Left vs. right & Liberal vs. Conservative
Ideological and partisan differences in Canadian politics
We typically place political leaders, parties and movements on the conventional left-right ideological spectrum. Most would agree that the Conservative Party in Canada is more to the right, and the Liberal Party and the New Democratic Party are more the left (with the NDP one or two steps further to the left than the Liberals).
Yet, the opinions that differentiate Canadians on the right from those on the left are not always the same as those that separate Conservative supporters from people who would vote Liberal or NDP. In other words, notions of “right” or “left” capture something different than being a Conservative or Liberal voter, or voting for the NDP.
The difference between left-right and Liberal-Conservative is the subject of this final part of my three-part series on political ideology (you can read part one here and part two here).
Photo credit: Rixipix
Left minus right
To start with, let’s see where the biggest differences in opinion are between those who place themselves on the left of the political spectrum and those who place themselves on the right (based on responses to a wide range of questions included in the 2023 AmericasBarometer).
The figures in the table show the difference (in percentage-points) between the proportion of those on the left who hold each opinion and the proportion of those on the right. A positive value indicates that those on the left are more likely to express that opinion and a negative value indicates that those on the right are more likely to express that opinion – but, as we’re looking at the distance between the two groups, the positive/negative sign doesn’t matter. To keep the list manageable, it includes only those items where there is at least a 20-point difference.
The top two issues that differentiate those on the left from those on the right are patriarchy (gender equality) and climate change.
Near the top of the list are items related to diversity, including whether immigrants are to blame for rising house prices, whether schools should teach Indigenous culture and history, and whether gays and lesbians should have equal rights. Similar items (about multiculturalism, immigration, gender equality and LGBTQ2S+ rights) also appear a little further down the list. (Keep in mind that some of this is a feature of the survey itself, which includes a series of questions on immigration, for instance, but only one on climate change.)
Also near the top of the list are several items that can be linked to populism, if not Trumpism. Those on the right are much more likely than those on the left to agree that political leaders can be justified in acting outside of the law to deliver their promises, that it’s good to have a strong leader who bends the rules to get things done, that it’s sometimes necessary for prime ministers limit the voice of opposition parties, and that direct democracy is better than representative democracy.
There are some other expected differences (compared to those on the left, people on the right are more likely to vote Conservative and less likely to vote NDP) and some more curious ones. For instance, those on the right are more likely to say they’ve experienced racism or sexism, or been a victim of a crime (which may surprise some who expected woke leftism to be more associated with feeling victimized). And despite their views on democratic norms, those on the right are more likely to trust political parties or respect political institutions.
In sum, some of the clearest dividing lines between left and right in Canada today relate to issues such as diversity and equality (gender equality, immigration and multiculturalism, and LGBTQ2S+ rights), climate change and support for strong leaders who transgress the norms of liberal democracy.
Liberal minus Conservative
How does this compare to differences between supporters of the different political parties (starting with Liberals and Conservatives)?
The lists are very different. Of the 10 largest gaps in opinion between Liberal and Conservative party supporters, only one appears in the first table of left-right differences: the seriousness of climate change. The climate change issue distinguishes both left from right, and Liberals from Conservatives.
But neither of the two items about gender equality from the first table appear in the second. Patriarchy (or opposition to it) distinguishes left from right in Canada to a much greater degree than it does Liberals from Conservatives.
The items relating to strong leaders breaking the rules or acting outside of the law are also missing from the list of major Liberal-Conservative differences. Conservative Party supporters are more likely than those on the right to expect leaders to respect traditional democratic norms (perhaps because they have no wish to unfetter the current prime minister).
What does appear on the list of Liberal-Conservative differences are, not surprisingly, items related to approval of the government and perceptions of how well the economy is doing. There are also several items relating to the political system, such as trust in parliament and pride in living under Canada’s political system. But whereas right-leaning Canadians expressed higher trust in political institutions in some cases than their left-leaning counterparts, Conservative party supporters express less trust than those supporting the Liberal Party. This does not necessarily mean that Conservative supporters are innately less trusting of the political system; rather, their level of trust today is muted by the fact that the Liberal Party holds office. It will likely rebound once their own party wins an election.
