THE COMMISSION' S VIEW OF THE NATURE OF CANADIAN SOCIETY.


The Commission has expressed an opinion of the nature of Canadian society, that is reflected in its omission of "peace" as an aspiration of Canadians.


We also live in a society that, like other
successful societies, values competition
and, indeed, relies upon it for basic
protection: our judicial, electoral,
parliamentary and economic systems are
all based on competition, and in large
measure, are deliberately adversarial. (1)


Canada, then, in the view of the Commission, is a competitive society with adversarial national institutions as opposed to a collaborative society. From this perspective of Canadian society, conflict is a natural part of the social order, something to be accommodated within the social structure. This perspective rationalizes conflicts between races, between cultural groups, between labor and management, and between women and men, as natural or to be expected. As one textbook on organizations states "the critical issue is not conflict itself, but rather how it is managed". (2)

The management of conflict is an exercise in the art of compromise. In the pursuit of compromise and thereby management of the level of conflict in Canada, the Royal Commission has sought the opinions of various interest groups in Canada, summarized these opinions in the form of an interim report appropriately entitled, Challenges and Choices, and invited responses to this report, responses which will supposedly influence the Commission in its production of its final report.

The language used by the Commission reflects this particular perspective of Canadian society and expresses it accordingly: "Challenges", full employment versus stable prices and costs, economic efficiency versus social equity.


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