Marchak argues that liberalism and socialism have many commonalities, such as the goals of equality and freedom for citizens. Corporatism, however, is opposed to equality and promotes an authoritarian hierarchy, resembling the older conservative ideology. To support her argument, Marchak provides a general overview of the study of ideologies, analyzes liberalism and socialism in the context of Canada, and uses Marxist theory to explain past and present class structure and the emergence of a corporatist social structure. A valuable contribution to the debate about the society we live in, Ideological Perspectives on Canada attempts to look at ideologies from an objective standpoint, while admitting that analysts can never fully remove themselves from the web of their own society, which in the Canadian case is steeped in liberalism, socialism, and corporatism.

M. Patricia Marchak (1936-2010), former dean of arts, University of British Columbia, is the author of several books including No Easy Fix, Logging the Globe, The Integrated Circus, God's Assassins, and Reigns of Terror.

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