allabootmatt
Senior Member
Hi all, want to throw out something I've been thinking about.
I am an eternal optimist, and have been looking for silver linings in the apparent right-wing ascendance in our city. The more I think about it, the more I wonder if, long term, it's not an entirely bad thing.
Here's why. North America is unusual in that ''urban'' issues like transport, land use, and the arts split along left-right lines. What's particularly funny about this is that the sides 'right' and 'left' have chosen in these debates sometimes seem completely random; in some parallel-universe Canada, one could certainly imagine, say, the hard right arguing that big cities should be the recipient of almost all government funds because there's no sense subsidising unsustainable rural lifestyles, or said right refusing to shovel endless piles of money into inefficient spending on highways because it's a poor use of taxpayer dollars.
In other words, there's nothing inherently ideological about the fact that, on our continent, cities seem to be 'left' and the country and suburbs 'right'--that's just the way that the cookie has crumbled over the years, and seems to have much more to do with identity politics than with what we traditionally understand about progressivism and conservatism.
But what if that could change? We have a real counterexample in Europe. In the U.K., the heartlands of the right- and left-wing elites are almost identical physically, with the Tory home in Kensington or Chelsea and Labour's in Islington or Hampstead. David Cameron and his ilk would find absurd the notion that, to truly honor conservative ideals, they should be living on a farm or in a subdivision and driving an SUV. There are similar splits elsewhere; the German right seems to have no problem with Munich, the French UMP pretty comfortable with Paris and Lyon, etc.
From this perspective, I think the Canadian right taking some ownership over cities and urban issues is a positive development. Even in Rob Ford's inner circle, we can see a diversity of views on issues like cycling, transit, and built form, and more importantly individuals who certainly don't seem to think having an interest in those issues is incompatible with their ideology. Similarly, I am hoping, anyway, that with Conservative seats in the 416 federally, Toronto-boosters like Jim Flaherty will be less shy, and translate their support for the city into influence around the Cabinet table.
In the long run, I guess I wish we could achieve a European-style decoupling of urban issues from the left-right spectrum, and a situation where one's partisan identification isn't a reliable predictor of one's views on cities. With Ford, Harper, and maybe even Hudak, I think there is a real opportunity to create space for 'urban conservatism,' which in the long run would be great for Toronto, since it would unhook the city's fortunes from the electoral cycle.
So, what say you all? Am I hopelessly naive, or onto something?
I am an eternal optimist, and have been looking for silver linings in the apparent right-wing ascendance in our city. The more I think about it, the more I wonder if, long term, it's not an entirely bad thing.
Here's why. North America is unusual in that ''urban'' issues like transport, land use, and the arts split along left-right lines. What's particularly funny about this is that the sides 'right' and 'left' have chosen in these debates sometimes seem completely random; in some parallel-universe Canada, one could certainly imagine, say, the hard right arguing that big cities should be the recipient of almost all government funds because there's no sense subsidising unsustainable rural lifestyles, or said right refusing to shovel endless piles of money into inefficient spending on highways because it's a poor use of taxpayer dollars.
In other words, there's nothing inherently ideological about the fact that, on our continent, cities seem to be 'left' and the country and suburbs 'right'--that's just the way that the cookie has crumbled over the years, and seems to have much more to do with identity politics than with what we traditionally understand about progressivism and conservatism.
But what if that could change? We have a real counterexample in Europe. In the U.K., the heartlands of the right- and left-wing elites are almost identical physically, with the Tory home in Kensington or Chelsea and Labour's in Islington or Hampstead. David Cameron and his ilk would find absurd the notion that, to truly honor conservative ideals, they should be living on a farm or in a subdivision and driving an SUV. There are similar splits elsewhere; the German right seems to have no problem with Munich, the French UMP pretty comfortable with Paris and Lyon, etc.
From this perspective, I think the Canadian right taking some ownership over cities and urban issues is a positive development. Even in Rob Ford's inner circle, we can see a diversity of views on issues like cycling, transit, and built form, and more importantly individuals who certainly don't seem to think having an interest in those issues is incompatible with their ideology. Similarly, I am hoping, anyway, that with Conservative seats in the 416 federally, Toronto-boosters like Jim Flaherty will be less shy, and translate their support for the city into influence around the Cabinet table.
In the long run, I guess I wish we could achieve a European-style decoupling of urban issues from the left-right spectrum, and a situation where one's partisan identification isn't a reliable predictor of one's views on cities. With Ford, Harper, and maybe even Hudak, I think there is a real opportunity to create space for 'urban conservatism,' which in the long run would be great for Toronto, since it would unhook the city's fortunes from the electoral cycle.
So, what say you all? Am I hopelessly naive, or onto something?
) and I had to reassure them that all would be quite well in that all they feared would come to pass would in reality not even be talked about. I would prefer a different government, yes, but I'm optimistic enough to believe that as a nation we have finally started to move away from 20th century North American development planning. This, of course, includes policy-makers.