6. Why the Governor General Matters

Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Contents v
3. Foreword ix
4. Introduction xiii
5. PART ONE. The Events and Their Background
6. 1. The ‘Crisis’: A Narrative 3
7. 2. A Crisis Not Made in a Day 19
8. PART TWO. The Governor General’s Decision to Prorogue
9. 3. To Prorogue or Not to Prorogue: Did the Governor General Make the Right Decision? 33
10. 4. The Governor General’s Suspension of Parliament: Duty Done or a Perilous Precedent? 47
11. 5. Prime Minister Harper’s Parliamentary ‘Time Out’: A Constitutional Revolution in the Making? 63
12. PART THREE. Constitutional Conventions
13. 6. Why the Governor General Matters 79
14. 7. When Silence Isn’t Golden: Constitutional Conventions, Constitutional Culture, and the Governor General 91
15. 8. Of Representation, Democracy, and Legal Principles: Thinking about the Impensé 105
16. PART FOUR. Coalitions and Parliamentary Government
17. 9. Coalition Government: When It Happens, How It Works 123
18. 10. Learning to Live with Minority Parliaments 136
19. 11. The Coalition That Wasn’t: A Lost Reform Opportunity 150
20. PART FIVE. Tensions in Canada’s Democratic Culture
21. 12. Western Canada and the ‘Illegitimacy’ of the Liberal-NDP Coalition Government 163
22. 13. Parliamentary Democracy versus Faux Populist Democracy 175
23. 14. Ultimately, the System Worked 189
24. Contributors 195
25. Index 197