Month: April 2011

Mapping Political Financing in Montréal

Using the data cleaned and released by Cedric Sam and Thomas de Lorimier (available on Cyberpresse), I geocoded the data and applied a density map function. The map shows interesting financial patterns in Montréal for the Bloc Québecois and for the Liberal Party of Canada. I’ve chosen those two parties since they have a strong historical influence in Montréal. As we can see on the map, the western part of Montréal is clearly Liberal while the east is more aligned with the Bloc Québécois.

The most interesting clusters are on both sides of Mount Royal. One side, situated in Westmount, contributes noticeably to the PLC while the other side, in Outremont, donates more to the Bloc Québec. To anybody living in Montréal, it’s hardly a surprising fact, but I think it’s nice to see it on a map.

Content Analysis of the Leaders' English Debate

Le débat des chefs offre l’occasion de faire des analyses de contenus très intéressantes. En effet, les politiques des partis et les opinions des chefs sont condensées et distillés à l’extrême. Il est donc possible de brosser un tableau impressionniste des préoccupations canadiennes (ou du moins, celle des chefs). Malheureusement, la transcription du débat francophone n’est pas disponible; alors, l’analyse portera sur le débat anglophone.

The leaders’ debate is a golden opportunity to measure the Canadian political landscape as the primary talking points of the leaders and their parties are condensed into a manageable size. Using the transcript of the debate, I used a co-word analysis to try to extract the gist of the debate. I think the resulting maps are interesting and can shed light on current political trends.
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