Our Century: The Canadian Journey

David E. Smith is a professor of political Studies at the University of
Saskatchewan. He is the author of Building a Province: A History of
Saskatchewan in Documents, The Invisible Crown, and Republican Option in
Canada, Past and Present.

The theme of Our Century is the unifying power of history. Even when the
tale is less than flattering, as it sometimes is here (racism and
bigotry are recurring shadows), Bothwell and Granatstein trace the
evolution of a common understanding of what it means to be a modern
Canadian.

The book is a marvel of historical compression, rigorously adhering to
a decade-by-decade account of the highs (mostly) and lows of the century
Laurier prophesied would be Canada’s. Here is a sturdy, sequential
chronology of wars, depression, prosperity, immigration, end of empire,
and more.

Still, periodization allows for little in the way of narrative subtlety
or discrimination. Studies in political sociology, for example, reveal
that events that mould people’s attitudes are less calendrical than
the format of this book might suggest. Generations carry with them the
formative influence of experience.

This dissent may sound like a debating point, but it is fundamentally
an argument about what constitutes a good explanation. Our Century is
eminently satisfying in the grand sweep it offers of the last ten
decades; it is less fulfilling in explaining how events intermingle with
one another.