Western Alienation in Alberta

Albertans' preoccupation with their sense of place within the Canadian community leads us to western alienation, a sentiment by no means confined to Alberta but which often finds particularly virulent expression within the province. It also leads us to the heart of the constitutional strategies adopted by Alberta governments, strategies which have left their mark on the broader Canadian constitutional landscape. Alberta governments, and particularly those of the last two decades, have pursued two quite different constitutional objectives—the enhancement or at least protection of provincial jurisdiction and the reform of national institutions. Until the early 1980s, the two objectives found expression within a coherent constitutional strategy. In more recent years, however, this strategy has started to unravel as the two objectives have come into conflict with one another.

--Roger Gibbins, "Alberta and the National Community," in Government and Politics in Alberta, ed. Allan Tupper and Roger Gibbins (Edmonton: University of Alberta Press, 1992), 67.