Rural Alberta is the most conservative region in Canada often leaning toward populist politics.[citation needed] For most of the last 80 years, the major right-wing party of the day has won all or most of the ridings here, often by large margins.[citation needed] The evangelical Social Credit Party was founded in rural Alberta, and for many years was either the first or second party in much of the region.[citation needed] The Progressive Conservative Party swept every riding here from 1972 to 1993.[citation needed] Rural Alberta was the power base for the Reform and Canadian Alliance parties from 1993 to 2000. The Conservative Party of Canada then won every riding in this region by large margins, making rural Alberta the least competitive region in the country.[citation needed] Some ridings in this area had been friendly to Red Tories, but since the 1990s the entire region has turned in a more fiscal and social conservative direction.[citation needed] For example, former prime minister Joe Clark represented the riding of Yellowhead (and its predecessor, Rocky Mountain) from 1972 to 1993 during his first tenure in parliament, but ran in (and won) the comparatively less conservative seat of Calgary Centre during his comeback to politics in 2000.[citation needed]
Much of this area has not been represented by a centre-left MP in recent memory; for instance, Lethbridge has been represented solely by right-wing MPs since 1930.[citation needed] The Liberals have been completely shut out from rural Alberta since 1972.[citation needed] As evidence of the antipathy much of the region has for the Liberals, Jack Hornercrossed the floor in 1977 to join the Liberals, only to be soundly defeated when he ran for reelection in Crowfoot as a Liberal in 1979, losing almost three-fourths of his vote from 1974.[citation needed] He was also resoundingly defeated when he tried to regain the riding in 1980.[citation needed] Increasing political polarization has seen Liberals draw their lowest percentage of votes here in recent years, rarely obtaining more than 20 percent of the vote, and in some ridings (Crowfoot and Yellowhead) they have attracted less than 3 percent.[citation needed]
As a measure of how deeply conservative rural Alberta is, the Conservatives retained all their seats there in 2015 when the party was heavily defeated nationally. They took every riding with 60 percent or more of the vote, with centre-left parties only managing to exceed 20 percent mark in three ridings.[citation needed] However, support for the Conservatives was not universal; in all but three ridings, the NDP and Liberals collectively obtained 20 percent, sometimes reaching past 30 percent.[citation needed]
Social scientist Clark Banack describes a "triple alienation" in rural Alberta, formed of the regional sense of Western isolation born from frustrations around federal support, alienation as 'ordinary people' in a rapidly changing province, and a specific 'rural alienation' from urbanites "in terms of lifestyle, values and work ethic".[1]: 7 Sociologist Sam Reimer surveyed Albertans and found that those in rural areas had a strong tendency toward anti-immigration views, regardless of religious affiliation.[1]: 7 Political scientist Nelson Wiseman wrote that early American settlers to Alberta shaped its politics with the concept of "Alberta's exceptionalism", giving a strong base to conservative parties, receptiveness to neoliberalism, and strongly resisting federal intrusion.[2]
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References
^ abBarber, Kathryn; Maas, Willem (2024). "Analytic Introduction: The Unique Features of Canadian Small Centres". Canadian Ethnic Studies. 56 (3). Canadian Ethnic Studies Association: 1–14. doi:10.1353/ces.2024.a939613.
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