Wednesday, June 08, 2011

On regional effects

The NDP's provincial surges in Canada's Atlantic provinces has received some attention already. But it's particularly worth noting how the provincial numbers figure to relate to the recent federal election results.

On the one hand, it does seem that the federal campaign managed to catch the attention some voters who otherwise weren't considering the NDP as a possibility - with at least some of those voters now expressing their support.

But perhaps more noteworthy is the fact that the NDP's provincial results in each province other than Nova Scotia still have a ways to go to catch up to the party's federal vote share. And if a higher profile nationally can make those numbers converge, then it looks entirely possible that the NDP could emerge as the leading challenger for government throughout a region that's historically been almost entirely barren territory.

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