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Of “Special Interest”: Interest, Identity and Feminist Constitutional Activism in Canada*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2009

Alexandra Dobrowolsky
Alexandra Dobrowolsky
Affiliation:
York University
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Abstract

A number of theoretical propositions are advanced through a consideration of the shifting strategies of feminist organizations in Canada during three rounds of constitutional negotiations. First, interest-oriented formulations alone do not capture the intricacies of representation. Representation should be conceived more broadly in terms not just of interest, but also of identity. Second, there are multiple routes to representation that include intersecting forms of representation. Finally, “special interest” designations can be used to undercut the democratic potential of collective mobilization.

Résumé

Plusieurs propositions théoriques sont mises de l'avant concernant les stratégies changeantes des organisations féministes au cours des trois dernières rondes de négociations constitutionnelles. Premièrement, la seule prise en compte des intérêts ne permet pas d'appréhender la complexité de la représentation. Celle-ci doit être conçue plus largement non pas seulement en termes d'intérêts, mais aussi d'identité. Deuxièmement, il y a plusieurs voies pour assurer la représentation qui tiennent compte des formes multiples de la représentation. Finalement, les appellations en termes « d'intérêt particulier » minent le potentiel mobilisateur de l'action collective.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 31 , Issue 4 , December 1998 , pp. 707 - 742
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 1998

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References

1 This is the standard (often structural-functionalist) definition where parties are defined as interest aggregators and integrators. Smith, Denis, “Party Government, Representation and National Integration in Canada,” in Aucoin, Peter, ed., Party Government and Regional Representation in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985)Google Scholar; Van Loon, Richard and Whittington, Michael S., The Canadian Political System (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1987), 307Google Scholar; and the Royal Commission on Electoral Reform and Party Financing, Reforming Electoral Democracy, Vol. 1: Final Report (Ottawa: Minister of Supply and Services, 1991), 207.Google Scholar

2 Presthus, Robert, Elite Accommodation in Canadian Politics (Toronto: Macmillan, 1973), 78.Google Scholar

3 Pross, A. Paul, “The Pressure Group Conundrum,” in Bickerton, James P. and Gagnon, Alain G., eds., Canadian Politics (2nd ed.; Peterborough: Broadview Press, 1994), 173Google Scholar. See also Pross, A. Paul, Group Politics and Public Policy (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1986).Google Scholar

4 To be sure, one can trace concerns on the evils of factions back to Madison (see Hamilton, Alexander, Jay, John and Madison, James, The Federalist: A Commentary on the Constitution of the United States [New York: H. Holt, 1898])Google Scholar; yet, for reasons discussed below, recent decrials have resonated widely. In Canada, Tanguay and Kay describe a “public mood of fear and hostility to organized interests,” noting that criticisms about the “pernicious influence of organized interest groups reached a crescendo in the aftermath of the 1988 federal election” (Tanguay, A. Brian and Kay, Barry J., “Political Activity of Local Interest Groups,” in Seidle, F. Leslie, ed., Interest Groups and Elections in Canada [Toronto: Dundurn, 1991], 77–78).Google Scholar

5 In response to the citizenry's current disillusionment with political parties, interest groups are accused of usurping the position of parties as the “primary” vehicle of representation. The Royal Commission on Electoral Reform and Party Financing suggests that “many citizens have found that pursuing a single issue through a single purpose organization is much more satisfying than participating in a political party, where they would have to accommodate their goals with competing interests” (Royal Commission on Electoral Reform, Reforming Electoral Democracy, 222 [emphasis added]). This reinforces the fact that interest groups have singular interests whereas parties accommodate many interests, and thus the latter are “best suited to performing a host of activities essential to representative democracy” (ibid., 207).

6 Knopff, Rainer and Morton, F. L., Charter Politics (Scarborough: Nelson, 1992), 79.Google Scholar

7 Whitaker, Reg, A Sovereign Idea: Essays on Canada as a Democratic Community (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1992), 299.Google Scholar

8 Pross, “Pressure Group Conundrum,” 179–80. To be clear, Pross would not subscribe to the growing anger expressed towards “special interest groups.” On the contrary, Pross continues to argue that interest groups not only serve a useful purpose, but have a rightful place in public policy making. He does, however, as the foregoing quotation attests, draw attention to the climate of hostility and even attacks on interest group politics in recent years. This phenomenon, in Pross's estimation, is a growing area of concern.

