Women’s Role in Canadian Politics – Both as Voters and Candidates

Running head: WOMEN’S ROLE IN CANADIAN POLITICS – BOTH AS VOTERS AND CANDIDATES
WOMEN’S ROLE IN CANADIAN POLITICS – BOTH AS VOTERS AND CANDIDATES
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WOMEN’S ROLE IN CANADIAN POLITICS – BOTH AS VOTERS AND CANDIDATES
Introduction
The aim of the essay is to provide an important event in the Post Confederation, that is,
Canada after 1867. However, it needs mentioning that women’s role in the forming of the
Canadian nation and the subsequent only began after the First World War and strengthened after
Second World War. Although the women’s voice began to be heard, their role in mainstream
politics was hardly recognized with just one woman being elected as a representative out of the
235 seats during the 1921 elections. The main thesis of this essay is to argue that the role of
women in Canadian politics as election candidates has not been realized fully even today despite
the fact that women had a huge role to play in Canadian history post 1867.
The essay will first provide a brief overview of the Post-Confederation followed by the
discussion on women in the Post-Confederation. Then, it will discuss the place, role and
contribution of women in the Post-Confederation. The essay will then talk about women’s
suffrage and their role as election candidates.
Discussion
Despite Canada being a self-governing colony since the 1840s, it had yet to realize
complete autonomy and sovereignty until 18671. Prior to 1867, Canada was known as
Confederation Canada and one in three people in Canada was French while more than 100,000
Canadians belonged to the Aboriginal community. They were known as First Nations, Metis and
Inuit. The Post Confederation Canada thus covers the history of the formation of a new nation
since the European colonization until the outbreak of the First World War in 1914 to the present
day. The period from 1914 to 1945 is marked by chaos, called as the “decades of discord” by
1 Belshaw, John Douglas. Canadian History: Post-Confederation. Campus Manitoba, 2016.

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WOMEN’S ROLE IN CANADIAN POLITICS – BOTH AS VOTERS AND CANDIDATES
John Belshaw, a renowned Canadian historian. Apart from the conflict in other parts of the
world, tensions were also rising within the country. The Canadian culture saw a dramatic change,
similar to the Western societies due to the war. The two wars and the Great Depression in terms
of economy that shook the entire West engulfed Canada as well. People’s expectations of
making Canada a socialist nation changed to atomistic and individualistic expectation.
Nonetheless, amidst all this, women’s rights especially in terms of legal rights were starting to be
realized strongly.
The two chief Canadian parties, the Tories- led by George-Etienne Cartier and John A.
MacDonald and the Clear Grits – led by George Brown, were in constant struggle for attaining
political power. However, the two parties realized the need for a politically united Canada and
decided to come together for the “Great Coalition”. The alliance of Cartier, MacDonald and
Brown agreed on achieving tow primary goals – to resolve the deadlock that the Act on Union
had created and to obtain new territory for agricultural agreement. The goals were hard to
achieve considering the rising tensions between Canada East and Canada West. While Canada
East was English dominated, Canada West was French dominated. Within these conflicts and
tensions, the women were being marginalized and it did not take much time for the women to
raise their voice and claim their presence.
Helga K Hallgrimsdottir, Cecilia Benoit, and Rachel Phillips note that although women in
the Confederation had little role to play except when the men folk were out fighting in the First
World War, the feminist movement was emerging2. Nancy Janovicek observes that it was most
probably an Aboriginal woman during the late 1860s who had first raised her voice for her
2 Hallgrimsdottir, Helga K., Cecilia Benoit, and Rachel Phillips. "The mother‐citizen and the working girl: first‐
wave feminist citizenship claims in Canada and discursive opportunities for twenty‐first century childcare policy."
Canadian Review of Sociology/Revue canadienne de sociologie 50, no. 1 (2013): 27-51.