The Beginning and End of Electoral Reform

Part of the Liberals’ 2015 campaign promise was to create two mechanisms to ensure democratic control over the process of reforming the electoral system. The first was the all-party House of Commons Special Committee on Electoral Reform (ERRE), which exercised representative democratic control: it guided the process, investigated the alternatives in depth, heard from expert witnesses, ensured cross-party support, and enabled parliamentary oversight. The second mechanism was made up of a range of public consultations that ensured a degree of popular democratic control: an e-consultation platform, town halls across the country, mail and phone surveys, and petitions that gave all Canadians the opportunity to participate in deciding on a new electoral system.

By the end of the process, both mechanisms favored proportional representation (PR): an electoral system where each party receives a percentage of seats in parliament equal to the percentage of the popular vote they win in an election. Based on its own investigations and the testimonies of the vast majority of expert witnesses, the ERRE recommended a referendum with two options: the current system (FPTP) or a new proportional system, to be designed by the government and explained to Canadians by Elections Canada in advance of the vote.

Public input similarly favored PR: the e-consultation platform showed a strong desire for change and support for most elements of a proportional system, and other avenues of public participation similarly backing PR and a referendum. Together, these representative and popular mechanisms provided the government with a mandate to give all Canadians the final say on whether or not to switch to PR.

However, when the ERRE committee released its final report, the Liberals immediately began backpedaling. Maryam Monsef, then minister of democratic reform, rejected the report. Monsef was soon replaced, but the new minister only doubled down, claiming there was no consensus for change and defending the existing FPTP system.

After a few months, Trudeau announced that his government was abandoning electoral reform, saying it was too divisive and risked too much instability. When Parliament voted on holding a referendum on PR, every non-Liberal MP and two Liberals supported the motion, but Trudeau rallied his caucus to narrowly defeat it.

Eight years later, Trudeau has finally given an honest account of what motivated this sudden reversal. Many have long guessed that he gave up when the process didn’t go his way, but the details of Trudeau’s explanation point to a deeper problem with his view of democracy.

Trudeau’s Antidemocratic Excuses

On the podcast, Trudeau tells Erskine-Smith that he has two big regrets about electoral reform. The first is that he “left the door open to proportional representation instead of ranked ballot.” The campaign promise to “make every vote count,” he admits, was “deliberately” crafted “to make sure that we were bringing in the Fair Vote people.” This ploy to win the support of pro-PR groups, Trudeau says, meant that proportional representation “was something that I had to leave a little bit of a door open to.”

While he stops short of admitting to intentionally deceiving Canadians, he says he regrets how the 2015 campaign promises made people think that his government might bring in PR, which, he says, “I never was going to, and I wasn’t clear enough on that.”

Trudeau’s second regret: “Not using my majority to bring in the model that I wanted.” Neither he nor his host seem to recognize the significance of this admission. Some commentators have noted how Trudeau seems to regret his inaction, especially as he now faces the prospect of Conservatives winning a majority government with a minority of the vote. The deeper issue, however, lies in the pronouns he uses in these comments, and what they reveal about his view of democracy.

Implicit in Trudeau’s comments is an admission that the two mechanisms of democratic control — the ERRE and the public consultations — were only ever meant to give a democratic gloss to the prime minister’s unilateral decision. That’s why the process was so quickly dropped when it failed to serve this purpose. Trudeau’s first regret is giving Canadians the false impression that they or their representatives ever had any real control over electoral reform. His second regret is not sweeping this facade of democratic control aside and imposing his own personal preference. That is, he doesn’t regret betraying the democratic process, he regrets not being honest about his contempt for democratic control, and not betraying it more decisively.

Trudeau’s final comments on electoral reform reveal the extent of his paternalistic view of government. After explaining why he thinks “proportional representation is dangerous for the country” (an ill-founded concern), Trudeau gives his final justification for dropping electoral reform (pay attention to the first-person pronouns): “I chose to say, okay, I’m not going to risk an irreversible change just to fulfill a promise I made . . . it was a gut-wrenching day for me to decide that I couldn’t move forward on something that might hurt Canada in the long term.”

