• North American Studies

La reglementation du contenu a 6te la pierre d'assise de la politique de telediffusion au Canada. Nous examinons, ici, les elements objectifs et discr6tionnaires de la politique du contenu et evaluons de facon critique a savoir si ce sont des externalites de consommation ou des echecs de la television a commerciaux qui justifient son existence. L'impact de la politique existante sur les externalites est faible, sinon inexistant. Bien que la politique de contenu puisse contribuer a une meilleur variete de programmation, cet impact est indirect et depend de la correlation entre les couits canadiens et les programmes sous representes et est partiellement nullifie par d'autres politiques. Les nouvelles technologies qui elargissent le choix et rendent le brouillage plus economique permettent un moyen plus efficace de cibler les externalites et d'offrir un menu plus riche au tilespectateur. La politique du contenu balkanise le marche national, entraine souvent la production de programmes de pietre qualit6, mais qui permettent au telediffuseur de presenter ce que son auditoire veut voir, et devrait disparaitre. A court terme, les politiques devraient plut6t mettre l'accent sur la mise en place, par la Societe Radio Canada, d'une structure qui separe les d6cisions de programmation de la vente de commerciaux. A long terme, les politiques devraient encourager, et non d6courager, les innovations institutionnelles dans la production, la diffusion et la tarification, generant ainsi de meilleurs services pour les telespectateurs, plus d'argent pour l'industrie et, consequemment, une plus grande demande pour des programmes locaux, nationaux et internationaux.

AbstractThe Social Sciences Citation Index was canvassed for citations of all articles, notes, review articles, comments and replies published in volumes 1–10 of the Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique. The data show that nearly three-quarters of the 335 items published between 1968 and 1977 were cited at least once, with a greater likelihood of the citation appearing in non-Canadian than in Canadian publications. English-language items were cited four times as frequently as French-language ones, on the average, and those with at least some Canadian content were cited nearly twice as frequently, on the average, as those with no Canadian content.

By law, 50 percent of private Canadian television broadcasters' programming must be Canadian. The author proposes that the laws promote one mandate of broadcasting policy by increasing programming diversity. The quotas induce substitution out of the dominant category and into other categories, in response to differential costs and revenues between domestic and imported programming. To test the hypothesis, profit maximizing programming that would exist without the regulations is simulated.and compared to observed programming. Herfindahl indices (calculated for predicted and observed programming, across stations, and across time), indicate that under some assumptions of broadcaster behavior, diversity across stations is higher with the content laws than without.

This paper investigates the possible goals which the Canadian government might be pursuing through its Canadian content regulations. A number of policy tools, including the present regulations, are evaluated with respect to their potential for achieving these goals. In addition, a new and more efficient policy tool, transferable quotas, is considered.

The JCS was established to provide for the multidisciplinary study of Canada that would contribute to greater self-understanding and national consensus. This founding purpose remains compelling. Globalization threatens to drain Canadian content from Canadians’ experiences. Canadian Studies’ development fractured a shared experience of Canada and weakened its sense of national purpose. Canadian Studies’ renewal must, first, adopt a comparative framework to establish where Canada “fits” in the globalized world. Second, interdisciplinarity must speak in a national discourse and to the Canadian Studies agenda. Third, it should reconnect to its activist roots. Fourth, Canadian Studies must confront received wisdom and challenge traditional approaches.

Through an examination of the government's most recent attempt to defend the Canadian magazine industry (Bill C-55), this essay considers the politics of defending Canadian culture in the era of globalization. It argues that the defence of Canadian culture cannot be taken as synonymous with the defence of ways of life that are opposed to the profit-driven logic of global capitalism. Rather, struggles over Canadian culture can impede our understanding of Canada's place in globalization by distracting us from the real issues. This is shown in the defence of the Canadian magazine industry on the grounds of its importance to national culture. Magazines are exemplary mass cultural commodities whose form and content both express the consumerist values of contemporary capitalism. This paper argues that worries about Canadian content are often articulated at the expense of a more general examination of the function of culture within capitalism and of the implicit politics of the forms of mass culture. Examinant la derriere tentative du gouvernement de defendre l'industrie des periodiques canadiens par l'entremise du Projet de loi C-55, cet article soupese les politiques visant a defendre la culture canadienne en cette epoque de mondialisation. Il argumente que la defense de la culture canadienne ne peut etre consideree comme synonyme de defense des moeurs, lesquelles s'opposent A une logique du profit motivant le capitalisme mondial. Les luttes relatives a la preservation de la culture canadienne peuvent au contraire empower notre comprehension de la place du Canada au sein de la mondialisation et nous eloigner des vrais problemes en presence. Fondee sur son importance pour la culture nationale, la defense de l'industrie canadienne des periodiques demontre cette erreur. L'article argumente que les craintes relatives au contenu canadien sont souvent articulees au detriment d'un examen plus general des fonctions de la culture a l'interieur du capitalisme ainsi qu'a celui des politiques implicites quant aux formes elles-memes de la culture de masse. The fallout from two rulings against Canada by the World Trade Organization (WTO) made headlines recently on the same day in The Globe and Mail (Honey, Scoffield). The WTO's interim ruling against the Canadian auto pact in October 1999 was in the news again a year later when the final ruling was made concerning the date on which the pact would be eliminated in its entirety (Scoffield). As of 19 February 2001, the auto pact will expire, and with it a vision of economic nationalism that seems to many to be out of step with the times. At the same time, the Heritage ministry announced details of its Canadian Magazine Fund, a "$150-million olive branch extended to magazine publishers to lessen the competitive blow from U.S.-based publications" (Honey 113). The fund was first announced in conjunction with the passage of an amended and toothless Bill C-- 55 in 1999, which was itself a response to an earlier ruling by the WTO on Canada's national magazine policy. In the case of the auto pact, the federal government seems to be largely untroubled by the WTO ruling and is ready to let the pact die with little opposition. Industry Minister John Manley suggested that "the importance of the auto pact has been significantly reduced over recent years.... What we've built is a sector that is very strong, and is far exceeding the auto pact minimums" (qtd. in MacKinnon and Kennan B9). When it comes to magazines and periodicals, however, the government appears much more committed to supporting and defending the Canadian industry against the threat of foreign competition. The short-term outlook is unfavourable: while the Canadian Magazine Fund is intended to help make the industry much stronger, Chris McDermott, manager of periodical and publishing programmes for the Department of Canadian Heritage, nevertheless admits that at best it "may just help the industry stay where they're at" (qtd. …

Faculty members who participated in the International Canadian Studies Institute, an intensive thirteen-day multidisciplinary excursion into western Canada, make sense of their experiences and reflect on how the fellowship will affect their teaching and scholarship. The participants, faculty at universities and colleges in the Pacific Northwest, represent diverse disciplines ranging from anthropology to creative writing to criminal studies. As expected, the personal narratives are as distinct as the collection of fellows. All returned to their home institutions better prepared to infuse Canadian content into their teaching or research, having learned a great deal about Canada.