Ideological formation and liberal 'consensus': Reading the Rowell-Sirois Commission.

摘要

The Dominion-Provincial Relations Commission was a central event in the development of the Canadian economy and laid the groundwork for the policy paradigm shift that by 1945 had been thoroughly entrenched. This history has been thoroughly examined. But because the Commission and the period have been addressed mainly by political historians, the Commission's significance in the historical process of ideological formation has been missed. Additionally, the ideological landscape of the 1930s was far more complex than has previously been suggested.;In the development of this thesis, the submissions of national organizations, histories of economic thought, and secondary historical literature on Canadian intellectual and social history yielded a set of categories for the ideas expressed in these submissions. Political theory and studies on royal commissions yielded a framework for analyzing the process by which prominent ideas may change or be replaced. The transcripts of the Commission's hearings, pressure group submissions, and newspaper and magazine reports during and shortly after the hearings showed both the process of consensus building the Commission represented, and the public response it elicited. (Abstract shortened by UMI.).