9 Pal, Leslie A., “Advocacy Organizations and Legislative Politics: The Effect of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms on Interest Lobbying of Federal Legislation 1989–1991,” in Seidle, F. Leslie, ed., Equity and Community: The Charter, Interest Advocacy and Representation (Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy, 1993), 123Google Scholar. See also Pal, Leslie A., Interests of State: The Politics of Language, Multiculturalism and Feminism in Canada (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1993).Google Scholar

10 Archer, Keith, Knopff, Rainer, Gibbins, Roger and Pal, Leslie A., Parameters of Power: Canada's Political Institutions (Toronto: Nelson, 1995), 288Google Scholar. Further-more, in the section devoted to “Interest Groups and Political Institutions,” as an illustration of the kind of work that is done by “interest groups,” there is a full-page photograph of two women, one a pro-choice activist and the other the head of NAC, celebrating the Supreme Court's decision on the Morgentaler abortion case.

11 The authors then acknowledge: “In a pluralistic society with large demographic groups, there are a host of counterinterests that make it difficult for a predominant interest based on common demographic factors to emerge. To continue our example of feminism, its development was, and still is, hindered by the reluctance of some women to see their interests only in the context of their sex.… In order to establish an effective interest group, the women had to convince a solid core of supporters that the quality of being a woman was the most important shared characteristic and that the most important demands they had to make were based on this factor” (White, Walter L., Wagenberg, Ronald H. and Nelson, Ralph C., Introduction to Canadian Politics and Government [7th ed.; Toronto: Harcourt Brace, 1998], 154–155)Google Scholar. Very few political science texts make a clear distinction between interest groups and social movements. As an exception, Galipeau distinguished social movements from traditional interest groups and political parties (Galipeau, Claude, “Political Parties, Interest Groups and New Social Movements,” in Gagnon, Alain G. and Tanguay, A. Brian, eds., Canadian Parties in Transition [Toronto: Nelson, 1989], 404–426)Google Scholar. Whittington and Van Loon draw from this and note that social movements “provide for the expression of broadly based interests” and are “networks of interaction among a large number of often diverse individuals and groups that have a shared collective identity and that are conscious of themselves as having interests that are not being served by the status quo in society.” They then go on to identify clearly NAC as a movement and not an interest group (Whittington, Michael S. and Van Loon, Richard J., Canadian Government and Politics: Institutions and Processes [Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1996], 441–442)Google Scholar. See also Phillips, Susan D., “Competing, Connecting, and Complementing: Parties, Interest Groups and New Social Movements,” in Tanguay, and Gagnon, , eds., Canadian Parties in Transition, 440–462Google Scholar. However, this type of analysis in political science has been slow to develop and is not the norm.

12 Pross, “Pressure Group Conundrum,” 179–80.

13 Knopff and Morton, Charter Politics, 4.

14 It is interesting to note that this proclivity is both underscored, and qualified, in a chapter devoted to interest groups in another introductory textbook on Canadian politics. Guy writes: “It should be noted that women are not just a special interest group: They are also the majority of the Canadian population” (Guy, James John, ed., Expanding Our Political Horizons: Readings in Canadian Government and Politics [Toronto: Harcourt, Brace, 1997], 251 [emphasis added]).Google Scholar

15 I draw on numerous primary and secondary sources that span academic, popular and alternative books and articles, newsletters and newspapers of feminist organizations, material obtained from the National Archives of Canada (Ottawa) and the Women's Movement Archives (Ottawa), as well as briefs and personal papers from private files and libraries. Moreover, my analysis benefits from the 24 interviews conducted with representatives of national women's organizations who were active in the constitutional struggles of the 1980s to the referendum of 1992. Although I examined the briefs and publications of a number of provincially and territorially based organizations, my primary focus was on groups that described themselves as pan-Canadian. Therefore I did not interview representatives from umbrella organizations such as the Fédération des Femmes du Québec (even though it does consider itself to be a national organization), nor groups such as the Manitoba Action Committee on the Status of Women and the Vancouver Status of Women or the Yukon Status of Women and Nova Scotia's Women for Political Action, among countless others. In addition, it is important to point out that the visibility and centrality of certain groups in the constitutional saga changed. For example, while Indian Rights for Indian Women and the Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC) were active in the early 1980s, many of their claims were not at the forefront, largely because leading, white, middle-class, anglophone, feminist advocates insufficiently understood the complex interrelations of identity politics. With respect to NWAC in particular, the climate had changed by the time of the Charlottetown Accord. Also NAC, embroiled in various internal disputes, was not a pivotal actor (although many of its members, and member groups, were) in the early 1980s, but this would change in subsequent rounds. Some groups, such as the DisAbled Women's Network (DAWN) and the National Organization of Immigrant and Visible Minority Women (NOIVM), were only established in the mid-1980s (the former in 1985 and the latter in 1986), despite long-standing activism on the part of women from these constituencies. This provides a partial explanation for their infrequent mention.

