Hope and Fear Revisited: Did the Provincial Election of 2007 Mark the Transition to a Stable Two-Party System in Saskatchewan?

The Saskatchewan election of November 2007 seems to mark a significant break with the past. Lorne Calvert's NDP was decisively defeated by a new political entity, the Saskatchewan Party, under a new and relatively youthful leader, Brad Wall. His defeat, which brought an end to 16 years of NDP rule, was neither unexpected nor catastrophic. The Saskatchewan Party had held a commanding lead in the opinion polls for a year or more before the writ was dropped and Wall protected that lead with a low key, carefully scripted and uncontroversial campaign. While the NDP's share of the popular vote was lower than at any time since the 1930s- marginally lower even than the Grant Devine sweep in 1982 when the party was reduced to a rump of 9 MLAs-the Liberal vote held up just well enough to leave Calvert with 20 members in a 58 seat legislature. However, something unusual and interesting was clearly taking place. Mr. Wall was certainly eager to give this impression. In his victory speech to a packed campaign headquarters in Swift Current, he surprised the party faithful by introducing a new theme in the form of a slogan: "Hope not fear. " While echoing the rhetoric of the Bush administration, it was also a reference to the negative tactics of the outgoing government, which had bought advertising space before the campaign had even begun depicting their opponents as wolves in sheep'