The Canadian National Election of 2019
The goal of this assignment is to participate in and critically evaluate a number of events associated with the national federal election on October 21, 2019. This exercise will help you relate the themes of the course to one of the most important exercises of all democracies: elections and the right to vote.
.Your Journal should contain three entries of approximately one to two pages each (typed and double-spaced), based on your observations and critical evaluation of the following three distinct elements of the electoral process:
A) Journal #1 – The Media Campaign. Choose a major Canadian newspaper, follow the discussion of the election campaign between September 4 and October 21, and ask yourself:
• How is the election being framed? How are the major issues being defined?
• What bias does the newspaper project?
• Is the newspaper supportive or critical of the campaigns of the major political parties? Does the newspaper seem to be more supportive of one party over another?
• As the campaign progresses, does the newspaper change the focus of its analysis of the campaign as a result of changing public sentiment, new information secured, changing political priorities of the country, changing global pressures, etc.?
• What is your overall analysis of the newspaper’s coverage of the election campaign? Has that coverage helped you in deciding who to vote for?
B) Journal #2 – Attend a Political Event. Choose a political event like an all-candidates debate in your riding, a political rally, or a specific issue-focused event organized by one or more of the political candidates, attend it, and ask yourself:
• How did the candidates conduct themselves? Were you impressed with their messages and their presentation of themselves?
• How did the candidates define the issues? What were the major differences between them? In what ways were they similar?
• Did the candidates seem to be mimicking the national party message? Or, did they have a distinctive message, and did they offer promises intended to meet the specific interests of the audience and constituency they seek to serve?
• Were the candidates believable? Were they sincere? Do you think that if elected, they will be able to keep their promises?
• What is your overall analysis of the event? Did your attendance help you in deciding who to vote for?
C) Journal #3 – Election Post-mortem. After the election is over and the results are in ask yourself:
• Did the pollsters get it right? Were their predictions accurate?
• Do the election results indicate that Canada has changed in some way? If so, how? If not, why not?
• What is the relationship between the popular vote and seat total captured by each party? Is there a meaningful correspondence between the two? Were the election results fair?
• What do you make of the results? Do you think that the outcome is good for Canada? Based on the election campaign, what can we expect to see in the Speech from the Throne?
• What is your overall assessment of the federal election campaign of 2015? What does the election indicate to you about the health of Canadian democracy? What changes, if any, would you propose?
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