16 Pitkin, Hanna, The Concept of Representation (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967), 209, 240.Google Scholar

17 There are multiple sites of representation “ranging from political parties, trade unions and other social movements to the various apparatuses of the state, churches, corporations, families and scientific establishments” (Jenson, Jane, “Representations in Crisis: The Roots of Canada's Permeable Fordism,” this Journal 23 [1990], 665).Google Scholar

18 Young pinpoints the problem: “The discourse of liberal individualism denies the reality of groups. According to liberal individualism, categorizing people in groups by race, gender, religion, and sexuality, and acting as though these ascriptions say something significant about the person and his or her experience, capacities, and possibilities, is invidious and oppressive. The only liberatory approach is to think of people and treat them as individuals, variable and unique. This individualist ideology … obscures oppression. Without conceptualizing women as a group in some sense, it is not possible to conceptualize oppression as a systematic, structured, institutional process” (Young, Iris Marion, Intersecting Voices: Dilemmas of Gender, Political Philosophy and Policy [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997], 17).Google Scholar

19 Kymlicka, Will, “Group Representation in Canadian Politics,” in Seidle, , ed., Equity and Community, 63Google Scholar. See also Kymlicka, Will, Multicultural Citizenship (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

20 Identity is related to pragmatic practices and real life struggles. It is fluid, nonessentialist, plural and linked to politics. Collective identity can be defined as: “an interactive and shared definition produced by several interacting individuals who are concerned with the orientations of their action as well as the field of opportunities and constraints in which their action takes place” (Melucci, Alberto, Nomads of the Present: Social Movements and Individual Needs in Contemporary Society [Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1989], 34)Google Scholar. See also Melucci, Alberto, “The Process of Collective Identity,” in Johnston, Hank and Klandermans, Bert, eds., Social Movements and Culture (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1995), 44–47Google Scholar. Identity politics is the “mobilization around gender, racial, and similar group-based categories in order to shape or alter the exercise of power.… Identity politics help people overcome a sense of anonymity and anomie while also giving shape to perceptions of unequal power and recognition” (Minow, Martha, “Not Only for Myself: Identity, Politics and Law,” Oregon Law Review 75 [1995], 648–649)Google Scholar. Identity politics is also about “deconstructing and reconstructing (necessarily multiple) identities in order to resist and undermine dominant mythologies [and, I would add, socio-economic, political and cultural practices] that serve to sustain particular systems of power relations” (Bondi, Liz, “Locating Identity Politics,” in Keith, Michael and Pile, Steve, eds., Place and the Politics of Identity [London: Routledge, 1993], 96)Google Scholar. There have been countless academic interchanges, as well as practical debates around the politics of identity. Minow's article, cited above, provides a good overview of the central difficulties of identity politics. The critiques are numerous and range from the claim that identity politics challenges individualism to the notion that it undermines unity. On the former, see, for example, Fierlbeck, Katherine, “The Ambivalent Potential of Cultural Identity,” this Journal 29 (1996), 3–22Google Scholar. However, my task here is not to defend or reject identity politics, rather, I argue for its political relevance and complex representational implications. I also suggest that, given its shifting nature, identity politics need not always be fragmenting and divisive. Finally, as Phelan posits, perhaps it is not so much that identity politics is fragmenting or divisive, but that “it is the failure to acknowledge and respond to the inequalities and injustices that mark some identities that is divisive” (Phelan, Shane, “The Space of Justice: Lesbians and Democratic Politics,” in Charles, Nickie and Hughes-Freeland, Felicia, eds., Practising Feminism: Identity, Difference, Power [London: Routledge, 1996], 343).Google Scholar

21 In his critique of Mancur Olson, and his affirmation of Alessandro Pizzorno's position, Melucci also points to the limits of understanding collective action in terms of individualistic shared interests, and argues for the need to consider the process by which collective identity is constructed (Melucci, Alberto, Challenging Codes: Collective Action in the Information Age [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996], 61–67)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Furthermore, given what used to be a closed class party system in Britain, Squires comments on the salience of not only interests and identities, but also of ideologies (Squires, Judith, “Quotas for Women: Fair Representation?” in Lovenduski, Joni and Norris, Pippa, eds., Women in Politics [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996], 80)Google Scholar. Compared to Britain, ideologies have not been as prominent in the Canadian party system (see Dobrowolsky, Alexandra and Jenson, Jane, “Reforming the Parties: Prescriptions for Democracy,” in Phillips, Susan D., ed., How Ottawa Spends: A More Democratic Canada…? [Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1993], 48–49).Google Scholar

