
For progressive politics to be successful, the emphasis must be on working class, economic issues.
Since the 1960s, there has been a low grade power struggle within progressive electoral politics not regarding actual policy, but regarding emphasis. Which direction is the ‘tent pole’ of the democratic left.
Before the new left began to shift the focus of the movement towards race, gender, sexual orientation to leading roles, class based analysis and class based solutions dominated the left’s view, broadly speaking, although their solutions were seen as reformist by more radical elements. Naturally, when dealing with local campaigns, race, ethnicity, culture, gender and sexual orientation may loom large, but for national or provincial leaders, the platform, as opposed to the policy, is critical and highly strategic.
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A recent piece by David Coletto of Abacus Data, sheds a powerful light on Canadian voting blocks, and how they think and interact in 2025. Abacus is widely acknowledged as a top pollster within an elite group of top pollsters.
Coletto broke out 5 groups from his data, that form consistent clusters and plotted them on a Cartesian plane with the X axis as the traditional pro or con economic intervention in the market POV and a Y axis regarding pro or con views of cultural politics, like identity or what some might call the “woke” POV. What he found looks something like the chart below.
At this point, those who want a deeper dive into Coletto’s research, might be advised to hit the link to his longer piece here.
https://abacusdata.ca/abacus-data-voter-segmentation-consumers-profiles/
What does the data tell us about campaigning from the left? What is the formula, for example, for the NDP but, by extension, any party that wants to operate in the left of center territory? The basic building block would seem to be Group 2 - progressive on both axes. However this gives a political floor but also a ceiling, at roughly 24%.
In Canadian politics, under our ‘first past the post’ system, most elections are won between 37% and 45% in our
multi party system. Where do progressives go to find the extra 15-20% needed to win? The Group 5 voters are both too small, at 6%, but also antithetical to the economic POV of the core progressive voters. Group 4 is too ideologically conservative and Group 1 is both too moderate and too unreliable. This leaves the obvious conclusion that the progressive coalition must be composed of Group 2 - 24% and Group 3 - 21% leading to 44% or higher with a few votes from Group 1.
In short, if we set aside the unreliable moderates, the remaining voters are 45% economically progressive and 30% culturally progressive. There are far more voters to be found with an economic, progressive populist messaging than culturally progressive messaging.
The implications are significant. A progressive party, aiming for 40%+ needs to form its image primarily around economic issues like higher wages, higher minimum wages, unions, pensions, benefits, dentacare, pharmacare, school lunches, $10 childcare, and reinforce public healthcare. Do they turn against cultural rights? Obviously not. They simply don’t lead with cultural issues the same way that boxers don’t lead with their chin. Leader’s speeches, leader selection, the platform (campaign issues) as opposed to party policy, usually a multi page document covering almost all issues.
Identity oriented and culturally oriented activists are not wrong and are real assets to parties. It is not surprising that they are passionately behind their issues. Does orienting your politics more in a labour - working class direction mean caving in to a white male set of priorities? Absolutely not. Organized labour in Canada is 53% female, with major gains in recent years, by POC and 2SLGBTQ in leadership as well as membership.
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So where does that leave us, in campaigning for education, usually at the school board or provincial level? We can be assured that campaigning for the progressive vote begins with the fight for proper educational infrastructure from funding to new schools, to fewer portables, to renovations, but on to good wages and working conditions for all education workers from teachers to support staff, to class size, The goals must be mainly oriented to the most possible post secondary grads whether that be university, community college or apprenticeships. This includes reduced and eventually free tuition. Canada already has an outstanding record here, formerly 1st place with 60% now 2nd behind South Korea, but the Koreans are experiencing too many university grads and too few jobs for them.
On the other end of the school system, the ideal future would include the downward extension of the public school system to age 2 when most kids are toilet trained. Naturally, this is a stretch goal, and needs a step by step approach. It falls under the economic goals for the working class. Hopefully, there would be $10/day style childcare pre age 2.
As we venture into progressive cultural issues, we gradually walk on thinner and thinner ice with working class voters. It must be done, however, but carefully, in obvious defence of female and racialized students but increasingly 2SLGBTQ students. This takes courage and it shouldn’t be surprising when some urban trustees set the early pace for provincial MPP/MLA reps who often have wider constituencies to respond to. When you build your reputation on economic progressivism, you earn the right to run some cultural political risks for small, but oppressed groups.
In conclusion, the more successful social democratic parties of Europe, and Australia, Latin America and New Zealand build their original credibility as working class parties built on unions and coops. The German SPD ran its most recent successful election campaign on a simple, powerful slogan - Respect for Workers. The American Democrats, who built a somewhat progressive reputation, from Roosevelt to Johnson threw away their most recent election by forgetting who they were. They abandoned the working class, while attempting to maintain a progressive reputation with identity cultural politics. There are simply not enough votes in that position, to win.
A final quote directly from Coletto’s conclusions.
‘’Canadians show a readiness to accept state interventions on economic issues - demanding robust public services, redistribution, and affordability measures - yet remain more cautious and tradition minded when it comes to cultural change.’’