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Much ado about Parties

Conventional wisdom holds that governments matter - i.e., that a new government, particularly one of a different political party, will make substantial changes to the policies of the state it was elected to lead. The focus of this article is whether party affiliation matters in determining Canada's priorities and policies in its trade relationship with the United States. It will compare policy statements and performances of Liberal, Progressive Conservative, and Conservative governments from the advent of the Trudeau Liberal government in 1968 to the present and will argue that party affiliation has had little impact on Canada's US trade policy over this period. The analysis will proceed in three parts. In the first part, the Canada-US trade relationship will be discussed briefly. This will be followed by an overview of the economic priorities of Canadian governments concerning the US from 1968 to the present, as gleaned from major policy statements such as white papers and speeches. The final part of the article will set out some of the reasons why party affiliation has had little substantive impact on Canada's trade policy with the US over the last 40 years, including the limited electoral salience of trade issues with the Canadian public, the difficulty of "packaging" positions concerning the increasing complexity of trade issues in parties' electoral platforms, the private sector character of trade, and the increasing intrusiveness of trade agreements to which Canada is a signatory.CANADA-US TRADE: A BRIEF OVERVIEWCanada has always been a trading nation. International trade, especially bilateral trade with the US, is an increasingly important component of Canada's economic health and, therefore, a concern to all political parties. That trade matters to Canada has long been understood: in 1942, Hugh Keenleyside wrote that for Canada, "trade and other economic factors are fundamental to ninety percent of all international relations."1 Almost 40 years later, these same sentiments were voiced by an official in the Department of External Affairs when he remarked that Canada's foreign policy is "90 percent oriented toward trade and commerce."2 In addition to the importance of international trade to Canada, it needs to be stressed that trade policy is not singular but rather plural in character. Each province and sector has different needs and expectations concerning Canada's economic relations with the US, as well as the rest of the world.Canada consistently leads the G8 states in terms of exports as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP). What this means is that Canada more than any other member ofthe G8 relies on exports for its economic health. Access to the US market is of prime importance. Exports to the US over the 2001-07 period accounted for 84.5 percent of total Canadian exports, on average. This was an increase from 80.8 percent for the 1990-2000 period, from 73.5 percent over the 1980-89 period and from 68.6 percent over the 1970-79 period. Illustrating the importance ofthe American market as a source for Canadian exports, according to export data for 2007, eight American states would rank as Canada's top export destination if they were to be considered as separate markets and not part of the US.At the provincial level, Canadian provinces became increasingly dependent on international exports for their economic health over the 19972006 period. Ontario was the most economically integrated into the global economy, leading Canadian provinces in terms of percentage of GDP accounted for by the export goods and services (47.8 percent) over this period. Nova Scotia, conversely, was the least integrated province with an average of 25.6 percent of its GDP coming from the export of goods and services over this time.3 Examining provincial trade with the US, all provinces were exporting more to the US in 2007 than in 1998. This increase in integration with the American market was led by Ontario which sent an average of 90. …