22 Cairns writes, “The world of politics is … a political world of interests whose advocates focus on the short run” (Cairns, Alan C., Reconfigurations: Canadian Citizenship and Constitutional Change, ed. by Williams, Douglas E. [Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1995], 61)Google Scholar. While it is true that some use the term “interest” broadly to refer to various material, ethical, social and cultural concerns (as Paul Pross endeavours to do), interests are often economically defined. In Marxist models, material interests are at the forefront. On the primacy of material interests and fears about their “displacement” by the cultural, see Phillips, Anne, “From Inequality to Difference: A Severe Case of Displacement?” New Left Review 224 (1997), 145Google Scholar. Interests are contingent constructs, they are articulated and re-articulated in relation to changing socio-economic, political and cultural patterns. As Pringle and Watson explain, interests “are precarious historical products which are always subjected to processes of dissolution and redefinition.” What is more, they write: “Interests are constituted and constrained by the discursively available possibilities for representation and action in any particular situation” (Pringle, Rosemary and Watson, Sophie, “‘Women's Interests’ and the Post-Structuralist State,” in Barrett, Michele and Phillips, Anne, eds., Destabilizing Theory: Contemporary Feminist Debates [Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992], 66 and 69)Google Scholar. As a result, a narrow use of the term interest is problematic, as is the exclusive reliance on interest to reflect the complexities of representation.

23 Some political scientists have defined representation more broadly. Here, for example, Jane Jenson's work is pivotal. Jenson was among the first to make the point that definitions of identity shape interest claims. See, for instance, Jenson, Jane, “All the World's a Stage: Ideals, Spaces and Times in Canadian Political Economy,” Studies in Political Economy 36 (1991), 50–56CrossRefGoogle Scholar. However, in general, leading political approaches treat representation as taking place in distinctive representational forms, mostly in parties and interest groups. In contrast, building on Jenson's contributions, I suggest that not only are there multiple representational forms, both institutional political and non-institutional political, but these can and do overlap. See Dobrowolsky, Alexandra, The Politics of Pragmatism: Women, Representation and Constitutionalism in Canada (Toronto: Oxford University Press, forthcoming).Google Scholar

24 First Nations activists have also taken issue with the special interest label. For example, Cairns comments on how Ovide Mercredi, former grand chief of the Assembly of First Nations, during the last round of constitutional negotiations announced that “natives are not just a special interest group in this round; that they will be dealing government-to-government in these national unity discussions” (Ovide Mercredi quoted in Cairns, Reconfigurations, 166–67).

25 Vickers, Jill, Rankin, Pauline and Appelle, Christine, Politics as if Women Mattered: A Political Analysis of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), 5.Google Scholar

26 Cohen, Marjorie Griffin, “The Canadian Women's Movement,” in Pierson, Ruth Roach, Cohen, Marjorie Griffin, Bourne, Paula and Masters, Philinda, eds., Canadian Women's Issues, Vol. 1: Strong Voices, Twenty-Five Years of Women's Activism in English Canada (Toronto: Lorimer, 1993), 19–20.Google Scholar

27 Burt, Sandra, “Organized Women's Groups and the State,” in Coleman, William and Skogstad, Grace, eds., Policy Communities and Public Policy: A Structural Approach (Mississauga: Copp, Clark, Pitman, 1990), 194.Google Scholar

28 Cohen, “The Canadian Women's Movement,” 21. Not only do some key actors take part in interest group-like behaviour—such as presenting briefs and meeting politicians, but these tactics are often used in a way that causes confrontation, attracts media attention and gains public notice. Other strategies are employed as well: direct action tactics, rallies, marches and sit-ins. In contrast, protest is neither the preferred, nor is it considered to be an effective form of interest group behaviour. Pross's key supposition has been that interest group effectiveness is premised upon building solid, mutually supportive relationships, and creating and maintaining a stable environment (Pross, Group Politics, 241). In later years, however, he has discussed both direct (face-to-face) and indirect (media campaigns and confrontations) approaches. See Pross, A. Paul and Stewart, Iain S., “Breaking the Habit: Attentive Publics and Tobacco Regulation,” in Phillips, Susan D., ed., How Ottawa Spends (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1994), 129–164.Google Scholar

29 Indeed, it is important to point out that Canadian women's movement encompasses many movements. However, I will use women's movement in the singular for purposes of clarity.

