How does the population density of Canada affect Canadian nationalism?

Answer 1

Because its cold up North & people rather live down south because its warmer.

Canada is a Confederation of many Nations with many cultures. The idea of Canadian nationalism comes from the federal government. They want all members of the Confederation to think of themselves as Canadian first, to identify not with the Nation they are from but the Confederation their Nation is part of. The advantage is one of power and money. If a person identifies with Canada, rather than their own heritage, their own culture and history, it makes if much easier for the federal government to expand it's responsibility and tax base.

Canadian Nationalism is very much an Ontario and Quebec driven concept, they are dominate in the Confederation and were the province of Canada before the Confederation was called Canada. All other Nations joined them, Canada. As a result Canadian Nationalism is defined and promoted primarily by Ontario and Quebec. They consider themselves "real" Canadians and they, more so than others, are promoting Canadian Nationalism.

Low population density makes this more difficult. It is hard to tell people thousands of miles away, from a different Nation, a different culture, who have a different history, live in a different climate, different geography, that they are part of "Canada". Having huge areas of land, land the size of other countries, between large population centres tends to have people develop their own identities, their own way of dealing with the day to day issues.

Another problem is representation. Canada high density areas, which just happens to be most of the areas that see themselves as Canada, do not want to share power, resources, or federal services with a few people thousands of miles away. Supplying services, giving representation to people from a different Nation, a different culture is not something that comes natural to anyone and that includes Canadians.

High population density in Southern Ontario and Quebec combined with low population density in the North and West has made Nationalism a very hard sell.