Independent Alberta?

Is it possible for Alberta to declare independence from Canada with a post-1945 POD?

  • Yes, under the right circumstances

    Votes: 7 43.8%
  • No, not possible at all

    Votes: 9 56.3%

  • Total voters
    16
With a post-1945 POD is it possible for Alberta to become an independent nation? Or is the concept just too far out there?
 
If it happened it'd probably be to Anglosphere conservatives what Sweden is to Anglosphere liberals.
 
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It is only human to react to perceived regional bias on the part of the federal government with a movement for independence. Those Ottawa/Bay Street bastards or whatever. They are also often Quebecois bastards. You can then define your region as Alberta or Western Canada, or Quebec. You would note that at least some of the movement leaders themselves are really quite bastardly themselves, with disgusting beliefs, or their own regional biases such that northern Alberta would tend to favor independence from southern Alberta. I don't have a lot of faith in human nature, or my ability to define "plausibility" . I don't think most Albertans do either.
 
Not at all. Even during the years of the NEP, when Western alienation sentiment was at its peak, there wasn't much serious talk of independence, and that talk would die down after 1984, even though Mulroney's failures kept Western alienation at a high point.
 
I once read an anthologized article by a Quebec PoliSci prof, a sovereigntist who visited Alberta in the early 80s to compare Alberta separatists to the Quebec version. He found that the Albertans, unlike the Quebeckers, had little sense of a positive cultural identity, and were basically just coasting on grievances surrounding federal energy policy.

That same anthology also contained a description of Nick Taylor, the legendary Alberta Liberal leader, speaking on a panel at a separatist rally, and telling the assembled rowdies that they were being used as pawns by Peter Lougheed in his battles with the federal government. Which was probably a pretty accurate description of the situation.

As for hard stats, the Western Canada Concept party won a by-election in 1982, and after a brief season of euphoric anticipation, were completely shut out of the legislature in the subsequent election, winning even less of the popular vote than the NDP. This at the height of western alienation and anti-Ottawa sentiment.

Long and the short, no, I don't think there was ever a serious possibility of Alberta separating. You'd need SEVERELY worsened relations with the federal government than in OTL. As I recall, even the federal Liberals weren't defending the NEP by the time Mulroney shut it down.
 
Going down memory lane...

The guy who ran our local sports-equipment shop in Edmonton was a candidate for the WCC in 1982, their high watermark. When the newspaper ran one of those election articles where they have photos of all the candidates above their policy statements on various issues, the photo this guy had submitted showed him wearing a ball cap and a t-shirt, and looking at the camera with a what I can only describe as a dazed stare.

Not trying to sound like a snob here, since the way I normally dress would hardly be suitable for political campaigning either. The point is, I'd know enough not to dress that way when posing for a campaign photo.
 
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