(PSM2) Has It Happened Here? The Far Right and Canadian Exceptionalism

Recent developments—including the emergence of the People’s Party and protest movements like the “Freedom Convoy” and “1 Million March 4 Children”—challenge the narrative that Canada has resisted the rising tide of far-right movements, parties, and leaders sweeping the globe in the early 21st century. Papers in this session seek to understand the state of radical politics in Canada today; identify factors enabling and constraining its success; and situate it within a global context by outlining the distinguishing features of Canada’s far right. Tags: Politics, Social Movements

Organizers: Martin Lukk, University of Toronto, Sakeef Karim, New York University, Sébastien Parker, University of Toronto

Presentations

Jessica Stallone, University of Toronto

Karaoke Nation: How National Belonging is Constructed through Social Activity in Quebecois Seniors' Lives

Within the social sciences, it has become increasingly popular to study extreme forms of nationalist expression to understand processes of exclusion, racialization, boundary-making, and nationhood (Mudde 2019). Sociologists, too, study the ‘far right’, ‘radical right’, or ‘populist right’ to answer questions about rising hatreds related to Islamophobia, antisemitism, anti-immigrant, or anti-refugee sentiment (Miller-Idriss 2020). Citizens’ motivations for voting and supporting far-right political parties (or policies), though, are often complicated and restricted by limited choices. Moreover, how citizens make sense of national politics, in relation to their own ideologies and positionalities, matter for voting behaviour. This paper rejects the trend to interrogate extremes forms of nationalism, but instead examines the everyday forms of nationmaking that sustains an exclusive nation. I use the case of Quebec to argue that banal nationalism (or everyday nationmaking, Billig 1995) functions to socially construct rigid boundaries of social membership. Quebec is a minority nation. Its nationhood is challenged on two fronts: by the Canadian majority, in which they constitute a Francophone minority and by immigrants, to which they compose the majority receiving society (Laxer et al. 2014). Quebec’s nation-making involves reconciling these tensions (Laxer et al. 2014). In particular, the state has worked to preserve Quebec’s national identity by controlling immigrant-related diversity. Recent examples include implementing Bill 21 and Bill 96. Bill 21 is the first North American to ban wearing religious symbols for public employees at the workplace. Bill 96 includes new measures to protect the French language, at risk of isolating Anglophone minorities. The state defends both laws respectively to maintain Quebec values of ‘laicité’ and the French language. These laws can arguably be interpreted as radical politics, even if legislated by a center-right political party. This paper examines how senior residents of Quebec—those who identify as white, Catholic, Francophone—makes sense of their ‘Quebecoisness’ and how these ideas, in turn, shape how they understand national belonging for so-called others. Through 12-months of ethnographic data collection in two private residences with seniors that identify as Quebecois, I find that seniors’ participation in group activities—such as singing, pool table tournaments, choir, community events, church attendance, library book days and more—are embedded with meanings that are tied to Quebecois identity. This form of everyday nation-making in social activity takes on mundane (language) and fun (singing) forms. In the group activities that involve ‘dance nights’, choir or other forms of group singing, residents felt connected to ‘Quebecoisness’ by singing French songs, often from renowned Quebecois artists. During pool matches, residents used language and colloquial expressions to perform their Quebecois identity. The municipal library also deposited books monthly, with stickers indicating which books were written by Quebecers. Therefore, I find that group activities in senior homes, at times, is a form of ‘banal nationalism’ (Billig 1995) –or everyday nationmaking. I argue that banal nationalism keeps seniors tethered to social life. Interlocutors were at a stage in the life course where they were retired, had lots of free time, and were often distanced from their families. Without social activity, seniors would often be alone in their apartments and isolated from the social world, with negative consequences for their mental and physical health. Group activity, then, served to keep seniors connected to life itself by keeping them active, being social with acquaintances and friends and having fun. Despite these forms of activity being seemingly harmless, they have exclusionary effects. Participating in group activity in senior homes worked to socially construct a collective “us” based on white, Francophone and Catholic identities. By participating in leisure activity, interlocutors performed their ‘Quebecoisness’ through singing and dancing, language, and expression, reading books, and watching TV and film and so forth. I argue that these expressions of banal nationalism are a form a boundary making that involves socially constructing an imagined Quebecois community that is rooted in white, French, and Catholic ancestry. This collective nationmaking through activity has implications for how Quebecois seniors reaffirm their selfhood and collectively define their nationhood. Arguably, banal nationalism sustains exclusionary and ‘radical’ political outcomes like Bill 21. A far right political party with sustained support may be absent in Quebec, but the outcomes of exclusionary politics that privilege whiteness and Europeanness are similar to far right politics in the US and Europe. 