30 Susan Phillips, “New Social Movements,” 194. See also Phillips, Susan, “Meaning and Structure in Social Movements: Mapping the Networks of Canadian Women's Organizations,” this Journal 24 (1991), 755–782.Google Scholar

31 Black, Naomi, “Ripples in the Second Wave: Comparing the Contemporary Women's Movement in Canada and the United States,” in Backhouse, Constance and Flaherty, David H., eds., Challenging Times: The Women's Movement in Canada and the United States (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1992), 97.Google Scholar

32 For new social movement analysts, interests are associated with the institutional political and identities with the non-institutional political. See Offe, Claus, “Challenging the Boundaries of Institutional Politics: Social Movements since the Sixties,” in Maier, Charles S., ed., Changing Boundaries of the Political (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987).Google Scholar

33 Vickers, Jill, “Bending the Iron Law of Oligarchy: Debates on the Feminization of Organization and the Political Process in the English Canadian Women's Movement 1970–1988,” in Wine, Jerry Dawn and Ristock, Janice L., eds., Women and Social Change: Feminist Activism in Canada (Toronto: Lorimer, 1991), 79.Google Scholar

34 Melucci strives to counteract these accusations. He considers the implications of both the political system and the state. Nonetheless, he still maintains that: “recent forms of collective action largely ignore the political system and generally display disinterest towards the idea of seizing power” (Melucci, Challenging Codes, 102). He continues: “collective demands do not assume political form … these demands are irreducible to representation through the functions of the political system, because they traverse different areas of social production to reemerge in other sectors of society, outside the official channels of representation” (ibid., 112).

35 For example, in Castells' account, the social is given priority, even though he acknowledges that both civil society and the nation state are in crisis. He argues, what is required is “project identity” that is, for social actors to redefine their position in society: “new subjects—that is collective agents of social transformation—may emerge, thus constructing new meaning around project identity. Indeed, I would argue that, given the structural crisis of civil society and the nation-state, this may be the main source of change in the network society” (Castells, Manuel, The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture, Vol. 2: The Power of Identity [Oxford: Blackwell, 1997], 67 [emphasis added]).Google Scholar

36 Melucci has gone to considerable lengths to address what he terms the “novelty” of the women's movement because it does not fit with his overall new social movement theory. This occurs not only in his recognition that the women's movement is not really “new,” but also, in his claim that it, more than any other social movement, has the “capacity to address difference” and has pursued various routes to achieve its goals (Melucci, Challenging Codes, 135, 133). In order to reconcile these discrepancies from his social movement framework which distinguishes the cultural from the political, Melucci makes a distinction between feminism, which he sees as engaging the political system, and the collective action of the women's movement, which he believes challenges society and resists and disrupts cultural codes. In my view, the women's movement engages in both practices, which are often interrelated, although specific strategic emphases can shift.

37 Once more this suggests that notions of interest have to be reconsidered. However, here the intent is to emphasize that politics is not just a matter of interests but is also about negotiating identities.

38 Phelan, “The Space of Justice,” 339.

39 To be sure, the current neo-liberal agenda and the related democratic deficit are critical here. On top of cutbacks to the state and social services, the government withdrew its funding of numerous feminist groups, publications and resources. The nature and extent of the cuts devastated the women's movement and Canadian women who disproportionately depended on state services. However, by labelling actors that protested such moves, such as women's groups and their allies, “special interests” that hinder rather than help democracy, politicians could disparage social movement efforts and bolster their own agenda. In relation to constitutionalism, the government could also explain its reticence to communicate with various group and movement representatives, that is, they were mere “special interests.” In sum, by giving priority to markets over civil society and the state, and instead of fostering deliberative democratic potential, the government found the accusatory special-interest label useful indeed. Not surprisingly, this rocked the women's movement given that it had high stakes in, and experienced the interconnections between, all three areas: market, state and civil society. For more on these issues see Brodie, Janine, Politics on the Margins: Restructuring and the Canadian Women's Movement (Halifax: Fernwood Press, 1995)Google Scholar. See also Dahlerup, Drude, “Learning to Live with the State: State, Market and Civil Society: Women's Need for State Intervention in East and West,” Women's Studies International Forum 17, 4 (1994), 117–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

40 Squires fears that by accommodating identity in existing representational structures, fluid identities may become static. This could lead to essentialism, then divisiveness and fragmentation (Squires, “Quotas for Women,” 87). While these are valid concerns, Squires's critique is directed towards models that focus on identity alone. I consider both interest and identity, stressing the changing nature of collective identity and its potential for multiple outcomes.

