Fourteenth International Conference on Climate Change: Impacts & Responses

Abstract

Within the context of the current global discussion on climate change, Canada’s political response to the ongoing climate crisis effects how our country is perceived on the international stage. Canada’s historical and contemporary position as an energy extraction state is key to the nation’s identity and economy, influencing its political decisions. Canada’s location is also uniquely precarious in that it both disproportionality contributes to, and suffers from, the consequences of global warming, and this tension is observable in current political discourse. Therefore, an examination of environmental concern in Canada as reflected in voter support for the Green Party of Canada is overdue. This paper begins this work through an analysis of academic articles mainly discussing climate change and Canadian political parties generally, as well as the regular publications of federal election summaries. From these sources, this paper compares themes of Green party emergence and success to the EU and Australasian literature – themes of post-modernism, the economy, voting systems, and to a lesser extent, party funding, party competition and environmental and social events – to analyze where the similarities and differences to Canada’s Green party lie. This study therefore fills a gap in third party political research in Canada, as historically, the parties examined have largely been the NDP and the Bloc Quebecois. This study also makes additions to important conversations surrounding Canada and the rise of concern at home and abroad about the issue of global climate change.