Finally, there are several items relating to diversity and equality rights, including immigration, multiculturalism and LGBTQ2S+ rights. With the exception of gender equality, diversity and equality issues distinguish not only left from right in Canada, but also Liberals from Conservatives.
NDP minus Conservative
Next, we can compare Liberal-Conservative differences to NDP-Conservative ones. Given that both the NDP and Liberals are progressive parties, do the same items differentiate their supporters from those who support the Conservatives?
There are many similarities. NDP and Liberal Party supporters are more or less equally distanced from Conservative Party supporters on issues such as climate change, whether immigrants are good for the economy, and whether they would be comfortable with a gay, lesbian or bisexual person as prime minister. In some cases, such as the importance of teaching Indigenous culture and history in schools or whether economic inequality is a big problem, the NDP-Conservative gap is a little wider, indicating that agreement among NDP supporters is more emphatic than it is among Liberal supporters.
However, most of the items relating to the political system (such as feeling proud of living under our political system or trusting parliament) – where there is a Liberal-Conservative gap – are missing, meaning they do not really distinguish NDP supporters from Conservative supporters. In these cases, NDP supporters and Conservative supporters share the characteristic of opposition parties. Their lesser support of the political system is driven not so much by ideology, but by the fact that they currently sit on one side of the aisle in the House of Commons, while Liberals sit on the other.
(The large NDP-Conservative gap on the rating of the performance of the prime minister in the table below is a little misleading, as it reflects the intense negative feelings of Conservative supporters compared to only moderate negativity on the part of New Democrats. The same is true for the question about trusting the federal government to do what is right.)
In short, on social and economic issues, NDP and Liberal Party supporters both hold opinions that distinguish themselves from Conservative supporters, but the extent of the difference from Conservatives is sometimes more pronounced in the case of the NDP. But questions about the political system bring NDP and Conservative supporters closer together, as fellow opponents of the government.
This is illustrated in the two tables that follow. Almost all the items with at least a 20-percentage point gap between NDP and Conservative Party supporters relate to economic or social issues (the exception are the two questions noted above); every item with at least a 20-percentage point gap between NDP and Liberal Party supporters relates to the political system.
What have we learned from this exercise?
The left-right ideological spectrum is relevant to understanding politics in Canada, but it is not the same as the differences between parties. In particular, being on the right means something different from just being a Conservative (even if, for some people, the two affiliations overlap: see the second part of this series).
Some opinions associated with Trumpist populism – namely support for strong leaders unconstrained by the rule of law – distinguish people on the right from those on the left, but less so Conservative supporters from Liberal supporters or from supporters of the NDP. This doesn’t mean that there are no populist (or even authoritarian) Conservatives. It just means that this dimension is not what makes Conservative supporters as a group stand out from supporters of the other parties.
Opinions relating to diversity and equality (particularly immigration, multiculturalism and LGBTQ2S+ rights) tend to differentiate people on the left from those on the right, as well as Liberal and NDP supporters from Conservative supporters. Opinions about gender equality, however, are only relevant for the left-right distinction and not the Liberal/NDP-Conservative one.
The issue of climate change consistently and strongly differentiates both the left from the right, and Liberal-NDP supporters from Conservative supporters. It constitutes one of the biggest ideological and partisan cleavages in Canadian politics today.
The findings featured in this post are from the Canadian portion of the 2023 AmericasBarometer. The AmericasBarometer is a biennial comparative survey of democratic values and behaviours that covers countries in North, Central and South America, as well as a significant number of countries in the Caribbean (the 2023 survey covers 25 countries). The project is led by the Latin American Public Opinion Project (LAPOP) at Vanderbilt University.
The survey is the most comprehensive source of information about support for democracy in Canada. Follow the Environics Institute to catch more reports from this survey.
The 2023 AmericasBarometer in Canada survey was conducted by the Environics Institute for Survey Research, in partnership with LAPOP at Vanderbilt University. It was conducted online with a representative sample of 2,500 Canadians (aged 18 and over) between July 20 and August 4, 2023. The author is solely responsible for any errors of presentation or interpretation.
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Third part in an interesting series, with important nuances between general ideology/leaning vs partisan support.