41 Bernstein, Mary, “Celebration and Suppression: The Strategic Uses of Identity by the Lesbian and Gay Movement,” American Journal of Sociology 103 (1997), esp. 535, 537.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

42 “It is alleged … that women's organizations, and most especially the NAC, are self-interested and unrepresentative ‘special’ interest groups. The designation of second-wave feminism as a ‘special interest group’ implies that its demands are not in the general interest…” (Gotell, Lise and Brodie, Janine, “Women and the Parties in the 1990's: Less than Ever an Issue of Numbers,” in Thorburn, Hugh, ed., Party Politics in Canada [7th ed.; Scarborough: Prentice-Hall, 1996], 69)Google Scholar. See also Knopff and Morton, Charter Politics, 54.

43 Eberts, Mary, “Women and Constitutional Review,” in Doerr, Audrey and Carrier, Micheline, eds., Women and the Constitution in Canada (Ottawa: CACSW, 1981), 6Google Scholar. See also “What Constitutional Rights We Women Want—And Won't Get,” Kinesis, March 1981, 3.

44 Secretary of State Women's Program grants grew from $700,000 in 1980 to $1.2 million in 1981 and $3.2 million in 1982 (Pal, Interests of State, 143).

45 There would be some tolerance for feminist organizations given Prime Minister Trudeau's Liberal government commitment to liberal egalitarianism and a just society. However, “[t]his is not to imply that the state under the control of the [Trudeau] Liberal government… was particularly sympathetic to feminism, but that it behaved pragmatically under extraordinary pressure from women to change…. Nothing occurred without a struggle, but change was underway and the rhetoric of liberalism was used by women to [access] even meagre resources for improving women's conditions” (Cohen, Marjorie Griffin, “Social Policy and Social Services,” in Pierson, et al. , eds., Strong Voices, 266).Google Scholar

46 See Coleman, William, Business and Politics: A Study of Collective Action (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1988), 52.Google Scholar

47 For example, Senator Duff Roblin expressed his “warm appreciation for the closely reasoned and well-supported document” prepared by the National Association of Women and the Law (NAWL), and even Justice Minister Jean Chrétien thanked the CACSW and NAWL for their excellent presentations and announced that there would be major revisions to the constitutional proposals. See Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence (December 9, 1980), 22: 62. See also “Will Make ‘Major Changes’ Chrétien Says in BNA Statement,” The Globe and Mail (Toronto), January 13, 1981, 10.

48 The Liberal government had sponsored the CACSW's research initiatives, but was unwilling to support NAC's request for funding to do the same. Moreover, one Ottawa women's group experienced an audit of their organization. In their view, this was more than coincidental: “Examiners … went through our books exhaustively. They questioned us for months. In the end, we did get our funding renewed, but it was a pretty harrowing summer” (Kome, Penney, The Taking of 28: Women Challenge the Constitution [Toronto: Women's Press, 1983], 79).Google Scholar

49 Marilou McPhedran, as quoted in Lawrence, Judith and Hastings, Jane, “Bill of Rights: One Predisposition for All,” Broadside 2 (1980/1981), 7 (emphasis added).Google Scholar

50 Marilou McPhedran interview, November 20, 1995.

51 Doris Anderson interview, November 15, 1995.

52 Some commentators, such as Burt, Black and Razack, place emphasis on the “elitist” and “closed” aspects of the campaign, and others, such as Kome and Gotell underscore the grass-roots initiatives, the reality was more of a strategic amalgam. See Burt, Sandra, “The Charter of Rights and the Ad Hoc Lobby: The Limits of Success,” Atlantis 14 (1988), 74–80Google Scholar; Black, “Ripples”; and Razack, Sherene, Canadian Feminism and the Law: The Women's Legal Education and Action Fund (Toronto: Second Story Press, 1991)Google Scholar; versus Kome, The Taking of 28, as well as Lise Gotell, “The Canadian Women's Movement, Equality Rights and the Charter,” CRIAW/ICREF Paper No. 16 (Ottawa: CRIAW/ICREF, 1990).

53 From the beginning, NAC advocated consultations and the CACSW published and distributed a Charter fact sheet that included a detachable coupon for feed-back from which it received 12,000 favourable replies to its proposals. There also were efforts to make the February 14 conference broadly based, that is, participants could represent a “wide range of economic positions” (see “Valentines Day Revenge,” Broadside 2 [1981], 4).

