Separation anxiety

Jim Storrie
posted by | 13RTs
May 06, 2025

The dominant narrative in Canadian politics right now is one of unity—an appeal to rally around the flag in the face of Trump’s ongoing trade war. But things are a little different in Alberta. Here, it seems like everyone wants to talk about splitting up: corporate media has published a flurry of articles recently on separatism on the right, and in the other direction, the Alberta NDP just voted to divorce from their federal party.

Everyone’s falling for the separatist grift. You shouldn’t

“Western secession is all the rage. How would an independent West fare economically?” asks one CBC reporter. “Danielle Smith's reform is nudging Alberta separation vote from 'if' toward 'when,'” warns commentator Jason Markusoff. “Alberta Separatists Push to Leave Canada After Liberals Win Election,” reports the American publication Newsweek.

The further you get from Alberta, the more dramatic the story gets. Go all the way around to India and it’s “Thousands demand an independent Alberta, is Canada on the brink of breaking apart?”

Is Canada really “on the brink of falling apart”? Seems a bit exaggerated, right?

Alberta’s separatist movement is a great example of what we call ‘astroturf’ politics. We call it that because it’s not a grassroots movement but a simulation of one, bought and paid for. And given how many media outlets seem to be falling for it, funders are getting a good return on this particular investment.

Part of the problem here is one of misidentification. There is a powerful, extremist populist right-wing movement in Alberta that is exerting leverage and control over Danielle Smith’s UCP administration, but they aren’t primarily organizing around separatism. I’m talking about Christian nationalists, represented by organizations like David Parker’s Take Back Alberta or the Liberty Coalition of Canada.

These groups are racking up far more clout and success than the single-issue separatist parties which constantly sprout and die here. Compared to David Parker, separatist Republican Party of Alberta leader Cam Davies is just some clown shouting in a parking lot. And while Parker’s set do say they favor separation, their primary objective isn’t an independent Alberta. It’s an Alberta re-oriented around the desires of the Christian nationalist movement—a hierarchy of discrimination, with white supremacy at the very top.

The true threat to Alberta isn’t these fringe figures bleating about independence—it’s the Take Back Alberta crowd who are, even now, pushing your premier to adopt terrible policies on vaccines, health care, education, human rights and more.

Meanwhile, the Alberta NDP elect to do right-to-work to themselves

Unlike the Alberta separatists, one group did pull off a bit of a separation over the weekend, and that’s the Alberta NDP.

Calls to disaffiliate the Alberta NDP from the federal NDP have been growing ever since differences on fossil fuel policy—and a perceived attempt at entryism by Leap Manifesto co-author Avi Lewis—drove a wedge between them during the Notley administration.

Shannon Phillips, the former Alberta NDP climate minister who now works with conservative lobbyist Ken Boessenkool, castigated the federal party for being willing to even entertain the Leap behind closed doors at the Alberta NDP 2016 convention in a speech that she just released publicly on her Substack on Monday. At that convention, Alberta Federation of Labour president Gil McGowan famously declared that Leap would be “a millstone around our [the party’s] necks.”

Today’s federal NDP has largely retreated on the issues of pipelines and oil and gas emissions, so you might think that hostility had been resolved. Yet even years later, during the most recent Alberta NDP leadership race, fist-shaking at the federal party was still going on. Naheed Nenshi, who steamrolled to a dominant victory in that race, said he’d like people to be able to opt out.

At the Alberta NDP convention over the weekend, the party followed through on that commitment. It’s unclear exactly what the mechanism will look like, but very soon Alberta NDP members will be allowed to opt out of their federal memberships if they choose.

Over a year ago I wrote that disaffiliation isn’t just a bad idea, but a lazy one too. The federal and provincial NDP are much more aligned now than they were during Rachel Notley’s premiership, as evidenced by Notley’s recent appearance alongside then-federal leader Jagmeet Singh in Edmonton; in fact it’s an Alberta MP, Heather McPherson, who has been earning much of the NDP’s media lately, particularly through her firm support for Palestine.

Disaffiliation is attractive to leaders for some obvious reasons: you get to look like you’re doing something, which is always a prime motivator for unimaginative or unambitious politicians, and you also get to blame the Alberta NDP’s poor showing in recent elections on someone else.

The great irony here is that the Alberta NDP are employing a tactic commonly used against workers. Governments that want to sabotage unions often enact ‘right to work’ policies which allow people to opt out of union dues. The incentive to freeload is high, people opt out, the union starves for lack of dues and falls apart.

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Sundries

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