A City Divided
Oct. 28th, 2014 11:06 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jsburbidgeSo, predictably, John Tory has been elected with about 40% support -- a comfortable edge over Ford's 33.7% and Chow's 23.2%, and will set about governing, as he says, "building one Toronto".
Except that he will have great difficulty doing so.
It's not just that there's that third of the city which supported Ford regardless of an almost entirely negative campaign, a divisive past on council, and the near-certainty that a Ford mayoralty would have been one of deadlock and dysfunction; or that there's another fifth of the city which was coalesced around a campaign willing to lump Tory in with Ford.
Nor is it just that the primary expression of "Ford Nation" is anger (an anger which is so thoroughly anti-government, anti-establishment, that finding common ground is extremely difficult).
It's the distribution that gives away the story.
If you look at an electoral map by ward, Ford took northern Etobicoke, much (if not all) of York, the western edge of North York, and most of Scarborough except for the very southwest (Ward 36 supported Tory at 40.7% to Ford's 36.8% -- in fact, it's one of the wards that fairly closely tracked the city as a whole).
In north-western Etobicoke, Ford polled at 70.2% in Ward 1, and 67.9% in Ward 2. Let that sink in for a moment. Andray Domise, who ran against Rob in Ward 2 and had widespread support in the city's middle-and-left generally, got 8.2% of the vote for councillor as against Rob Ford's 58.8%, coming in third.
In 12 wards, Doug Ford got above 50% of the vote. The councillors re-elected for those wards include most of those whom the political commentariat considered the worst councillors in Toronto (not so much on the basis of ideology as on the basis of general competence, effectiveness in council debates, and understanding of issues): Crisanti, Nunziata, Mammoliti, Peruzza, Cho.
At the other end, Chow had a plurality of votes in three contiguous wards only, running from Trinity-Spadina to Parkdale. In none of those wards did she have above 48%.
This leads to several conclusions:
First, contrary to what I saw being repeated on Twitter in the run-up to the election, this is not a "progressive" city. It is broadly socially liberal (but note the rather ugly instances of explicit racism and implicit sexism that surfaced during the campaign: a significant chunk of the engaged electorate isn't even singing from that songsheet). It is also broadly fiscally conservative.
Secondly, you can divide the city up into two radically different types of political culture. In one world -- incorporating downtown, the old "East End", the southern part of Etobicoke, and the band of northern development between York and Scarborough (where development ran up Yonge and spread out relatively early) -- there's a broad majority consensus on social liberalism and a broad support for the functions of government -- managing density (with some variation), providing a range of services, supporting social needs. (There's considerable difference on issues around redistribution, amount and progressivity of taxation, etc., but to be honest this is less important at the civic level and more important at senior government levels.) In the other world, there's a resentment of government interference, an odd alliance of my-home-is-my-castle suburban dwellers who want a minimum level of core services (roads, garbage, utilities, schools (while they have children), recreational facilities (i.e. hockey, while they have male children)) and underclass members -- immigrants, visible minorities, and the chronically un- or under-employed -- whose interactions with the state are frequently if not usually mediated by the police, social workers, the court system, or EI/welfare officials. (One voter in the north of Etobicoke was quoted as saying he'd voted for Ford, but if he'd had to vote for somebody else it would have been Goldkind "because he's my lawyer".)
Tory represents the right of that first consensus much as Chow represents its left.
The second world is angry. The socially conservative, leave-me-alone suburbanites resent the social pressures enabling minorities and depressing their privilege; they feel threatened by technical and financial changes remaking the job markets and the workplace and rendering their financial positions more unstable; they want things to return to "a simpler time". The apartment-dwellers of Rexdale and other areas in the edges of the city are angry at the state, period. In a rational world, they would presumably make common cause with the Left, but it is in exactly those areas that Chow's support was weakest.
That anger is widespread, these days. You can see it in GamerGate, in the Tea Party, in UKIP. And as the pace of change is not slowing down, it's not likely to go away, either.
That anger also has nothing to contribute to the process of governance. (The people who are trying to advance the interests of the underclass are the very downtown elites the underclass resents. Progressives like Michael Shapcott or the leaders of Occupy are angry as well, but they're part of that other consensus, that government has a role in managing society.) It gives rise to frankly stupid proposals like wanting a subway or nothing on Sheppard.
The representatives of those areas tend to bring only one demand to the table: that taxes be kept at a bare minimum, even at the expense of important programmes (except if it interferes with the immediate infrastructure (roads, sewers, water, power, hockey rinks) in their areas). It's probably unfair to label these councillors as poor representatives of their areas: the problem is that they are excellent representatives of their areas, where their areas represent a push back against the whole structure of civic governance.
Thirdly, Tory's conservative credentials were heavily outweighed by his downtown and socially progressive credentials. He has very little to offer the councillors of the old Ford block. His political support has little grounding in their areas.
If I had to make a guess, I would say that Tory's committee chair appointments will end up excluding councillors from the top corners of the city (in a sort of mirror of Ford's excluding Toronto/East York councillors) because they have nothing valuable to contribute (expertise, conciliatoriness, management skills). There will be some overlap with Ford's appointments, but I can't see Crisanti, Ford, Mammoliti, Cho, or Moeser as being likely to get committee chairs.