54 Molgat writes: “preoccupied with and immobilized by internal conflict, NAC nearly missed the boat on … the debates leading up to the patriation of the Canadian constitution…. NAC endorsed the Ad Hoc Conference on women and the Constitution [and while] many NAC women attended and were involved in the planning, the executive voted to send no official delegates” (Molgat, Anne, “An Action that Will Not Be Allowed to Subside”: NAC's First Twenty Years [Toronto: NAC Publication, n.d.], 9).Google Scholar

55 Pat Hacker interview, November 16, 1995.

56 See Kome, The Taking of 28, 49; and Razack, Canadian Feminism and the Law, 33.

57 For example, the priorization of “women's” equality sections, and ultimately section 28, precluded the fact that Aboriginal women were working on a sexual equality guarantee which applied to Aboriginal rights. For the Native Women's Association of Canada (NWAC), sexual equality rights for Indian women were inextricably linked to Indian nationhood.

58 From 1989 to 1990, funding to the Secretary of State Women's program was reduced by 30 per cent. Between 1988 and 1992, NAC lost 50 per cent of its government grant. See Burt, Sandra, “The Women's Movement: Working to Transform Public Life,” in Bickerton, and Gagnon, , eds., Canadian Politics, 20.Google Scholar

59 Cohen, Andrew, A Deal Undone: The Making and Breaking of the Meech Lake Accord (Toronto: Douglas and McIntyre, 1990), 100.Google Scholar

60 Beverley Baines interview, April 13, 1996; Mary Eberts interview, November 16, 1995; and Marilou McPhedran interview, November 20, 1995.

61 For instance, the CACSW began internal investigations with executive and regional members, and LEAF sent telegrams to the first ministers outlining its concerns.

62 “The Report cavalierly dismissed the women's organizations' strong contention, backed by sound legal advice, that the Accord placed the gender equality rights of the Charter at risk” (Behiels, Michael, The Meech Lake Primer [Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press, 1989], 289)Google Scholar. See also Baines, Beverley, “Consider, Sir… On What Does Your Constitution Rest? Representational and Institutional Reform,” in Schneiderman, David, ed., Conversations among Friends/Entre Amis, Proceedings of an Interdisciplinary Conference on Women and Constitution Reform (Edmonton: Centre for Constitutional Studies, 1991), 56Google Scholar; Eberts, Mary, “The Charter and Meech Lake: A Negative View,” in Beaudoin, Gerald A., ed., As the Charter Evolves (Cowansville: Les Editions Yvon Blais, 1990), 274Google Scholar; and Baines, Beverley, “Gender and the Meech Lake Committee,” Queen's Quarterly 94 (1987), 809.Google Scholar

63 Five pan-Canadian organizations (Ad Hoc, CACSW, NAC, NAWL, LEAF), as well as two broadly based Quebec feminist groups (FFQ and the Avis du conseil du statut de la femme, CSF) made submissions.

64 Sylvia Gold made this statement before the committee and is recorded in Senate of Canada, “Proceedings of the Senate Submissions Group on the Meech Lake Constitutional Accord” (1986–88), 5: 34.

65 Other organizations included: the Canadian Association for Community Living; the Canadian Ethno-cultural Council; the Canadian Human Rights Advocate; the Canadian Polish Congress; the Canadian Rights and Liberties Federation; La Ligue des droits et des libertés du Québec; the National Union of Provincial Government Employees; and the Union Culturelle Franco-Ontariennes (Ad Hoc Memo, June 23, 1988; Marilou McPhedran personal files).

66 Ad Hoc Steering Committee Minutes, April 22, 1988; and Marilou McPhedran personal files. See also Ad Hoc Committee on the Meech Lake Accord and Women, “Memo to Ad Hoc members,” November 17, 1987; and “Women Prepare Campaign on Accord,” The Globe and Mail (Toronto), November 17, 1987.Google Scholar

67 Ad Hoc memo to members, November 23,1988; and Nancy Ruth personal files.

68 Prior to the Meech Lake Accord, through its work on economic issues, NAC extended its networking to advocacy coalitions like the National Anti-Poverty Organization, the CLC, the Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Canadian Council on Children and Youth. It also had strong connections with child care coalitions.

69 Marilou McPhedran interview, November 20, 1995.

70 While NAC contested the Conservative government's neo-liberal, free trade stance, for example, opposition escalated, funding levels dropped and conventional political alliances were significantly strained.

71 Women's Legal Education and Action Fund, “Statement to the Senate of Canada Committee of the Whole on the Meech Lake Constitutional Accord,” March 16, 1988, 13.