That is, he overrode the ERRE and public consultations, and refused to let the issue go to a referendum, because he decided it was too risky to let Canadians choose our own electoral system. Trudeau’s comments reveal his view of the role of elected government: not to dutifully enact the decisions of the people, but to decide issues for Canadians. He acted based on his view of Canadians’ best interests, and will continue to do so, even if that means paternalistically overriding Canadians’ attempts to chart their own destiny.

Two Models of Democratic Government

The view implicit in Trudeau’s comments is what political scientists call an “elite theory of democracy”: the view that democracy is merely government by elected elites, and that the people’s only role is to choose who will rule. This view is a far cry from real (or republican) democracy, where public decisions are forced to track the people’s control rather than the whims of paternalistic elites, and where politicians are delegates who enact the will of the people, rather than rulers imposing their own agendas.

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has tried to strike a contrast with Trudeau by framing himself as a champion of the people. Poilievre has even written that corporate lobbyists shouldn’t come directly to him, but should take their ideas to the public and “convince Canadians that it’s good for them.” But this democratic rhetoric is as hollow as Trudeau’s: despite his populist makeover, Poilievre still attends expensive pay-for-access events with corporate lobbyists and big-money donors. And despite his promise to listen to the people to choose what policies to support, he has vowed to cut Canada’s new public pharmacare program — a move only 14 percent of Canadians support. Poilievre may talk a populist game, but he aspires to be the same sort of unilateral decision-maker as Trudeau.

New Democrats believe a different and more genuine model of democracy is possible. In the current session of parliament, our caucus has used the Confidence and Supply Agreement with the Liberals to secure real, tangible gains for Canadians. This includes pushing the government to deliver much-needed benefits like dental care for children, expanded housing investments, and improved benefits for low-income seniors — none of which were part of the Liberals’ original agenda, and all of which they voted against in the previous session.

Our values as New Democrats also guided our recent decision to end this agreement. Unlike Trudeau, who has governed by personal prerogative, Jagmeet Singh has led our party in enacting the decisions of caucus, party members, and Canadians. When the Liberals started dragging their feet on the issues that NDP MPs were sent to parliament to address, we made it clear that we would not continue to support a government that had stopped fulfilling the priorities of Canadians, leading us to exit the agreement.

Which Way Forward?

Ultimately, the question facing Canadians is not just about which leaders to choose, but the nature of our democracy itself. Trudeau’s broken promise on electoral reform and his candid comments on his rationale show his narrow vision of democracy: one that centers decision-making power in the hands of a few political elites (or even a single prime minister). This old, elite model of politics sees government as an entity that is created and authorized by voters on election day, and which then rules over citizens who are reduced to passive subjects until the next election.

But such a life is beneath the dignity of a free person: real freedom requires retaining and exercising democratic control, not just signing it away for four years at a time. As the famous political philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau put it: a people that only participates in politics by voting for its rulers “is free only during the election of members of parliament. As soon as they are elected, the populace goes into slavery, and is nothing.” If democracy is to be government of the people, by the people, for the people, it must involve more than mere elections.

By contrast, a new, republican model of democracy sees government as an activity that is continuously exercised by free and equal citizens. Democratic citizens must participate in making the decisions that shape their lives, at home, at work, in public, and in their society — in their cities, provinces, and country. As much as possible, these decisions should be made through public deliberation and mass participation. Popular authority may sometimes be delegated to representatives, but it is never alienated. Leaders who make major decisions based solely on their own prerogatives, especially if they override, ignore, or disenfranchise the people, betray the foundation of a democratic society.

The path forward can’t start from a choice between competing elites — it must start from a choice between competing models of democratic government. For democracy to be more than a facade for elite control, it must be grounded in the principle that power rests with the people — not as a symbolic notion, but as a practical reality.