Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau take part in a ceremony on Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) at the National Holocaust Monument in Ottawa on May 6.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
That was an attention grabber: The Angus Reid Institute put out an analysis last week saying the leaders of Canada’s major federal political parties have never been held in such dismal regard. It was based on an analysis of 50 years of public-opinion data.
It’s the first time that all three major federal party leaders, the survey said, have garnered net ratings of negative 12 or worse at the same time.
The minus-12 rating – meaning the disapproval percentage is that many points higher than the approval one – belongs to Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre. By today’s standards, that’s actually a good rating. NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh scores his worst ever ranking at minus-14. And, the study noted, “Prime Minister Trudeau’s approval has dropped to its lowest point at just 28 per cent, with a net approval of negative 38.”
Usually at least one party boss is well liked. “Our fractured and divisive politics, however, appear to have created an era where all leaders can remain under water at the same time,” the study declared.
What it doesn’t note is that the embarrassment for our leaders is eased if they look abroad. Their low standing is hardly unique – it’s common everywhere, especially for heads of state.
How, for example, are the other G7-country leaders doing? According to Morning Consult, Britain’s Rishi Sunak’s approval rating is at a brutal 26 per cent, and Emmanuel Macron of France weighs in at a pathetic 23 per cent. Olaf Scholz of Germany does even worse at 22. Fumio Kishida of Japan is worse still, at 17 per cent.
U.S. President Joe Biden’s 39-per-cent approval rating sounds splendid by comparison. In fact, it’s one of the worst for first-term presidents in history.
Ruchir Sharma, chair of Rockefeller International, tracks leaders’ approval ratings in 20 major countries. “In the developed world,” he writes in the Financial Times, “no leader has a rating above 50 per cent. Only one country (Italy) has seen its leader gain approval in the 2020s.”
There are lots of reasons for the low standings, such as inflation, rising inequality and the slowing of growth in average per-capita incomes, but it’s not like there’s a great global recession or depression. Economic conditions have been worse in Canada and elsewhere in the past.
Mr. Trudeau’s low standing stems from the housing crisis, inflation, immigration and his government’s incompetence as seen, for instance, in the ArriveCan app scandal. As well, there’s the fatigue factor, with his being in power almost nine years.
But for him and other leaders, we’re forgetting the elephant in the room: the burden of being at the helm in the online age. It’s often mentioned but not highlighted nearly enough. Owing to the internet and social media, political leaders are under bombardment from a gazillion more voices than they ever faced in the predigital era.
For the pall of unparalleled negativity that hangs over our politics, look to the naysayers, cynics, vilifiers and haters who have been handed microphones by virtue of this communications revolution. It’s been the catalyst for the disinformation epidemic, the rise of far right and left fringes, the debasement of the dialogue, the extreme polarization, the discrediting of the mainstream media, the erosion of trust in institutions.
With the comms system gone rogue, national leaders – provincial and civic leaders don’t have it so bad – can no longer influence, shape or control the message as they did before. Against the torrent of abuse, they have become more and more defenceless.
Compare the environment Justin Trudeau faces to that of his father. In Pierre Trudeau’s time, there was no internet, no relentless social-media attacks. The hard right barely existed, conservatives being of the more moderate Tory stripe. The more liberally inclined CBC had a far greater audience share. The right-wing Sun chain had yet to expand and conservative Postmedia had not yet been born.
Similar things can be said about Mr. Biden in respect to the level of rancour he faces, compared to earlier times.
Governor-General Mary Simon spoke out this week against online vitriol that became so intense she had to turn off her social-media accounts. Against the insult culture the internet has spawned, she said, there has to be boundaries.
It’s a forlorn hope. Attempts to create boundaries are in the works, but there’s no turning back from what the digital age, which sounded so democratically promising at the outset, has unleashed.
We’re trapped in a system where negative voices have disproportionate impact. Authoritarian leaders who exert online controls can find, by coercion (Vladimir Putin, anyone?), great favour. Our own politics will continue to be permeated by an air of gloom.