Surveying Opinions Across the Border The Niagara Report Project

Canada and the US are neighbors whose futures are inextricably bound together. Among a host of other things, they share the most important, and most extensive, bilateral economic relationship in the world, and for seventeen years their economies have been integrated in a free trade zone. Surprisingly, in light of the intensity of cross-border connections, no effort has been made to monitor, on a systematic and cross-time basis, the relationship as it is perceived by citizens on either side of the 49 th parallel. This paper introduces such a project ‐ “the Niagara Report”. We discuss several of the methodological and design considerations in fielding such a project. And we present the first results of our surveying of parallel samples of about 1,000 Canadians and Americans in August 2005. We report on their responses to a benchmark series of questions that will be replicated in subsequent years. We hope that this project will add to our understanding of the processes of integration and interdependence as they unfold in the years ahead. * An earlier version of this paper was presented at the Biennial Conference of ACSUS, Millennium Hotel, St. Louis, MO, November 18-21, 2005. The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and have not been endorsed by, and are not reflective of, the position of the Government of Canada.