72 See “Free Speech?” The Womanist 3 (1991), 27Google Scholar; “Ottawa Checking on Groups,” The Globe and Mail (Toronto), September 18, 1992Google Scholar; and “Quebec Women's Group to Get $105,000 Cheque: De Cotret Says Recorded Phone Call a ‘Misunderstanding,’” The Globe and Mail (Toronto), September 18, 1992, A4.Google Scholar

73 Citizens' Forum on Canada's Future, Report to the People and Government of Canada (Ottawa: Supply and Services Canada, 1991), 27 (emphasis added).Google Scholar

74 Judy Rebick interview, November 15, 1995.

75 Green, Joyce, “Women in the Senate,” The OptiMSt 18 (1992), 20 (emphasis added).Google Scholar

76 “Mulroney Sees Tide Turning Toward Yes Victory,” The Globe and Mail (Toronto), October 23, 1992, A8.

77 Barbara Cameron interview, April 12, 1995.

78 Mary Eberts interview, November 16, 1995. See also Whitaker, Reg, “Politicians and Bureaucrats in the Policy Process,” in Whittington, Michael S. and Williams, Glen, eds., Canadian Politics in the 90's (Toronto: Nelson, 1995), 433–435.Google Scholar

79 Judy Rebick interview, November 15, 1995.

80 Mary Eberts interview, November 16, 1995.

81 Russell, Peter, Constitutional Odyssey: Can Canadians Become a Sovereign People? (2nd ed.; Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1993), 180.Google Scholar

82 This quotation is taken from a draft of a funding application prepared by Equality Eve; Nancy Ruth personal files (emphasis added).

83 Delacourt, Susan, United We Fall: The Crisis of Democracy in Canada (Toronto: Penguin, 1993), 330Google Scholar; and Judy Rebick interview, November 15, 1995.

84 Jeffrey, Brooke, Strange Bedfellows, Trying Times (Toronto: Key Porter, 1993), 202.Google Scholar

85 Judy Rebick interview, November 15, 1995. To elaborate, NAC held that the Canada clause threatened equality rights for it empowered governments over individuals and disadvantaged groups, thereby creating a hierarchy of rights. For example, the clause emphasized the supremacy of Parliament and Canadian federalism as key elements of Canada's character but did not mention the Charter. The clause was so written that Canadians and their governments were committed to issues such as language rights, but only Canadians (and not governments) were said to be committed to sexual and racial equality. This wording constituted uneven treatment in NAC's view. Furthermore, no mention was made of people with disabilities, the elderly, religious minorities, gays and lesbians, or the poor, and this also was deemed to be unacceptable.

86 Cameron, Barbara, “Towards a Feminist Constitutional Agenda,” The Womanist 2 (1991), 40.Google Scholar

87 Eve, Equality, Equality Eve Report: What Women Want (Toronto, June 1991).Google Scholar

88 Brown, Jackie and Jaffer, Fatima, “NAC's No a Constitutional Question: Women and the Constitutional Question,” Kinesis, October 1992, 13.Google Scholar

89 Judy Rebick interview, November 15, 1995.

90 Vickers, “The Canadian Women's Movement,” 278.

91 Nancy Ruth interview, November 16, 1995.

92 This coalition work was apparent around the proposed social charter. See Brodsky, Gwen, “Social Charter Issues after Beaudoin-Dobbie,” in Points of View (Edmonton: Centre for Constitutional Studies, 1992), Vol. 2, 25.Google Scholar

93 Cameron, “Towards a Feminist Constitutional Agenda,” 40 (emphasis in original).

94 “Quebec's Largest Women's Group Speaks,” The Womanist 2 (1991), 37.Google Scholar

95 The first quotation is from Equality Eve booklet, Why You Need to Be at the Constitutional Table (no date), 2; and the second from Equality Eve, Equality Eve Report, 49.

96 Molgat, Anne, Expanding Our Horizons: The Work of the Canadian Advisory Council on the Status of Women and Its Context (Ottawa: CACSW, 1993), 27.Google Scholar

97 National Action Committee on the Status of Women, “NAC Says No; The Charlottetown Agreement Is a Bad Deal for Aboriginal Women,” no date.

98 Green, Joyce, “Constitutionalizing the Patriarchy: Aboriginal Women and Aboriginal Government,” Constitutional Forum 4, 4 (1993), 115.Google Scholar

99 Jaffer, Fatima, “Referendum on Accord: What's Up Next?” Kinesis, November 1992, 3.Google Scholar

100 Interview, Sharon Mclvor and Teressa Nahanee, February 5, 1996.

101 Delacourt, United We Fall, 360.

102 Memo, “Come Out against a Bad Deal,” September 30, 1992, sponsored by individuals from groups including the Vancouver Gay and Lesbian Centre and the Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Ontario; Anne Molgat personal files.