{"id":176139,"date":"2022-05-24T10:30:36","date_gmt":"2022-05-24T14:30:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/irpp-policy-options.local\/issues\/doug-ford-political-durability\/"},"modified":"2025-04-14T03:26:10","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T07:26:10","slug":"doug-ford-political-durability","status":"publish","type":"issues","link":"https:\/\/potestlaunch.irpp.org\/fr\/2022\/05\/doug-ford-political-durability\/","title":{"rendered":"Understanding Doug Ford\u2019s political durability"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the June 2 Ontario provincial election approaches, political observers are presented with a confusing landscape. With more than two-thirds<\/a> of Ontario voters indicating a strong or moderate desire for a change in government and widespread dissatisfaction<\/a> with its management of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ford government would seem to be at serious risk of being replaced. So far, however, polls show<\/a> Doug Ford\u2019s Progressive Conservatives seem poised to retain power.<\/p>\n

Ford was first elected four years ago on a platform<\/a> focused on cutting red tape, taxes and hydro rates. The widespread responses required by the pandemic might have been expected to blunt the appeal of this limited vision of the role of the province\u2019s government. Indeed, when polled<\/a> about budget deficits resulting from COVID spending, a resounding 82 per cent of Ontarians preferred running deficits to cutting services and 71 per cent preferred greater deficits to cutting public service jobs.<\/p>\n

A more inward-looking Ontario emerges under Ford<\/a><\/p>\n

Will Doug Ford\u2019s promises exacerbate Ontario\u2019s problems?<\/a><\/p>\n

Will the Ford era lead to a political realignment in Ontario?<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As recently as January<\/a> 2022, improving and expanding health care was ranked as the most important priority for the province, ahead of stimulating the economy and at double the rate of reducing taxes or reducing the deficit. Yet the themes<\/a> of keeping consumer costs low and cutting red tape remain central to the government\u2019s so-far apparently successful re-election bid.<\/p>\n

All of this requires some sort of explanation. How is it that Ford\u2019s Conservatives, in early polling, seem to be on the road to victory when their public policies are at odds with the priorities of Ontarians or the policy lessons from the pandemic?<\/p>\n

The answer, at least in part, is the Ford government\u2019s rhetorical ability to explain the challenges of COVID-19 and other developments. Ford has also been helped by the inability of the opposition to provide a compelling counter-narrative \u2013 one that moves beyond the managerial approach<\/a> emphasizing balance among competing interests and agendas. That model, employed by both preceding Liberal premiers, stressed administrative competence and moderation as primary political values. This was quite decisively displaced by Ford in 2018.<\/p>\n

Historical and economic context is important to understanding Ford\u2019s political durability. During the past 50 years Ontario\u2019s economy has undergone major structural changes<\/a>, characterized as a shift away from manufacturing to service and knowledge-based economic activities.<\/p>\n

Ontario\u2019s experience of this transition has been far more positive than its \u201crust belt<\/a>\u201d neighbours on the south side of the Great Lakes. While those states have suffered dramatic declines in economic activity and population, Ontario\u2019s overall trajectories remained fundamentally positive.<\/p>\n

Examined more closely, however, the province\u2019s economic transition has been less smooth. Rather, it has involved a high degree of polarization among employment types and income<\/a> in the growing service sector. This polarization<\/a> has featured the simultaneous creation of high-paid professional and managerial employment at the upper end of the labour market. But the bottom end is increasingly defined by precarious and low-paid personal service jobs. There has been little or no new mid-skilled job-creation in between.<\/p>\n

The economic transition has also been geographically uneven<\/a>. Growth in service-sector employment has been heavily concentrated in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and to a lesser extent around Ottawa. Regions of the province traditionally associated with manufacturing, particularly in southwestern and central Ontario and the Niagara Peninsula, have been increasingly left behind.<\/p>\n

The impact of these dynamics could be seen in the outcome<\/a> of the 2014 election. Then, the winning Liberal vote was concentrated in the relatively prosperous urban GTA. Declining urban communities moved toward the NDP and rural central Ontario remained the Progressive Conservative base.<\/p>\n

Since then, the geographic divisions have become even more pronounced, with \u201cthe hyper-concentration<\/a> of knowledge-based activities in and around downtown Toronto\u201d and a relative decline in the suburban 905 region surrounding the city. That region would provide a core of the \u201cFord nation<\/a>\u201d constituency that propelled the Progressive Conservatives into government in 2018.<\/p>\n

