Right-wing Populism, Conservative Governance and Multiculturalism in Canada

Is it possible for populist conservatism to challenge multiculturalism and immigration policy without expressing the extreme nativism found in much European and American populism today? In this paper I consider one notable attempt. Between 1971 and 2006, Canadian federal governments had incorporated multiculturalism into a broader regime of liberal welfare state development, through constitutional and other means. The Conservative party of Canada government (2006 – 2015) attempted to normatively and politically detach multiculturalism from the Canadian welfare state, while finding ways to accommodate the ethnic diversity of Canadian society. In doing so it applied some of its ideological inheritance from the right-populist Reform Party of Canada while modifying Reform’s political strategy in decisive ways. My Paper will examine the Conservative government’s reformed multiculturalism and immigration policy by considering its strategic blend of populist appeals, courting of visible minority voters and rejection of the liberal egalitarian foundations of Canadian multiculturalism. The analysis points to the party’s uniqueness among contemporary parties of the ‘new right’, and by accounting for a model and practice that tempers without entirely rejecting the populist nativism typical of RRRP in Europe, should offer an illuminating comparative case study for this workshop.