By Radio Television Malacañang (RTVM) (source) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
“You have to be swimming with the tide of history,” in order for a policy to withstand the test of time and stay relatively unchanged over the course of subsequent administrations, says Stephen Azzi, associate professor of political management at Carleton University. It has to be things that can’t be immediately repealed, and the timing has to be right, he says.
Historic examples of lasting policies Azzi cites include the major change Trudeau’s father, Pierre Elliott Trudeau, made during his time as prime minister: establishing the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
“I think it has to be dramatic, it has to be something noticeable, so things like tax cuts aren’t the sorts of things that get remembered. Big measures—building a railway, creating a charter of rights—those are the things that tend to be remembered. It has to be big and dramatic instead of tinkering at the edges, and it has to be something that lasts,” says Azzi.