Stephen Harper’s gentler style of populism

Dear Editor:

Stephen Harper left a tangled legacy and abrasive style that alienated both friend and foe.

Since leaving politics he has been active internationally promoting conservative ideals and is releasing a new book in October on the rise of populism and how conservatives should respond. According to his publisher, Harper is offering populism with pragmatic leadership, as his solution to the uncertainty facing both business and government today. He advocates change is possible using the approach he pioneered as prime minister; incremental solutions to policy challenges.

Harper says he is troubled to see fellow conservatives like Donald Trump attacking the global economic order and he hopes to rescue populism, by remaking it in his own image.

Pointing out the strengths and successes of his past government, he offers a competing vision to the U.S.-style protectionism that passes for modern-day conservative populism, attempting to reshape it for Canadian consumption that is neither Trump-style populism, nor progressive.

He has taken his message directly to Fox News and the Stanford Graduate School.

Diplomatically disagreeing with Trump on trade and engagement with Russia, though Harper did raise eyebrows at the Five Eyes security pact forum in London, England, when he said “the world has got to get use to Mr. Trump’s new world order,” his comment immediately sparked comparisons of a Neville Chamberlain type-appeasement towards the vindictive U.S. president’s bully tactics.

Harper is attempting to articulate a third way. Though the difference remains thin; the contrast he makes between American and Canadian conservative populism is on immigration.

Emphasizing his government’s support for large scale immigration policies was the reason his conservative party was one of the few centre-right parties in the world that won a majority immigrant vote.

Even so, both Harper’s third way and Trump’s protectionism seek to remake the liberal order; one less subtle than the other.

So the takeaway is Harper is worried about the damage done to conservatism by Trump’s harsh strain of populism and it seems he is trying to encourage conservatives to appeal to their better angels.

Well; all I can say is good luck with that.