(Quebec) Political scientist and former CAQ member Émilie Foster is worried about the future of the private member, who is losing “more and more power” in our democracy, because he is “crushed by the control of communications” of parties increasingly centralizing policies.
Mme Foster, who sat in the National Assembly under the colors of the Coalition avenir Québec from 2018 to 2022, believes that this observation is valid for a large part of the political parties in Quebec, in the other provincial legislatures and in Ottawa.
Political parties have become machines for centralizing power and controlling the message. […] The private member, crushed by the control of communications and the party line, is losing more and more power in our democracy.
Émilie Foster, political scientist and former CAQ MP
Mme Foster, who is now an associate professor at Carleton University, makes this observation in an article published in the digital journal Policy Options. “That should worry us,” says the one who was also vice-president of the Coalition avenir Québec.
Contacted by The PressMme Foster points out that this article is based on a “personal reflection”, but also on a review of the literature which shows that this is a reality for all Canadian elected officials.
Third link: they learned it last
Recent example: the backbenchers of the Coalition avenir Québec learned after everyone else that the Legault government was backtracking on a flagship promise of the party: the construction of a highway tunnel between Quebec and Lévis.
“Imagine the disappointment in the troops. It’s a pretty telling recent example,” she says. “It should have been handled differently. The deputies were entitled to be informed well in advance. This is unfortunately an example of what happens in governments, where backbenchers are the last to know, because it is worse in power, ”she explains.
The motivation behind it all: political parties are “infused with a marketing logic” and “sell themselves as a product”. They are in “permanent electoral campaign”, summarizes the one who has a doctorate in public communication from Laval University.
The team around the party leaders wants to control the message as much as possible, and avoid blunders. Mme Instead, Foster believes that political machines should “trust MPs” and stop “being afraid of leaks.”
Party-line spokespersons
The situation is particularly painful for “backbench MPs”, “ruling party MPs who are neither ministers nor officers”. “In all governments, the control of the message is exercised everywhere, even in the constituency where the messages must be dressed by the national,” she laments.
She herself, as the member for Charlevoix–Côte-de-Beaupré, paid the price for this way of doing things. At the time, the CAQ had promised the construction of a casino in Quebec, which undoubtedly meant “the death” of the Charlevoix casino. “I had no choice when national media asked me to toe the line. I was sandwiched,” she said.
Elected officials therefore find themselves “spokespersons for a party line”. To this kind of criticism, the chiefs often reply that the debates take place internally, in caucus. But they can “decide to direct the content by reducing the exchanges to a few predefined themes and by transmitting the outline of the key messages of the week”, she explains.
The role of the media
If the political parties are mainly responsible for this situation, the media also have their part to play “in this culture of unanimity”. “While MP dissent is tolerated and even celebrated in other democracies, even a hint of rebellion by backbench MPs is covered negatively in the Canadian media,” she wrote.
She believes that “the media should stop treating a dissenting MP’s point of view as a betrayal”. The solutions are not simple, but she believes that political parties have a “moral duty” to think about them.
Parties must remember that they are doing politics, not marketing. Debates are healthy, necessary and should be encouraged, even if it means losing a few votes in the next election.
Émilie Foster, former CAQ MP and political scientist
The solutions probably go through parliamentary reform that would give more room to ordinary MPs, she believes. Within the political parties, the decline of militancy poses a problem: the leaders increasingly choose the candidates-deputies, which reduces their autonomy. “And even when there are nominations, the leaders have a long arm,” she underlines. The parties will therefore have to reform their way of doing things to leave more room for free speech among elected officials.