Canada isn't hopelessly divided — but our politicians can always make it worse

As the self-styled "freedom convoy" lay siege to Ottawa in February, interim Conservative leader Candice Bergen told the House of Commons that Canada was "more divided than ever before."

It wasn't quite a new idea. After the 2019 election, then-Conservative leader Andrew Scheer told the House that "deep cracks are showing in Confederation and the prime minister has divided this country like it has never been before."

Many Canadians agree with Bergen — 60 per cent of respondents to a survey conducted by Abacus Data in mid-February said Canada was "more divided than usual."

Two separate polls conducted in March found similar beliefs. According to a survey by the Angus Reid Institute, 82 per cent of respondents said the pandemic had pushed people further apart instead of bringing them closer together.

WATCH: Candice Bergen accuses Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of dividing Canadians

A poll conducted by the Canadian Hub for Applied and Social Research at the University of Saskatchewan found 72 per cent of respondents said the pandemic had divided Canadians, 73 per cent felt the same about last fall's federal election and 75 per cent of respondents said Canada was "more polarized" than it was a year ago.

Even the prime minister acknowledged a need for healing after the convoy left Ottawa. "Look, in the heat of the moment, we can all get carried away trying to win an argument," Justin Trudeau said, perhaps acknowledging that he had pushed some of his own rhetoric too far. "But not every single conversation has to be about winning an argument."

Bergen's concern didn't disappear in the weeks after order was restored to the nation's capital. In her statement responding to the announcement of the Liberal-NDP accord two weeks ago, Bergen said she worried about its potential impact on "political polarization" and "national unity."

It would be a mistake to completely dismiss such concerns. The strain of the last two years shouldn't be underestimated. 

But Canadians may not be as divided as they imagine themselves to be.

It's certainly not the case that this country has never been more divided. Canada's most politically divisive episode likely remains the conscription crisis and the federal election of 1917. And the century since saw many deep conflicts: the October Crisis, the Quebec referendum in 1980, "let the eastern bastards freeze in the dark," the free trade debate, the failures of the Meech Lake and Charlottetown accords, the Oka crisis, the Quebec referendum in 1995.

If nothing else, that list is a reminder that Canada has faced perilous moments in the past and somehow found a way to survive.

The pandemic, more than any recent political issue, may have caused direct and personal conflicts between friends and family members through disputes over health precautions, masking and vaccination. But we risk overstating the degree of division the pandemic triggered.

According to the latest data, 82 per cent of Canadians have received at least two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine — nine points higher than the vaccination rate in the United Kingdom and 16 points higher than the rate in the United States. When the possibility of requiring vaccination in certain settings became a political issue last summer, support for those mandates was similarly high.