Deena Abul-Fottouh, Dalhousie University

Normalizing Right-Wing Extremism Online: The Case of the Ottawa Freedom Convoy

The rise of right-wing extremism (RWE) in many western democracies is cause for alarm. Efforts by major social media companies to constrain the spread of RWE has forced far-right leaders and influencers to explore new narratives and rhetorical tools to diffuse their ideas online. They started to tone down their rhetoric and penetrate other existing movements to normalize their discourse and be accepted in the public sphere. Most existing research looks at online RWE through studying their blogs, far-right channels, or social media accounts of far-right known figures. However, much less is known about how right-wing extremist ideas and conspiracy are transmitted and adopted in online spaces and venues that are not necessarily affiliated with the far right but rather are shared by the public. In this research, we study how RWE usurps existing movements to get their narratives more mainstream. The case of the Freedom Convoy protests in Ottawa, Canada in 2022 epitomizes this. During the COVID-19 pandemic, online expressions of far-right narratives have risen dramatically. However, there is disagreement—both among pundits and scholars—about what activities should be considered far-right extremism and what should count as non-extremist activism. As part of the Freedom Convoy, protestors claimed that their goals to rescind emergency measures put in place to reduce the spread of COVID—or even to demand the resignation of the Prime Minister—were well within the bounds of ordinary politics. By contrast, critics denounced the protest as giving voice to extremists – pointing to leaders’ affiliations with extremist groups, the spread of far-right narratives, and the spread of misinformation and conspiracy theories among protestors as evidence of extremism. By looking at the case of the 2022 Freedom Convoy online, we gain new insight into the spread of right-wing extremist ideas online. We specifically ask: 1- Who are the LEADERS of the Freedom Convoy online and what are their relationships to the far-right? 2- What is the extent of the spread of far-right NARRATIVES among the supporters of the Freedom Convoy online? 3- What is the extent of circulation of MISINFORMATION AND CONSPIRATORIAL narratives by the supporters of the Freedom Convoy online? The proposed project is nestled within and will contribute to the theoretical framework of online right-wing extremism which draws on three key developments: the circulation and diffusion of far-right discourse in everyday lives on social media platforms, the rise of the alt-right as a lighter version of extremist far-right, and the immersion of far-right discourse in conspiratorial beliefs that found fertile grounds online during the pandemic. We use a two-pronged computational social science methodological approach of network analysis and natural language processing to study the diffusion of RWE through X (formerly Twitter). We use a Twitter dataset collected from #IStandWithTruckers, a Twitter hashtag that clearly advocates for the Freedom Convoy. To answer research question 1, we use network analysis measures commonly associated with influence and diffusion on the Twitter networks (e.g., degree and betweenness centralities) to determine the influencers in both the Twitter mentions and retweets networks and then identify whether they affiliate with the far-right. To classify the narratives shared and whether they include far-right narratives (research question 2), we conduct a content analysis of the most shared tweets in the #IStandWithTruckers retweet network and in the timelines of influencers that were identified by network analysis. To answer research question 3 and study the diffusion of misinformation and conspiratorial beliefs, we first use network analysis to determine the most shared URL domains in the Twitter networks. We then use Media Bias Fact check to determine the veracity of those domains and their inclination to the far right. This research presents innovative methods to identify right-wing and online conspiracy and to detect the broadcasters of right-wing extremist discourse online.

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Non-presenting authors: Tina Fetner, McMaster University; Clifton van der Linden, McMaster University

Fahad Ahmad, Toronto Metropolitan University

Beyond the Convoy: Exploring Philanthropic Foundations' Role in Mainstreaming Right-Wing Populism

Right-wing movements have had a long presence in Canada, yet, only recently, have associated groups garnered the attention of policymakers and academics (Perry and Scrivens, 2019). The frequent characterization of right wing movements as “extremist” or “radical” implies that the values and norms they encapsulate lie outside the acceptable modes of political expression. Yet, when the so-called “Freedom Convoy”—frequently described as Canada’s “far right protest”—brought the capital city of Ottawa to a standstill for a month in the winter of 2022, about half of Canada sympathized with their ideas, even if they did not agree with their tactics. Members of the Conservative Party of Canada took photographs with the convoy leaders and participants. Such endorsements suggest that the ideas of the convoy did not reside outside the spectrum of acceptable politics. The study of “right wing populism” (RWP) attempts to capture the ideas and discourses of the right—ethno-nationalism, anti-immigration, Islamophobia, anti-establishment, economic protectionism, and others—that resonate across sections of global north publics (Mudde, 2017). Whereas the study of right-wing populism has largely focused on the role of political parties, newer studies have started to consider movement dynamics, charismatic leaders, and transnational connections. Among these queries, our intervention sheds light on an understudied area: what role do philanthropic foundations play in mainstreaming right-wing populist ideas; and what are the pertinent material and symbolic mechanisms of support from philanthropic foundations that enable such legitimization? As such, this exploratory inquiry adds to a broader call in the literature to understand the role of putatively liberal institutions—like, philanthropy—play in sustaining right wing populism. We focus on the case of Canada as it represents a somewhat paradoxical case. Much has been written celebrating the positive role of Canada’s official multiculturalism policy on social cohesion and national identity formation. So positive was Canada’s public image of multiculturalist liberalism that when it appeared Donald Trump would become President in 2016, progressive Americans proclaimed they would move to Canada. Studying the ascendance of right wing populism in Canada provides an instructive opportunity to think past conventional paradigms of left/liberal versus right/conservatist divides. Further, by thinking about the pivotal role of philanthropy, our intervention sheds light on another important puzzle: how do liberal institutions at times, knowingly and at others, inadvertently normalize ideas associated with RWP? To examine this, we have started putting together an original dataset identifying financial flows from philanthropic foundations to organizations that publish reports and knowledge instruments that are often reused by RWP movement actors. In the same dataset, we also examine the presence of RWP ideologues on the boards of Canadian philanthropic foundations. Such ideologues either espouse RWP ideas and/or are connected to the “Freedom Convoy” in a meaningful way. While still in preliminary stages, the database provides an opportunity to examine previously uncovered networks of relationships and shed light on the hegemonic processes through which ideological frames/discourses of RWP are mobilized through philanthropic foundations.  For this paper, we present our findings based on analysis of the preliminary dataset we have assembled. Through this, we are able to highlight the mechanisms through which philanthropic institutions, sometimes unwittingly and sometimes knowingly, bolster right wing populist ideas while at the same time professing commitment to liberalism. As such, our findings speak to the political economic and symbolic dimensions that affirm philanthropic institutions, which in turn facilitate the proliferation of regressive ideologies associated with RWP.

