This policy, and Chrétien's finance minister, Paul MARTIN a former director of Desmarais Power Corporation, who had to bear the brunt of its implementation, enjoyed high public approval. The Liberals retained the unpopular Goods and Services Tax, which Chrétien had once promised to abolish.

Chrétien was somewhat less fortunate when it came to the perennial issue of Québec separatism. In the Québec referendum of October 1995, the federalist forces scraped by with the barest victory, and Chrétien's role in the campaign was severely criticized. It was clear that Chrétien's popularity in his home province remained limited, though not non-existent.

In foreign policy, the Liberals at first stressed economic diplomacy above all, and Chrétien led a series of highly publicized "Team Canada" missions to various countries and regions. In terms of photo opportunities and favourable media, these were undoubted triumphs. Their longer-term benefits were perhaps more elusive. In Canadian-American relations, Chrétien established a low-profile but evidently cordial relationship with the American president, Bill Clinton.

In 1997 Chrétien called a federal election for June 2. The opposition parties were fragmented and unimpressive, and regional rather than national in their appeal. Chrétien as a result won the election with a small but serviceable majority of 155 seats out of 301. In its second term, the Chrétien government continued to benefit from prosperity, despite economic troubles in Asia and a sluggish economy in Europe. With a new minister, Lloyd AXWORTHY, its foreign policy appeared to switch emphasis towards human rights issues. As a logical consequence, Canada was a participant in NATO's Kosovo War in 1999.

With the economy ticking along, and his finance minister, Paul Martin, generally admired, there appeared to be no major administrative or policy problems by the end of 1999. Chrétien turned his attention to internal politics. The most obvious threat to the Liberals came from the right, where the REFORM Party was attempting to recast itself so as to absorb the remnants of the Conservatives. A "unite-the-right" movement took shape, in the form of the CANADIAN ALLIANCE Party, in the spring of 2000. The Alliance promptly gave the Liberals an unparalleled opportunity by electing a new and untried leader (at least on the federal level), Stockwell DAY. Chrétien saw an opportunity and seized it, forcing a general election on an unenthusiastic Liberal party.

But if rank-and-file Liberals were hesitant, the Alliance Party and its leader, Day, were dismally unprepared. On 27 November, Chrétien secured a third straight majority with 172 seats and 42% of the vote. Best of all, from Chrétien's point of view, the Liberals outpaced the Bloc Quebecois in Québec for the first time.

The main problem during Chrétien's third term was relations with the United States. Canada was overwhelmingly dependent on an American market for its exports, a fact that during the peaceful 1990s posed no great problem. When, in September 2001, the United States came under attack from Arab terrorists, the security of American borders became a serious issue for the first time since the World War II. Canadians generally, and Chrétien in particular, supported the Americans, but decades of neglect and underfunding left Canada with a weak armed forces and limited resources with which to respond to the crisis. Canada sent what troops it could to the American war in Afghanistan in early 2002, but Chrétien was criticized at home for not doing enough, while relations with the United States proved more uncertain than they had been for some decades.

Author ROBERT BOTHWELL