University of Northern British Columbia: Open Journal Systems
Not a member yet
560 research outputs found
Sort by
Explaining Canadian Provincial Voting Behaviour: Nuance or Parsimony?
Full text linkAs one of the first empirical works to examine cross-provincial differences in vote behaviour, this study uses provincial election data drawn from eight provincial elections held between 2011 and 2012 to assess provincial vote choice. It applies two models of vote choice pioneered at the federal level, the “bloc-recursive” model and the valence model, to provincial elections. It is found that, despite that bloc recursive model encompassing several more variables, both models are similar in their ability to predict voter behaviour. However, the bloc recursive model is superior for understanding the unique political dynamics of each province. As such, the choice of which model to use comes down to a preference for nuance or parsimony
Is Preserving Minority Languages and Cultures the Key to Avoiding the Impending Eco-Apocalypse? : An Ecolinguistic Reading of Le Clézio’s Le Rêve Mexicain
Full text linkThe purpose of this essay is to explore Le Clézio’s Le Rêve Mexicain from the lens of the growing field of ecolinguistics. In Le Rêve Mexicain, the 2008 Nobel Laureate in Literature speculates about the present and future ramifications of the destruction of divergent Amerindian civilizations. When a civilization or a language disappears, an entire worldview vanishes as well. In addition to wondering how Amerindian societies would have evolved if their trajectory would not have been ‘interrupted’ by the Conquest, Le Clézio hypothesizes that these indigenous voices could still help us to avoid the impending eco-apocalypse. In Le Rêve Mexicain, the Franco-Mauritian author attempts to preserve the remaining vestiges of rich Amerindian cultures and to embed them into the existing environmental discourse of dominant world languages
Policy Design in the MPP Curriculum
Full text linkIn the following pages, we discuss the pedagogy of policy and program design. Why design, as distinct from analysis? The classic policy-analytic framework compares future worlds with different possible policies in place, and evaluates them according to relevant criteria. In Bardach’s “Eightfold Path” [Bardach 2011] a canonical step is to Identify Alternatives–but where do these alternatives come from? Frequently they are already in play, having been proposed by advocates and interest groups, but often a Problem (or Opportunity, as the motivating challenge is often better framed) is waiting for one or more good alternative responses, and inventing these is where the design arts overlap with policy analysis. Indeed, generation of a well-designed policy sometimes manifests an opportunity not previously recognized
Explaining the Federal-Provincial Turnout Gap in the Canadian Provinces
Full text linkSecond order election models predict that voter turnout will generally be lower in ‘second order’ subnational elections compared to ‘first order’ federal elections. In Canada, we find that this is not always the case: some provinces have higher turnout rates for provincial elections than federal elections. Using data from seven Canadian provincial elections, this article examines how attitudes such as trust, satisfaction with democracy and interest in politics compare across levels of government in order to explain cross-provincial differences in voter turnout. It finds that while contextual factors matter, interest in provincial politics is one of the strongest predictors of high provincial turnout relative to federal turnout
Raising, Spending, and Regulating Party Finances in the Provinces
Full text linkMoney is essential for political parties and candidates. In this article, we probe the complicated relationship between money and electoral politics. Using the cases of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and British Columbia, we explore the potential for provincial political systems to serve as laboratories to examine how different regulatory regimes affect political financing. As such, this article is an exploratory analysis of the potential for the comparative study of provincial campaign finance
Linzey, Andrew, ed. The Global Guide to Animal Protection. Urbana: U of Illinois P, 2013
Full text linkHandling uncertainty in bioenergy policy design: A case study analysis of UK and German bioelectricity policy instruments
Full text linkIn designing policies to promote bioenergy, policy makers face challenges concerning uncertainties about the sustainability of bioenergy pathways (including greenhouse gas balances), technology and resource costs, or future energy market framework conditions. New information becomes available with time, but policy adjustments can involve high levels of adaptation costs. To enable an effective steering of technology choices and innovation, policies have to strike a balance between creating a consistent institutional framework, which establishes planning security for investors, and sufficient flexibility to adapt to new information. This paper examines implications of economic theory for handling cost and benefit uncertainty in bioelectricity policy design, focussing on choices between price and quantity instruments, technology differentiation, and policy adjust- ment. Findings are applied to two case studies, the UK's Renewables Obligation and the German feed-in tariff/feed-in premium scheme. Case study results show the trade-offs that are involved in instrument choice and design e depending on political priorities and a country's specific context, different options can prove more adequate. Combining market-based remuneration with sustainability criteria results in strong incentives for bioenergy producers to search for low-cost solutions; whereas cost-based price in- struments with centrally steered technology and feedstock choices offer higher planning security for investors and more direct control for policy makers over what pathways are implemented. Independent of the choice of instrument type and technology differentiation mechanism, findings emphasise the importance of a careful policy design, which determines the exact balance between performance criteria such as cost control, incentive intensity, planning security and adaptive efficiency
Comparing Child Care Policy in the Canadian Provinces
Full text linkThe ten Canadian provinces offer a rich site for comparative analysis of child care policy. To utilize this, we construct a framework that uses quantitative measures to assess the variation in child care arrangements across the ten provinces. Our framework suggests that provincial child care variation is multi-dimensional and often involves trade-offs or compromises. This finding challenges some of the assumptions of regime theory, which suggests that social policy arrangements are logical and cohesive. We argue that while regime theory is useful for understanding broad differences in social policy arrangements, including differences between Canada and other industrialized democracies, empirical comparative analysis of the kind we have undertaken is important for uncovering the more complex and nuanced variation apparent in real-world policy arrangements at the provincial level
Terrorism Made Simpler: A Framing Analysis of Three Canadian Newspapers, 2006-2013
No full textHow do mainstream Canadian newspapers portray contemporary terrorism? The 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States and the ensuing “war on terror” has deeply impacted media coverage of terrorism and terrorism-related events around the world. Canada is no exception and scholars have begun examining various aspects of terrorism coverage in the Canadian media system. Inspired by framing theory, the following study adds to this growing literature by developing a model for understanding and evaluating media coverage of terrorism according to “degrees of simplification.” The model is applied to a sample of articles drawn from three Canadian newspapers in two periods of time—June 2006-June 2007 and June 2012-June 2013. Three main findings are discussed. First, both The National Post and La Presse tended to present terrorism-related news and analysis using simpler frames than The Globe and Mail. Second, the coverage of domestic terrorism was far less simplistic than the coverage of international terrorism in all three newspapers. Third, while simplifying frames were more frequent in 2006-7 than in 2012-3, the study finds weak evidence that mainstream framing practices employed by the Canadian newspapers radically changed between these two time periods
Letting the People Speak: the public consultation process for nuclear power in Alberta and Saskatchewan
Full text linkThis paper compares the Alberta and Saskatchewan governments’ public consultation process for the introduction of nuclear power in their provinces. While the goal was the same – to gauge public reaction on a continuous policy issue – the design of their respective consultation process was quite different. The paper analyzes the techniques of public consultation in the nuclear sector, especially the use of public hearings and multiple consultative tools. Finally, it assesses the impact that public consultation has on government decision-making