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Non-presenting authors: Adam Saifer, University of British Columbia – Okanagan; Paul Sylvestre, University of Ottawa

Iga Mergler, Wilfrid Laurier University; Neil McLaughlin, McMaster University

Why George Soros Conspiracy Theories Never Took off in Canada and Why that Might be Changing

The lack of a mass based far-right party in Canada makes us stand out among comparable advanced industrial nations, but we also have not seen the same level of anti-Soros conspiracy theories as one finds in the Poland Hungary and the United States. Soros, a Hungarian American philanthropist, has been at the center of right-wing populist attacks on globalist elites around the world because of his unique combination of wealth, liberal capitalist views, his highly influential Open Society Foundation and his Jewish roots. In Canada, however, these tactics of scapegoating Soros has not really worked, like in Lithuania and Slovenia, among other examples discussed in the literature. This paper will outline the comparative sociological reasons discussed in the Canadian exceptionalism literature and in the scholarship on Soros for why Soros conspiracy theories never really took hold here. We will the discuss how Erza Levant, the Truckers Convoy and the new Canadian right wing internet figures such as Jordan Peterson and Lauren Southern may be changing this, as anti-globalist populist right here allies with American Trumpism and Orban in Hungary to replace liberalism and social democracy with new illiberal forms of democracy that could happen here.

Emily Laxer, York University, Glendon Campus; Rémi Vivès, York University, Glendon Campus

Canada, Still the Exception? Mapping Populist Discourses in Canadian Federal Leaders' Social Media Presence

The last decade has seen a marked increase in social scientific and public interest in populism. Since 2016, the year that saw Donald Trump elected U.S. President and Britain’s exit from the European union (“Brexit”), the number of publications including the terms “populism(s)” or “populist(s)” in their titles have virtually exploded, as have worldwide google searches of the term “populism” (Peker, Vivès and Laxer, 2023). This substantial increase in attention poses challenges for social scientific research. If populism is of such broad significance, how can it be clearly defined? What are its characteristic features and key dimensions? How can we reliably operationalize and measure it? Current answers to these questions are disproportionately informed by observations of right-wing populisms in Europe, which are known to elicit public fears about the cultural influence of foreign and domestic “others”. This has left a clear imprint on the field. For instance, several studies define populism as inherently prone to excluding minority populations (e.g., Engesser et al., 2017). Others address populism as a matter of degree, distinguishing its minimal or “thin” forms characterized by positive references to the “people”, from “thick” versions that include negative references to “elites” and “others” (Jagers and Walgrave, 2007). A third branch of scholarship regards exclusion of “others” as characteristic of right- but not left-wing populisms (Freisen, 2021). In this study, we aim to ascertain whether and to what extent theoretical propositions derived from the European experience can illuminate the role and impact of populisms in non-European contexts. We focus on Canada, which, until recently, was widely viewed as impervious to the global populist surge, particularly its exclusionary dimensions. However, this tale of “exceptionalism” has become overshadowed by reports that parties, leaders, and movements deploying populist discourse and strategy have taken on greater significance and visibility in the wake of the covid-19 pandemic. Using a dataset of over 5,000 original tweets by five Canadian federal party leaders, we compare the prevalence and intensity of three characteristic populist discourses: people-centrism, anti-elitism, and exclusion of “others”. Our decision to include politicians from across the political spectrum is informed by a conception of populism as a communication style, which varies in degree both within and across parties, and which contains multiple dimensions, some of which are taken up by “mainstream” parties. In including politicians from a range of ideological traditions, we also seek to avoid presuming who is or is not “populist”, opting instead to focus on instances of populist mobilizing, which can take varied forms. Our results complicate prevailing definitions of populism by showing a weak correlation between people-centrism – which is widespread across the political spectrum – and anti-elitism – which is far more circumscribed. We also find far more complexity in the make-up of right-wing populisms – particularly in terms of the exclusion of “others” – than the European literature suggests. We argue that our findings warrant a rethinking of populism’s key dimensions and relationship to ideology beyond the Canadian case.

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Non-presenting authors: Efe Peker, University of Ottawa