George Grant and Canadian Broadcasting Regulation by Bruce D. Dyck

In 1965, George Grant claimed that Canada had lost its identity, becoming a "branch plant satellite" of the United States (40).  Grant argued that private broadcasters in Canada would make Canadian culture, like the Canadian economy, "redundant" (53), in that it would essentially be a carbon copy of American culture.  While Canada's film and television industries suffered due to inadequate funding and infrastructure during the late-60s and early-70s that made it nearly impossible for them to compete with the slicker, higher budget American-made productions, Canadian radio was not saddled with the enormous costs and direct competition from cross border stations that Canadian television faced, nor the monopolistic film distribution structure that was controlled by the American movie studios (Dorland 117).  However, despite competing on terms that were more favourable to Canadian artists, Canadian radio stations still filled the airwaves with almost exclusively American top 40 music.  In the case of radio, the extent to which Canada had, according to Grant, lost its national identity during the late-sixties and early-seventies, had less to do with American cultural imperialism than a lack of political, economic, and creative initiative by both the government and regulatory boards that allowed station owners to pursue profits at the expense of promoting Canadian content.

Canadian Content: George Grant, the CRTC by Bruce Dyck

In 1965, George Grant claimed that Canada had lost its identity, becoming a "branch plant satellite" of the United States (40).  Grant argued that private broadcasters in Canada would make Canadian culture, like the Canadian economy, "redundant" (53), in that it would essentially be a carbon copy of American culture.  While Canada's film and television industries suffered due to inadequate funding and infrastructure during the late-60s and early-70s that made it nearly impossible for them to compete with the slicker, higher budget American-made productions, Canadian radio was not saddled with the enormous costs and direct competition from cross border stations that Canadian television faced, nor the monopolistic film distribution structure that was controlled by the American movie studios (Dorland 117).  However, despite competing on terms that were more favourable to Canadian artists, Canadian radio stations still filled the airwaves with almost exclusively American top 40 music.  In the case of radio, the extent to which Canada had, according to Grant, lost its national identity during the late-sixties and early-seventies, had less to do with American cultural imperialism than a lack of political, economic, and creative initiative by both the government and regulatory boards that allowed station owners to pursue profits at the expense of promoting Canadian content.

Philip Blond's Red Toryism: A Canadian Tradition Revived and Revised

Editorial Note: Red Toryism is a Canadian political tradition that has been revived (with some alterations) in the UK by the Radical Orthodox scion, Philip Blond. To get a sense of the similarities and differences between the Canadian Red Tory Tradition and its recent British counterpart, compare Ron Dart's article on the [Canadian] Red Tory tradition with the following variety of attempts to define Blond's current revised vision:

The Red Tory sounds like Margaret Thatcher in a Che Guevara beret, just as the distributist sounds, to someone unfamiliar with the term, like a redistributionist, or a communitarian might be confused with a collectivist. (It would not hurt the third-way Chesterbellocians to update their nomenclature.)

Zach Dundas describes Red Tories this way:

The Red Tories argue that modern free-market capitalism poses as potent a threat to individual liberty and communities as Big Government. Red Tories lump big-box stores, industrial agriculture, and high-finance shenanigans together with heavy-handed bureaucracy and high taxes: all, in their view, undermine the rock-ribbed Conservative values of local autonomy, strong community, diverse traditions, and decentralized power. The Red Tories view themselves as defenders of grassroots community against both the free market and the State.

The Red Tory Tradition by Ron Dart

The language of Red Toryism became popular in the mid-1960s when Gad Howoritz suggested that George Grant was a Red Tory. The publication and immediate success of Grant’s, Lament for a Nation: The Defeat of Canadian Nationalism (1965), made it abundantly clear that there were historic forms of conservatism in Canada that could not be equated with American republicanism. Horowitz, in his classic article, ‘Tories, Socialists and the Demise of Canada’(1965), argued that there was a ‘Tory touch’ in the Canadian political tradition that leaned more towards the commonweal and socialism than did the free enterprise system of Blue Toryism. It was this ‘Tory touch’ that was more ‘Red’ than ‘Blue’ in orientation that distinguished the Canadian from the American notions of conservatism.

Political Ressourcement: Anabaptist Inaccuracies, Radical Orthodoxy, Red Toryism, and George Grant by Ron Dart

"George Grant was Canada’s most significant public philosopher."

Graeme Nicholson, Athens and Jerusalem: George Grant’s Theology, Philosophy, and Politics (p. 323)

1

The Constantinian Fall Myth

There is a rather inaccurate and shallow read of Christian history that unfolds in this manner. Once upon a time there was the pure New Testament church that was faithful and true to the radical commitment to Jesus Christ. This period of time was short, and the fire did not burn bright and with much light for long. The 1st century soon gave way to the post-apostolic era, and in the 2nd-3rd centuries, the intensity and spirit of the martyrs gave way to assimilation, many compromises and a thinning out of the faith journey.

The most serious distortion and compromise of the church took place when Constantine came to power in the early decades of the 4th century, and Eusebius’ oration and adoring speech to Constantine made it clear that the church had now become a lapdog and dancing bear of imperial politics. The age of true prophets and genuine martyrs was over. It was just a matter of time before Theodosius and Charlemagne took control of the church and reduced it to a vassal of political power.

Lament -- Poetry by Eric H. Janzen

LAMENT

This shredded flag hangs low

like the burdened shoulders

of a visionary watching the

vision of his passion fade

'what is necessary is not necessarily

good' says the wind as it

moves the flag aside, passing

with the memory of resistance,

the recollection of the desire

to make something distinguished

and like George Grant

witnessing the dream so slowly

extinguished, a northern fire

smouldering like so much smoke and ashes

rising now falling free to mark

the mourning few and leave

the shredded flag to hang askew

over a hill pondering the loss of

the true north and its strength

given over for weakness.

George Grant and the Orthodox Tradition by Ron Dart

George Grant was Canada’s most significant public philosopher.                                 

Graeme Nicholson[1]

George Grant has been called one of the most important public intellectuals in Canada in the latter half of the 20^th century. He had a wide ranging mind and imagination that covered and touched most aspects of the Western and Eastern traditions. Grant was a Christian renaissance humanist in the best sense of that compelling term. The fact that Grant was drawn to the best of the Western theological, philosophical and political tradition meant that he encountered the riches of Orthodoxy in his many probes. This brief essay will touch on Grant’s encounter with Orthodoxy. I will ponder his encounter   and engagement with the Orthodox tradition in five unfolding phases.

First, Grant’s initial encounter with Orthodoxy was through the marriage of his sister, Alison Grant, to George Ignatieff. Grant had studied with George Ignatieff’s brother, Nicholas, who taught History at Upper Canada College in the 1930s. But the meeting of George Ignatieff and Alison Grant

and their marriage in November 1945 brought Grant into the centre of the Russian Orthodox way as it was embodied in England and Canada in the WWII period. George Ignaitieff had this to say about his Russian Orthodox heritage in his classic book, Memoirs of a Peacemonger:

The Orthodox church gave me a sense of belonging, of being in touch with my roots, of safety and stability in an otherwise confusing world. Even in early childhood I derived great comfort from prayer and from the familiar Orthodox liturgy, and I have remained a devoted member of the church ever since. p. 33.