Sylvia Bashevkin comments on NDP Leadership

January 4, 2012

NDP’s Female Contenders Must Offer Substance, Not Just Style

Article by Sylvia Bashevkin, Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto.

4 January 2012, The Globe and Mail

The NDP leadership race presents, in many respects, a déjà vu experience. For more than 30 years, candidates for the federal party’s top job have claimed they could win support in Quebec, unite urban and rural constituencies across the country, and push the Liberals to the margins of national politics.

What makes this campaign distinctive is the candidacy of two women MPs, Peggy Nash and Niki Ashton, for the leadership of a party that has already had two female leaders. The NDP stands out in international terms not only for Audrey McLaughlin and Alexa McDonough’s successive terms at the helm between 1989 and 2003, but also for B.C. MLA Rosemary Brown’s path-breaking leadership run in 1975.

Continue reading at The Globe and Mail.