Parting At The Crossroad Summary

Canada and the United States are countries that are known to share some similar attributes, but the question people often ask is why they each possess a different path to health reforms. A universal healthcare system funded by the government in Canada, and a dual-tried system of medicare and medicaid targeted at the poor and elderly in the United States. This essay, will talk about key points from the article “Parting at the crossroad”, why I think the author Maioni is convincing in making her case, and also some Important “take home” messages that I came across from reading and analyzing the article.

First, I will start by identifying some of the key points from this article.The author critically analyzed the policy trends in both countries,

Canada and the United States, to explain the divergence in health policy reforms. (Maioni,1997) identifies that the change in healthcare reforms started in the 1940’s and it happened as a result of the formation of a social democratic third party in Canada.

This article also identifies how the rules of the Canadian Parliamentary government, created an opportunity for the emergence of this social democratic third party that helped to shape the Universal healthcare in Canada, but failed to do so in the United States (Maioni 1997, Pg.413). The reason for the status quo in the U.S, it the inability for a third party to make political decisions due to the influence of the two major parties which is different in the Canadian Institution. (Maioni 1997) adds that a third party in Canada may not be able to form a government, but is able to influence federal policymaking. The federal government in the Canadian intuition is also known to be decentralized, that is, they are not involved in

policymaking decisions such as health policy decisions, which is the work of the provincial government. Whereas in the U.S, the federal government is fully part of the decision making process and this may hinder the formation of a third party at the state government level. To summarize the article, as a result of the different institutional attributes in both countries, Canada was able to create a social democratic third party, which helped to shape the kind of health insurance in Canada right now which is the government-financed universal Healthcare, whereas, made it different from the United States’s.

From reading this article, I believe that Maioni is convincing in making her case.

Through historical evidence and analysis, Maioni has been able to present a reason as to why Canada and the U.S parted in their approach towards health reforms. She implies that the divergence is a result of the evolution of a social democratic third party in Canada which was able to influence health reforms and gave rise to the universal healthcare system. The author carefully analyzed these two countries political system even though they both have the same political cultures unlike other European countries. The author explained how their different political institutional attributes were able to influence their policy output. The Canadian political system, encourages a democratic third party which has led to the development of the government financed healthcare system. Whereas the U.S political system made healthcare reformers to restructure their idea to appeal to a wide Coalition within the democratic party. This led to their parting in terms of health insurance. Also, the article does not contradict with my previous knowledge of Canadian and American politics, this makes it easier for me to believe or agree with the message Maoini is trying to

convey.

Some Important “take -home” messages that I came across from the article include the importance for the federal government to be involved in healthcare decisions and to provide for the basic needs of the people, examples of this are in Canada and the United States. However, it should also be the responsibility of the state to provide a good and quality healthcare system for all its citizens. The government of Canada is able to achieve this goal whereas the U.S has failed because of the different political institutions. The benefits of having a Universal healthcare insurance is that it provides a comprehensive healthcare system which largely satisfies the healthcare needs of the people. The type of healthcare system thats the U.S practices makes it difficult to achieve this due to health inequalities that may be experienced by the elderly and the poor which ironically is the target group for the health insurance system, they receive sub-par treatment because doctors may want to provide full attention to those that are willing to pay, in that way the purpose of the system is defeated and it can not be qualified as good and quality healthcare . Passing the health reforms is not an easy process because of the politics and bureaucracy involved in the process, which will result in debates over the efficiency of funding the healthcare system.
In my opinion, the U.S should emulate some of the better aspects of Canadian politics to make it easier to achieve the goal of a successful healthcare program goal. Also, I think that the U.S would be better served test running prototypes for public health insurance on individual states rather than the entire country thus reducing the risk of a nationwide health system meltdown and insuring that health policies are good for the citizens, and affordable for the government.