The inside story on his unlikely victory
Somewhere, Samantha Power is smiling. Yesterday, while she was working on Obama’s State Department transition, her predecessor as the head of Harvard University’s Carr Centre for Human Rights (now run by adventurer-cum-Prospect-writer Rory Stewart), and fellow journalist-turned-academic, clinched the nomination for the Liberal Party of Canada.
Michael Ignatieff’s victory comes at a time of great turmoil in Canadian politics. Despite huge enthusiasm for Obama—over 70 per cent of Canadians supported him—the country oddly re-elected a prime minister, Stephen Harper, who in temperament, ideology and style is Obama’s antithesis. But Harper might have reason to take pause; having dismissed the coming recession during the election, he is now faced with holding together a minority government facing a crashing economy and a volatile political mess. And so enters Michael Ignatieff. But it wasn’t supposed to happen this way.
Instead of a hoped-for delegated convention win next May, Ignatieff yesterday was acclaimed leader amidst a rather unlikely flurry of parliamentary drama.  On November 27th, a mere six weeks after the election and to fierce criticism, finance minister Jim Flaherty released an unwise economic statement—one which played politics in lieu of addressing the country’s economic woes.
In particular, he announced plans to cancel public party financing. In so doing he created a unity of protest that the Canadian left itself rarely manages, driving the leftist NDP, the Separatist Bloc Quebecois and the centrist Liberals into each others’ arms. They formed a coalition, under the leadership of the lame duck Liberal party leader, Stephane Dion. Their plan was to bring down the government.
Having grossly underestimated the opposition reaction, Prime Minister Harper was forced to ask the Governor General (an unelected figure, appointed by Queen Elizabeth) for a short term reprieve in the form of an archaic “prorogation” of Parliament. With this granted, and faced with a budget vote and potential election in January, the Liberal party decided its leisurely six month leadership election might usefully be slightly sped up. Indeed, they broke into something of a sweat.
This was all good news for Iganiteff. The author and writer had the edge in every measure of support, from caucus to party brass to general membership. His two competitors—the much younger Dominique Leblanc and his old college roommate and ex premier on Ontario, Bob Rae—saw the writing on the wall, and gracefully stepped aside.
Which brings us back to Samantha Power. At around the same time she began working in Obama’s Senate office, Ignatieff was making his first moves into Canadian politics. Both seemed drawn to politics, after years of writing and talking about it. After a rousing and flirtatious speech to the 2005 liberal party convention, Ignatieff then returned formally to run in 2006, expecting to sit as an MP in Paul Martin’s government, and maybe get a chance at leadership.  But the Liberals lost that election, and he was thrown into a leadership race far sooner than expected.
It was during this leadership race that I became personally involved, as part of a policy team of Canadians around the world. (I’m currently doing a PhD at Oxford). We mucked in policy discussions during the campaign, and were a part of something that was quite unique to Canadian politics—genuine excitement, at the prospect of a different kind of politics. That’ll teach us. Ignatieff lost on the last ballot.
After a troubled tenure as leader, and a disappointing loss to Harper this November, liberal leader Dion agreed to step down, and called a leadership race. Ignatieff was the immediate front-runner. Our team reformed, far bigger now. The race was meant to end at a delegated convention in May. But, then, events intervened.
Ignatieff can be the first transformational Canadian leader in a generation. He is an intellect, internationally respected and, perhaps most importantly, he has a sophisticated and articulate knowledge of, and belief in, liberalism. What’s more, he is emerging politically along-side a US administration with which he shares ties and ideological and policy sensibilities. Both his and Power’s long play from academia to politics seem to have proved successful.
When Ignatieff first ran for Canadian politics, his critics dismissed him as an arriviste outsider, prone to stumbles and missteps: Iggy the egghead. Better head back to your Harvard seminars and your London dinner parties, they said. At the time Michael was quoted as saying that he was “less naive than I appear.” So it would seem.
Taylor Owen is a Trudeau Scholar at the University of Oxford and worked on policy for the short-lived Michael Ignatieff leadership campaign
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I’m sure Ignatieff’s mates are very happy about this news, but why anyone else should be isn’t clear. The guy was a total disaster as head of Harvard’s Carr Centre for Human Rights.
I’ve no idea why he’s heralded as some sort of aspiring philosopher-king: last year’s mea culpa in the New York Times had all the anti-intellectualism of John Gaunt. And I suspect Gaunty’s views on torture probably aren’t much more right-wing than Ignatieff’s.
Taylor,
In what respects do you see Ignatieff as transformative? While his intellectual career has been glittering, he has been much more limited in policy terms since joining Parliament – maybe that’s a price that one pays!
Taylor,
As much as I’m reassured by the idea of two charismatic intellectual leaders representing North America’s powers, what do you actually expect them to accomplish together? Where do you see joint Canadian and US interests making a difference on regional and international issues?
Further, when you say Ignatieff is “transformational”, do you expect Canadians to see liberalism differently, or the world to view Canada differently?
Hugh, for my views on his NYTs mea culpa, see here.
On Ignatieff being transformational, i agree this is somewhat of a slippery term. I suppose I see him as such in a few respects. One, he could substantially change the electoral calculus of the country. As was clear in his first press conference as leader, he is going to make a serious move into Western Canada, Quebec, and rural ridings. If he does these three things, he will fundamentally change the electoral map. As an aside to that, Alberta is on the cusp of a political shake-up. It is not impossible that Ignatieff becomes part of that equation. Sticking with internally, I think he could change the way canadians look at political leadership. We do not have a tradition of big, inspiring leaders. He has the potential to be both. Internationally, he will represent a major change in the way Canada is viewed. Reading the international clips on his win over the past couple of days gives a tastes of this. Policy wise, in 2006, his policy platform was progressive and bold. There is zero concern in thinking big on policy shifts and i am certain this will be evident in the plan that comes out of the next Liberal Policy convention. There is of course a case to be made that Harper has been transformational, and I suppose in some ways he has. Although I would suggest that many of his proposed transformation changes (such as Senate reform), have been thwarted by minority politics.
Re. aligned policies with the US, i think there are many. First, the two economy’s are so fundamentally tied that major changes in the US economy, a large green economic stimulus for example, will have a huge impact in Canada, particularly if we have a leader who makes similar structural changes (such as a national energy grid, large increase in r and d spending, carbon pricing, etc). There is also a real chance that NAFTA will be re-negotiated. If so, there is an opportunity to fold the environmental and labour side agreements into the treaty, which would require progressive leadership in both countries to accomplish. Internationally, the US is shifting focus to Afghanistan, where Canada has been playing a large combat role in the south. There will be even further strategic integration, as the US shifts from a counterinsurgency role, to likely playing a larger role in the NATO peacebuilding model that Canada has been a major player in developing. There are signs that the Obama admin might put a genocide response task force in the White House. If they do, I have little doubt that an Ignatieff government would seek to be involved.
All this is to say, I concede and my biases are on the table, that transformational politics may be in the eye of the beholder. But, I do think some major changes in canadian politics, how canadians view leadership, how canada is viewed internationally, and how the US and canada make major economic and foreign policy shifts are possible with an Ignatieff government.
[...] Taylor Owen has a new piece in the Prospect magazine advancing the claim that Michael Ignatieff could be an Obamaesque figure, [...]