Except that he will have great difficulty doing so.
It's not just that there's that third of the city which supported Ford regardless of an almost entirely negative campaign, a divisive past on council, and the near-certainty that a Ford mayoralty would have been one of deadlock and dysfunction; or that there's another fifth of the city which was coalesced around a campaign willing to lump Tory in with Ford.
Nor is it just that the primary expression of "Ford Nation" is anger (an anger which is so thoroughly anti-government, anti-establishment, that finding common ground is extremely difficult).
It's the distribution that gives away the story.
If you look at an electoral map by ward, Ford took northern Etobicoke, much (if not all) of York, the western edge of North York, and most of Scarborough except for the very southwest (Ward 36 supported Tory at 40.7% to Ford's 36.8% -- in fact, it's one of the wards that fairly closely tracked the city as a whole).
In north-western Etobicoke, Ford polled at 70.2% in Ward 1, and 67.9% in Ward 2. Let that sink in for a moment. Andray Domise, who ran against Rob in Ward 2 and had widespread support in the city's middle-and-left generally, got 8.2% of the vote for councillor as against Rob Ford's 58.8%, coming in third.
In 12 wards, Doug Ford got above 50% of the vote. The councillors re-elected for those wards include most of those whom the political commentariat considered the worst councillors in Toronto (not so much on the basis of ideology as on the basis of general competence, effectiveness in council debates, and understanding of issues): Crisanti, Nunziata, Mammoliti, Peruzza, Cho.
At the other end, Chow had a plurality of votes in three contiguous wards only, running from Trinity-Spadina to Parkdale. In none of those wards did she have above 48%.
This leads to several conclusions:
First, contrary to what I saw being repeated on Twitter in the run-up to the election, this is not a "progressive" city. It is broadly socially liberal (but note the rather ugly instances of explicit racism and implicit sexism that surfaced during the campaign: a significant chunk of the engaged electorate isn't even singing from that songsheet). It is also broadly fiscally conservative.
Secondly, you can divide the city up into two radically different types of political culture. In one world -- incorporating downtown, the old "East End", the southern part of Etobicoke, and the band of northern development between York and Scarborough (where development ran up Yonge and spread out relatively early) -- there's a broad majority consensus on social liberalism and a broad support for the functions of government -- managing density (with some variation), providing a range of services, supporting social needs. (There's considerable difference on issues around redistribution, amount and progressivity of taxation, etc., but to be honest this is less important at the civic level and more important at senior government levels.) In the other world, there's a resentment of government interference, an odd alliance of my-home-is-my-castle suburban dwellers who want a minimum level of core services (roads, garbage, utilities, schools (while they have children), recreational facilities (i.e. hockey, while they have male children)) and underclass members -- immigrants, visible minorities, and the chronically un- or under-employed -- whose interactions with the state are frequently if not usually mediated by the police, social workers, the court system, or EI/welfare officials. (One voter in the north of Etobicoke was quoted as saying he'd voted for Ford, but if he'd had to vote for somebody else it would have been Goldkind "because he's my lawyer".)
Tory represents the right of that first consensus much as Chow represents its left.
The second world is angry. The socially conservative, leave-me-alone suburbanites resent the social pressures enabling minorities and depressing their privilege; they feel threatened by technical and financial changes remaking the job markets and the workplace and rendering their financial positions more unstable; they want things to return to "a simpler time". The apartment-dwellers of Rexdale and other areas in the edges of the city are angry at the state, period. In a rational world, they would presumably make common cause with the Left, but it is in exactly those areas that Chow's support was weakest.
That anger is widespread, these days. You can see it in GamerGate, in the Tea Party, in UKIP. And as the pace of change is not slowing down, it's not likely to go away, either.
That anger also has nothing to contribute to the process of governance. (The people who are trying to advance the interests of the underclass are the very downtown elites the underclass resents. Progressives like Michael Shapcott or the leaders of Occupy are angry as well, but they're part of that other consensus, that government has a role in managing society.) It gives rise to frankly stupid proposals like wanting a subway or nothing on Sheppard.
The representatives of those areas tend to bring only one demand to the table: that taxes be kept at a bare minimum, even at the expense of important programmes (except if it interferes with the immediate infrastructure (roads, sewers, water, power, hockey rinks) in their areas). It's probably unfair to label these councillors as poor representatives of their areas: the problem is that they are excellent representatives of their areas, where their areas represent a push back against the whole structure of civic governance.
Thirdly, Tory's conservative credentials were heavily outweighed by his downtown and socially progressive credentials. He has very little to offer the councillors of the old Ford block. His political support has little grounding in their areas.
If I had to make a guess, I would say that Tory's committee chair appointments will end up excluding councillors from the top corners of the city (in a sort of mirror of Ford's excluding Toronto/East York councillors) because they have nothing valuable to contribute (expertise, conciliatoriness, management skills). There will be some overlap with Ford's appointments, but I can't see Crisanti, Ford, Mammoliti, Cho, or Moeser as being likely to get committee chairs.
