Who do I trust? That’s the question Liberals need to ask themselves as they prepare to choose a new leader — because it’s the question voters will be asking in the next federal election. But it’s not about trust in the macro sense: is this person honest? Will they keep their promises? Do they have the smarts and experience for the job? It’s trust in the micro sense: who do I trust to have my back? Who gets me? Who do I trust to look after my wallet, my job, my family and my country?
Polls show Canadians want empathy. That’s not a quality you can teach, but it is one you can fake. False empathy is the common currency of populists: most recently, U.S. President Donald Trump created a sense among the poorest Americans that he understood their struggles, despite having never faced them himself. Unlike genuine empathy, false empathy doesn’t depend on lived experience: it is an impression, an illusion. Populists understand the public mood and position themselves accordingly.
So where does this leave the three top contenders for the Liberal leadership? Do Mark Carney, Chrystia Freeland and Karina Gould bring either real or false empathy to the table? And critically, what is the audience they are going for? Is it the “common people” that the Conservatives are courting, or centrist Liberal switchers who were sick of Justin Trudeau?
Let’s start with Carney. On the macro level, he’s the guy to trust with your wallet: former Governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, someone who understands inflation, economic uncertainty, and the cost of living. On the micro level, he has work to do. Part of it is tall poppy syndrome, Canada’s annoying tendency to cut down those who fly too high. But Carney also embraced a suite of progressive policies, including carbon taxes, which ordinary Canadians now reject. He also needs to do more to remind Liberals that he was born in the village of Fort Smith, N.W.T., not Toronto.
Next, Freeland. She’s not running against Carney, but against Trump. She wants to be the leader you’d trust with your country: she is proud to have earned Trump’s ire during the CUSMA negotiations. But Freeland is also intimately tied to the least empathetic politician of our day: Trudeau, whose policies she both defended and crafted.
And then, there’s Gould, former Minister of Families, Children and Social Development. Gould trumpets her role in the national childcare plan, positioning herself as the leader to trust to look after jobs and social programs. She was the first cabinet minister to give birth in office and take parental leave. Her strengths lie in her ability to connect with middle-class families and younger voters, but like Freeland, she also wears the Trudeau mantle, and his middle-class failures.
Why is there such an empathy deficit in the Liberal race? Perhaps because for the past six decades, the party hasn’t had much of a populist tradition. Its leaders have all hailed from the upper economic class and / or intelligentsia: Pierre and Justin Trudeau, John Turner, Paul Martin, Stéphane Dion, Michael Ignatieff. With one notable exception: Jean Chrétien, le p’tit gars de Shawinigan.
Chrétien was the closest thing the Liberals have had to a populist: tough, scrappy, and plainspoken. He suffered from a disability, but it did not hold him back. At the same time, he was educated and connected: he was a lawyer, had a storied private sector career, and his daughter married into Quebec’s wealthy Desmarais family. As Canada struggled with debt, recession and internal angst, voters wanted a strongman who could feel their pain, and Chrétien fit the bill.
Were Chrétien still up for the job of prime minister, he’d be a contender. But he isn’t. The question then, is who incarnates the Liberal populist today? Who can Canadians trust to not only fix things, but feel things? That’s the question Liberal supporters need to ask themselves — and candidates need to answer.
Postmedia Network
Tasha Kheiriddin is Postmedia’s national politics columnist.