Politics
The Case For 'Incremental' Politics In New Brunswick – Huddle Today
Reading Time: 3 minutes
David Campbell is a Moncton-based economic development consultant and co-host of the Huddle podcast, Insights. The following piece was originally published on his blog, It’s the Economy, Stupid!, on Substack.
This isn’t a political blog. I avoid partisan politics because I have seen how politicians have messed up good economic development programs because they felt they had to do something different than their predecessor (and then promised to do so strenuously during the election).
But because this toxic form of politics is now coming squarely into the domain of economic development, I will make a few points that are hopefully worthy of the 145 seconds you will need to read this.
In a democracy, politicians should aspire to incremental, consensus-building politics. That’s true even, and especially, in parliamentary democracies like ours where the party in power normally has a mostly free hand to do what they want. In this system, the next party can just come in and undo what the other team did.
There was a time when a premier or prime minister would talk about being the premier/prime minister of all Canadians (or insert your province here). The line was something like: “Yes, we have our disagreements and I won’t change my mind on big issues that I care about, but I respect the fact that people can see things differently. I’ll try to win you over but we will work on finding areas of common ground where we can move ahead together.”
Now, for the most part, it’s something much, much different. I thought the vitriol against Harper was bad. Nothing I have ever seen compared to our current Prime Minister. I realize the “F-word” is now more commonplace than ever but now I see bumper stickers and TicTok videos with a branded “F Trudeau” theme (the U is a maple leaf for effect).
Things are bad. Maybe we should still have some respect for the office and some basic human decency in political discourse. If you poke around social media, you will see things just as bad about Premier Higgs, although they’re not as pervasive.
We have big challenges. New Brunswick needs to bring in thousands more people each year to meet workforce demand. We need growth industries that are export-focused to ensure we can sustainably generate tax revenue to fund public services, even as we decarbonize the entire economy in 25 or so years. We need to have high-quality and accessible public services in all corners of the province. Shortages of everything and unprecedented wait times will blow up any consensus.
Can’t we find a more accommodating form of politics? Forget social media — the algorithm will always reward the nastiest voices; the shock value alone drives clicks.
We have a potential example right here. When Susan Holt, I, and others finished the first draft of the provincial growth plan about five years ago her idea was to take it to the opposition and try to get consensus on the broad strokes of the plan. It was a good idea because if government changed there wouldn’t be a big effort to redo the economic development direction of the province and a one-to-two-year wait for the new government to figure things out.
It was possible the opposition wouldn’t play ball. It was possible the changes they would propose would be a bridge too far. But it was a modest effort at consensus politics.
Our boss at the time said no.
We will see if she has the same approach in opposition. Will she applaud economic development and population growth initiatives that align with her vision? Or will she oppose for the sake of opposition? Will she build goodwill or rant and rave about the apocalypse underway?
There is enormous temptation now to get into the social media gutter: To call politicians names, to exaggerate, to burn any kind of goodwill that might exist. That is what gets the likes and the retweets. It’s a nice dopamine hit to see the counter ticking up.
But we need incremental, consensus-building politics now more than ever.
It’s time.
P.S. Someone told me this is generational, that Millennials and Gen Z will burn longstanding friendships because of a disagreement over pronouns or something. I’m not sure. It might just be my networks, but the old-timers seem to be just as cranky. We need to bring young and old into this new approach to politics.
Huddle publishes commentaries from groups and individuals on important business issues facing the Maritimes. These commentaries do not necessarily reflect the opinion of Huddle. To submit a commentary for consideration, contact editor Mark Leger: [email protected].
Politics
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A former minister with the Parti Québécois (PQ) says his time in politics is over, and he’s ready to focus on his first love: the arts.
“People have to remember that I was dealing with the arts for 30 years before I went into politics,” Maka Kotto tells CTV News a day before boarding a flight to his native Cameroon for a music festival. “After 14 years in politics, I felt that I did what I had to do. And so, I decided to get back to my old practices.”
Kotto represented the PQ in the riding of Bourget from 2008 to 2018 and was also the culture minister in Pauline Marois’ short-lived government.
In addition to his time in provincial politics, Kotto represented the Bloc Québécois from 2004 to 2008 in the Canadian House of Commons — the party’s first Black member of Parliament.
“It drained my energy and I lost contact with my family, with my friends. When I was inside, I didn’t realize that,” he said. “My mother went to the other side in 2018 and I couldn’t say good-bye… I wrote a song about that.”
Kotto says his mother’s death was a moment that notably marked him.
“This was very awful. Until now, I still suffer for that,” he said. “You see, when you’re investing in politics, you have many, many sacrifices that you’re facing.”
Closing the political door and turning his attention back to music and acting was an effortless decision for the 62-year-old.
“This was much, much more, easier than politics,” he said.
Kotto says he remembers his father not liking the idea of him getting involved in the arts as a child — he wanted him to “be a good student.”
“The last time I sang, I was between 16 or 17 years old,” he recalls. “That was in college, at the boarding school church. It was a French Jesuit boarding school in Cameroon.”
When asked what’s scarier: putting out a jazz album or working in politics, Kotto doesn’t miss a beat.
“Oh, politics is scary because you don’t have fun in politics. You have problems every day, every night, every morning and you have to solve real problems,” he said. “When you’re singing, it’s a passion…The only goal you have to reach is to share what you feel.”
Kotto says he worked for about six months on his album, collaborating with the likes of Antoine Gratton, Taurey Butler and the Orchestre national de jazz de Montréal (ONJ).
“We have a lot of fun. That was the goal, and I hope that everybody listening to this album will have the same fun as the one we had in studio,” he said.
A few words he uses to describe his music: fun, love and friendship.
The release of Kotto’s first album is scheduled for the winter of 2024.
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