In effect, Ford succeeded with a populist appeal to the \u201creal Ontarians<\/a>\u201d on the losing end of the transition, who considered themselves under-served and over-taxed by the previous Liberal government.<\/p>\n

In the 2018 election campaign and throughout his tenure, Premier Ford has employed what might be understood as a \u201cmarket populist<\/a>\u201d appeal. This approach reframes in populist terms traditionally neo-liberal<\/a> economic goals such as a reduction in the size of the state and deregulation of the economy. These are then branded as what \u201creal Ontarians\u201d want.<\/p>\n

Slogans such as \u201copen for business<\/a>\u201d and \u201crespecting taxpayers<\/a>\u201d suggest a direct connection between policies that favour minimal government interference and personal economic prosperity. They imply that anything beyond minimal government action is incompatible with respect for voters \u2013 something the Liberal governments failed to show.<\/p>\n

Future of work isn\u2019t just elite chatter<\/a><\/p>\n

So much for \u2018austerity-light\u2019 in Ontario<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Ford government retained this posture through the COVID crisis but adapted it slightly to accommodate the increased governmental action necessitated by public health orders. The easing of restrictions framed as a requirement for economic prosperity has seemingly been this government\u2019s central directive in decision-making \u2013 \u201creopening for business<\/a>\u201d became the primary goal. Public health restrictions may be necessary to sustain economic prosperity in the long term but are ultimately subordinate to the economy.<\/p>\n

To this theme the government has added a new form of post-pandemic activism. This has focused on further cutting red tape and increased spending to \u201cget it done<\/a>\u201d in terms of housing, highway and transit construction. Whether the projects being \u201cdone,\u201d such as the 413 Highway<\/a>, actually make sense is a secondary question. At the same time, a focus on short-term affordability through moves such as a promised gas-tax cut<\/a> and the removal of road tolls<\/a> and vehicle licensing fees<\/a> plays well to public concerns<\/a> over rising living costs.<\/p>\n

Mounting effective responses to these narratives presents significant challenges for the province\u2019s opposition parties. Throughout most of the pandemic period, both the NDP<\/a> and the Liberals<\/a> focused heavily on how they would have managed things better, but operating within the parameters of debate set by the Ford government. To this, they have added attempts to top<\/a> Ford\u2019s populist appeals to affordability.<\/p>\n

So far, only the Green Party<\/a> seems to be presenting a conceptually different model in its plan for a green recovery<\/a>. It addresses the fact that \u201cthe path we were on was not sustainable or just\u201d and that sustainability (environmental, economic and social) could be an alternative basis for governance. But the chances of the Ontario Greens forming a government after June 2nd<\/sup> are remote.<\/p>\n

The environment and climate change<\/a> remain key points of vulnerability for the Ford government, particularly in the sense that they speak to his government\u2019s reactive policy style and lack of forward vision. The question of who actually wins<\/a> under Ford\u2019s form of \u201cmarket populism\u201d must also loom large. \u201cThe people\u201d or certain well-connected<\/a> interests: developers<\/a>, resource industries<\/a>, incumbents in the energy<\/a> and for-profit<\/a> long-term care sectors?<\/p>\n

But if the NDP and Liberals hope to unseat Ford, they need to develop a framing that proposes more than beating Ford at his own game. Rather, they must focus on how they would address the geographically, socially and politically polarizing model that has come to define large segments of the Ontario economy. They also need to deliver that vision with greater energy and charisma than they have shown.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As the June 2 Ontario provincial election approaches, political observers are presented with a confusing landscape. With more than two-thirds of Ontario voters indicating a strong or moderate desire for a change in government and widespread dissatisfaction with its management of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ford government would seem to be at serious risk of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":103350,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","ep_exclude_from_search":false},"categories":[9362,9358,9372],"tags":[8478,8371,9132],"article-status":[],"irpp-category":[4234,4250,4243,4229],"section":[],"irpp-tag":[7032,7154],"class_list":["post-176139","issues","type-issues","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economie","category-politique","category-recent-stories-fr","tag-canadian-elections-fr","tag-ontario-fr","tag-politique-canadienne","irpp-category-democracy","irpp-category-democratie","irpp-category-economy","irpp-category-politics","irpp-tag-ontario"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nUnderstanding Doug Ford\u2019s political durability<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"What has put Ford\u2019s Conservatives seemingly on track to win despite their policies being at odds with the priorities of Ontarians? 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