How many steps are there from developed world democracy to Third World authoritarianism? From APEC to Windsor, to Calgary, to the attack on the poor at Queen's Park, and now Quebec City, we are marching towards a place no one should want to go.

Yet the silence is deafening.

So far, the only government leader who seems disturbed by the picture unfolding in Quebec City is the enlightened mayor of the city himself, Jean-Paul L'Allier, who has bucked the elite consensus and is encouraging people to "express themselves democratically."

April 2, 2001

The slow march to authoritarianism
Murray Dobbin
The Financial Post (Toronto)

Where is everybody? That is, where are all those from the Canadian
political elite who, in better times, might be expected to publicly
condemn the draconian "security" preparations going on for the Summit of
the Americas in Quebec City? Is it just the young people, unionists, and
others from civil society groups who will be affected, who have the
courage to express outrage at this casual denial of civil liberties?

So far, the only government leader who seems disturbed by the picture
unfolding in Quebec City is the enlightened mayor of the city himself,
Jean-Paul L'Allier, who has bucked the elite consensus and is encouraging
people to "express themselves democratically."

The police operation in Quebec City is unprecedented and widely reported.
A huge no-go zone will be established, featuring four kilometres of
ten-foot-high chain-link fence, the largest and most expensive (at
$35-million) police mobilization in Canadian history, special ID for
residents of the security zone, the clearing out of 600 prisoners from a
local jail to make way for the citizens the police intend to arrest, and
the intimidating threat of plastic bullets and other police weapons.

This isn't security. It's decontamination. It's the political equivalent
of ethnic cleansing, sweeping away anyone who dares to criticize the
complicity of governments in corporate globalization. Thus we have
escalating police operations to respond to escalating public demands for
transparency in FTAA trade negotiations -- negotiations which themselves
threaten democracy.

The Canadian political and economic elite is united with respect to the
minimalist role of government. The yearly EKOS poll demonstrates an
enormous gulf between "ordinary" Canadian citizens and the plutocrats who
run the country. The secession of the successful has now spread into the
arena of civil liberties. If nation building is passé, why bother with
democracy?

Quebec City is just one more installment in the increasing crisis of
legitimacy of all Western governments, a crisis reflected not only in
demonstrations against organizations and forums that undermine national
sovereignty. It is revealed, too, in governments' contempt for citizens'
wishes for enhanced social programs -- reflected in massive tax cuts they
haven't asked for -- and in the dramatic decline in voter turnout in
Canada.

The governing elites were not always so homogeneous. Even ten years ago
there would have been a widespread outcry over the casual brutality of
strip searches of young women, the routine use of pepper spray at close
range, the charging of demonstrators by police on horseback, and the
expansion of what constitutes a "threat" to include holding up a sign
hundreds of feet from a motorcade of leaders.

And let's be clear, this not the police getting "out of control." The
problem is precisely that they are in control, as was demonstrated by the
direct involvement of the Prime Minister's Office in the police brutality
at APEC.

To expect the little guy from Shawinigan to respond in any other way to
this crisis in legitimacy would be naive. And there's no use appealing to
the once robustly democratic Parti Québécois. It is too accustomed to
indulging in its narrow nationalism. It cannot even see the irony of
collaborating with Ottawa to unleash riot squads on thousands of people
fighting for the principle of national sovereignty.

Do we have no statesmen amongst our former politicians who are alarmed at
the picture of the Summit emerging from press reports? And surely APEC
should have been the wake-up call, with the Canadian government's
repugnant kowtowing to the murderous dictator Suharto.

Maybe I missed them, but where are Bob Rae, Roy Romanow, Peter Lougheed,
Ed Broadbent, and John Turner who, partisan politics aside, surely can
grasp the importance of civil liberties?

Warren Allmand has spoken out with appropriate alarm on behalf of his
human rights centre. The federal NDP has taken a stand. Alan Borovoy of
the Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) has at least written to
the responsible federal and provincial ministers. But it's nowhere near
enough.

I know that Allan Blakeney, a member of the CCLA board, is concerned. And
I expect that so, too, are board members Pierre Burton and June Callwood.
There are many more voices that we need to hear -- and would hope to hear.

Where are the other human rights organizations? And Daphne Dumont,
president of the Canadian Bar Association? Is she not concerned about the
criminalization of democratic dissent? Is a ten-foot-high fence around Old
Quebec now seen as normal? Have the various bar associations asked
themselves by what constitutional authority these unprecedented measures
are being taken?

How many steps are there from developed world democracy to Third World
authoritarianism? From APEC to Windsor, to Calgary, to the attack on the
poor at Queen's Park, and now Quebec City, we are marching towards a place
no one should want to go.

Yet the silence is deafening.