At glance

The publication of this third Weekly coincides with the mid-campaign period and for the occasion, we have decided to present you with an overview of the first three weeks of the campaign rather than limiting ourselves to an analysis of the place of Indigenous issues only during this third week. In this regard, we note first of all that the word enfants has been the most popular word in French for three weeks, whereas communities was the most popular word in English. As the theme of reconciliation is an important one, we wanted to know if this word was often used, thus showing its relative importance in the campaign. Thus, in English, the word reconciliation ranks seventh (jute behind residential), while in French it ranks fifth (behind residential and climat). Similarly, we note that the most popular hashtags in French and English since the beginning of the campaign are polcan and elxn43 respectively. However, it should be noted that these hashtags are used to list tweets related to the current election and Canadian politics, which slightly biases the results. However, it is important to note the popularity of the JournéeDuChandailOrange hashtag in French and OrangeShirtDay, which arrived only in the third week of the campaign and were used only 5 times less in French and 7 times less in English than the most popular keywords that have been circulating since the beginning of the campaign. This shows the importance given to this elevation in the tweets published by party candidates.

Number of Tweets

The number of tweets published by candidates is indicative of the interest political parties have in Indigenous issues in their Twitter publications. For example, the following graph shows that in the past three weeks, the NDP has published far more tweets on indigenous issues than any other party. What is surprising is the significant difference with the Liberal Party, whose Indigenous issues have been an important part of political discourse throughout its mandate as a government in the 42nd Parliament. There is also an important difference between the NDP and the Green Party, which ranks only third in terms of the number of tweets published by its candidates on these issues. It is also surprising to see the lack of interest in these same issues on the part of Conservative Party candidates. The Bloc Québécois does not seem to be doing well, but we have ti keep in mond that this party only has members in Quebec, while all the other parties have members in all ridings across the country.

The analysis of the number of tweets published per day since the beginning of the campaign allows us to determine whether interest in Indigenous issues is sustained or sporadic from one political party to the other. The following graph confirms what the previous graph tells us. We can see that, apart for a few days at the beginning of the campaign, the NDP has always published more tweets than all the other parties. We also see that Conservative Party candidates really never have any interest in indigenous issues, their curve remaining very stable and very close to the bottom. Within the Green Party, interest in Indigenous issues varies widely from day to day, but the graph shows a growing interest during the last week of the campaign. Finally, it should be noted that the Bloc Québécois also seems to have a growing interest over the past week and has even published more tweets on this subject than the Conservative Party, which has 260 more members than the Bloc.

The following graph shows that interest in Indigenous issues is variable. There were three specific moments during the campaign when attention to these issues was particularly prominent. First, there is September 13, which is the day after the first Maclean’s/CityTV leaders’ debate. It should be recalled that on that occasion, a full segment of the debate was devoted to indigenous issues. This segment of the debate therefore seems to have instilled an interest in these issues on Twitter. The second highlight was on September 24 and the next day, when the Liberal Party released its climate proposal and the opposition parties criticized the Liberal government’s environmental record, including the purchase of a pipeline that had been opposed by several Indigenous communities. It was also during this week that activist Greta Thunberg launched the climate march with indigenous leaders. The last time there is a peak in the number of tweets published is on September 30. This date corresponds to the orange shirt day that commemorates the victims of residential schools. This is the day on which the most tweets on Indigenous issues have been published in the entire campaign to date, which explains the popularity of the OrangeShirtDay hashtag that we highlighted in our preamble.

Number of Tweets by Province

Since the beginning of the campaign, we observe a steady trend where Ontario and British Columbia are the provinces in which candidates publish the most tweets on Indigenous issues.In our opinion, two factors explain the increased interest in Indigenous issues in these provinces. Ontario and British Columbia have the highest number of NDP candidates (the party with the highest number of tweets on Indigenous issues) and, historically, the highest proportions of Indigenous populations in the country (which explains the greater interest in Indingenous issues among candidates in these provinces).

Number of Tweets by Riding

With respect to the ridings where the most tweets on Indigenous issues have been published since the beginning of the campaign, the following map gives the impression that this phenomenon is concentrated in northern ridings and northern provinces. This would be logical, since these are regions where the proportion of the Indigenous population is often higher. However, if we zoom in the map, we see that the ridings where Indigenous issues have received the most attention on Twitter are mostly urban ridings and where the proportion of the Indigenous population is much higher than in northern regions. It is difficult at this time to explain why it is the candidates in these ridings who publish the most tweets on Indigenous issues. Whether it is the assumption that the NDP predominates in these ridings, the proportion of the Indigenous population in these ridings, or the proximity of the ridings to indigenous communities, all these assumptions have been refuted. Further research will be needed to explain this phenomenon.

Content analysis

Correlation Analysis

The correlation analysis, which we represent in the graph below as a word network, identifies five main themes in the tweets published by candidates. First, there is the theme of funding and taxation to support the well-being and wealth development of Indigenous communities. The theme of the climate crisis and the need for real change is equally obvious. It also appears that the federal government’s relationship with the governments of Aboriginal nations has been of interest to candidates, which is not surprising, since this issue is at the heart of the discourse on financing and the climate crisis. In this regard, the graph highlights the demand, especially heard over the past week, for the need to recognize and respect indigenous rights by effectively implementing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Canada. Finally, the last theme confirms what all our analyses have shown. The theme of reconciliation and commemoration of events in residential schools and the need to honour the memory of those who have disappeared, as well as residential school survivors, has really come to the fore in this campaign, particularly on Orange shirt Day.