摘要：One approaches a publication of the Fraser Institute with the anticipation that whatever the problem being addressed, the culprit when exposed wil1 inevitably turn out to be too much government interference with freedom of exchange in the market place. Should the reader be sympathetic to this point of view, he wil1look forward with relish to the argument as it unfolds. AIternatively, if not of Iike mind, he would in al1 probability not run the risk of having his prejudices importuned by reading the book in the first place. Judged in this Iight, Canadian Confederation at the Crossroads will be a disappointment to both camps in that the size and ubiquity of government in Canada today is, if anything, accepted as afait accompli, and the only question is how the spoils wil1 be divided between the various levels of government. Not that this is immediately evident, since in the preface the editor, in justifying this col1ection of essays, states: This Fraser Institute study arose from the judgement that much of what is interpreted as separatist sentiment in Quebec, and in the West and in the Maritimes, could weil, in fact, represent a deeply rooted reaction to a rising feeling of alienation from government. The justifiable desire for personal and regional autonomy, it seems, is being increasingly thwarted by the encroachment of an ever larger and ever more remote governmental structure. The purpose of this study was therefore to examine the scope for constructive adaptation to these sentiments within the framework of our existing constitutional structure (p. xiii).
