Utopia vs Fearmongering
Albertans have seriously been discussing separatism since Spring 2025 (and issues of Western alienation for over a century). It has only been a couple of weeks since the official Alberta separatism referendum question was announced. We still have five more months of campaigning before October 19, 2026. And if Albertans decide they want a second referendum, it could be more years of campaigning. And if a second referendum passes it would be more years of negotiations with the rest of Canada. I am exhausted already.
Nevertheless, as a political scientist who specializes in Alberta politics and as a proud Albertan and proud Canadian, I have a professional and personal obligation to follow every twist and turn of the campaign. That includes writing about it.
Already a major theme of the campaign has emerged. The separatists have it easy. They can promise a utopia. Every grievance that you have (pipelines, taxes, laws, regulations, equalization, immigration, guns, vaccines, transgender rights, house prices, underrepresentation in Parliament, etc) will be solved by separatism. To paraphrase, Jacques Parizeau, the former Quebec Premier and separatist leader, separation is a magic wand that solves all problems. Everything that you like about Canada (citizenship, passports, pensions, Banff/Jasper, currency, etc) you get to keep. Everything that you don’t like about Canada (taxes, federal laws, other provinces (except maybe Saskatchewan), Parliament, Prime Ministers, non-Conservatives, immigrants, Indigenous rights, etc) you get to remove.
Meanwhile, the pro-Canada side often has to act as the scolds. They have to resort to reality checks on the vision of a utopia.
No, you will not automatically get to keep the money you currently spend on federal income tax and GST. There will be a commiserate increase in provincial taxes to replace the loss of federal transfers as well as the hundreds of billions in startup costs for a new country. Plus, Alberta’s share of the national debt.
No, you will not automatically get to keep your citizenship and passport. These would be part of the negotiations with the rest of Canada.
No, it will not be easier to build a pipeline through BC if Alberta were to be independent. No, the UN Law of the Sea will not help you.
No, Alberta will be a landlocked country if it became independent.
No, you do not get to take the existing territory of Alberta with you. Indigenous reserves, national parks, and federal crown land would all be part of the negotiations with the rest of Canada.
Can Alberta separate? Yes. But it would not be seamless or quick. It would be after long and acrimonious negotiations with the rest of Canada. And the result will be a poorer, smaller, less populated, and less politically significant place.
It is more fun to promise a utopia. You get to make cute AI created videos and graphics. But an adult conversation about an issue as serious as separation requires addressing the hardheaded realities. Even if that gets you labelled a fearmonger.
It's also worth asking ourselves: What kind of utopia do the Alberta separatists want to build for themselves?
So far as I can tell, they want a conservative mono-culture. A white Albertan ethno-state purged of immigrants and minorities and anyone who happens to disagree with them or doesn't fit into their idealized and rather fascist view of Albertan life. They don't want to be part of a political community with pluralism, respect for diversity, and a belief in the legitimacy and dignity of minorities. They want to end indigenous rights, and mass deport any and all immigrants they dislike (in other words, all of them). They want to defund and shut down the universities with their pesky liberal tendencies, and force Alberta's diverse and cosmopolitan cities to adhere to their own views. They want to ban abortion and end gay marriage and get women back into the kitchen and pregnant.
To paraphrase George Orwell, their vision is of a vast, brainless empire where, essentially, nothing ever happens except the endless mining for more oil and continual breeding of new generations of oil riggers.
They promise a utopia, but their utopia is actually a dystopia for anyone who doesn't look and act like them.
Thank you. Succinct, clear and objective!