Canada in 1977 is a far different country from the
Canada of the 1950's when the first version of this book
was planned. The old certainties about our political, social
and economic life have long since disappeared; the solutions
to a host of new and complex problems are now by no
means clear. A nation which once complained that politics
were dull has lived through crises that have captured head-
lines around the world. Above all, the social and political
revolution in Quebec has forced a radical rethinking of the
nature of the Canadian state and society. The fanatics of the
Front de liberation du Quebec destroyed whatever com-
placency we may have felt about the stability of our social
and political life, while the victory of the Parti quebecois
in 1976 threatens the survival of the Canadian state as we
now know it.

How Are We Governed? is designed to provide the back-
ground to and some insight into the working of government
and politics in Canada. There are many books describing
Canadian government. Most of them could be entitled
How We Are Governed for they trace, with fastidious
attention to form and detail, the institutions of Canadian
government and the smooth working of the Canadian gov-
ernmental system. Yet institutions do not work the way
they are supposed to, and their operations is seldom smooth.
This brief volume attempts to look at how government does
work, at the political forces behind the governmental
facade, at the defects as well as the virtues. It may raise
more questions than it answers.

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