how constitutional design can accommodate competing nation-building agendas within a single state. When exploring these fascinating stories of Canadian and Austro-Hungarian public laws and political theories, this paper will also develop a critical argument that the ethnic/civic distinction is unable to make evident the difference between the two countries in a comparative scrutiny.

A Pesquisa em Ciência Política e os Povos Indígenas no Canadá: uma entrevista com Christopher Alcantara

Christopher Alcantara is a professor of political science at Western University in London, Canada, and has dedicated himself to the study of indigenous peoples and Canadian indigenous politics from this disciplinary field. His book Negotiating the Deal: Comprehensive Land Claims Agreements in Canada, published by the University of Toronto Press in 2013, received several major awards and was a reference for researchers in the field. In this interview, we sought to present this important author of the field of Canadian political science to the Brazilian academic community, reviewing the main arguments of his two most recent books. Alcantara discusses the challenges of doing scientific research that is, at the same time, decolonial and emancipatory, in addition to bringing concrete benefits to the indigenous communities involved. Finally, the researcher gives advice to those who want to start their studies on this topic of research and do not know where to start. With this interview, we aim to strengthen the academic exchange of ideas and research methodologies between Brazil and Canada, instigating the interest of undergraduate and graduate students and students for issues related to the indigenous issue in both countries.

Tailor-Made for Canada

While reform of Canada's electoral system has not yet occurred, it has been an ever-present, ever-potent topic in Canadian political science since the middle of the 20th Century. While there are aspects of First-Past-the-Post (FPTP) to be admired, its fundamental flaws cannot be ignored; the system encourages parties to exacerbate sectionalism, leaves far too many voters unrepresented, and too often allows for uncooperative governments. Mixed-Member Proportional (MMP), a form of Proportional Representation (PR), possesses the best aspect of FPTP, local representation and accountability, and amends its most serious flaws. MMP represents all votes cast, attenuates sectionalism, and creates diverse legislatures that incentivize cross-party cooperation far more than FPTP does currently. Canada is nearly a perfect country for MMP, and this system should be implemented for our federal elections.

Open Access and Academic Journals in Canada: A Political Science Perspective

AbstractThe push to implement Open Access (OA) as the new standard for academic research dissemination is creating very real pressures on academic journals. In Canada, the Social Science and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) recently adopted a policy requiring that journals applying for its Aid to Scholarly Journals (ASJ) grant make their scholarly content freely accessible after no more than a 12-month delay. For journals such as the Canadian Journal of Political Science (CJPS) that not only publish high-quality, peer-reviewed articles to a specialized audience but also support the work of scholarly associations through the revenues they generate, the push to move to OA comes with a number of challenges. The Canadian Political Science Association (CPSA) and the Société québécoise de science politique (SQSP) established a committee to chart the best course of action for the CJPS in light of this changing landscape. This article summarizes the key findings of the committee and underscores some of the challenges of OA for journals with a profile similar to the CJPS, as well as for the broader research ecosystem that they support.

The Life and Death of an Issue: Canadian Political Science and Quebec Politics

AbstractHow has English-speaking Canadian political science conceived of the relationship between Quebec and Canada? Why has an issue that has been considered central for more than three decades become less attractive, if not marginal, within the discipline? The aim is to examine, from this example, the overlapping relationship between science and politics. The intent is also to show that Canadian political science has examined the Quebec/Canada relationship from four different angles: 1) its interest in Quebec politics was part of the urgency of the moment, based on a crisis that challenged the foundations of the political system; 2) it questioned the legitimacy of the sources of the dispute, namely the compatibility between the new expressions of Quebec nationalism with the presumed principles on which the Canadian political community had been founded; 3) Quebec nationalism also encouraged a reflection on the existence (or not) of “English Canada” as a sociological and political reality; 4) the combination of the first three factors caused the prescriptions for getting out of, or resolving, the crisis to evolve over time, to the point of rendering research on this issue obsolete.

Departmental Engagement in Doctoral Professional Development: Lessons from Political Science

There is widespread discussion about the need to develop and enhance the career prospects of PhD graduates, and many Canadian universities are seeking to provide professional development programs and mentorship specifically for doctoral students. This paper considers doctoral career preparation from the department level through an in-depth examination of how Canadian political science departments approach the issue, drawing on a survey of department chairs. We find that departments are supportive of professional development; while departments are not in the position to provide extensive programs and struggle to integrate efforts systematically, they are well-positioned to participate in collaborative approaches and welcome improved communication and coordination. We argue that graduate faculties should consult with departments and engage them in professional development program design, perhaps tailoring to specific disciplines as needed, and that departments should look for opportunities to work with graduate faculties before initiating their own programs.

Departmental Engagement in Doctoral Professional Development: Lessons from Political Science

There is widespread discussion about the need to develop and enhance the career prospects of PhD graduates, and many Canadian universities are seeking to provide professional development programs and mentorship specifically for doctoral students. This paper considers doctoral career preparation from thedepartment level through an in-depth examination of how Canadian political science departments approach the issue, drawing on a survey of department chairs. We find that departments are supportive of professional development; while departments are not in the position to provide extensive programs andstruggle to integrate efforts systematically, they are well-positioned to participate in collaborative approaches and welcome improved communication and coordination. We argue that graduate faculties should consult with departments and engage them in professional development program design, perhapstailoring to specific disciplines as needed, and that departments should look for opportunities to work with graduate faculties before initiating their own programs.