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This special edition of the Review includes four papers that deal with health care reform in Canada in the 1990-2003 period. The papers are a small sample of some 30 case studies that have been prepared from an ongoing research project entitled Cross-Provincial Comparison of Health Care Reform in Canada (hereafter referred to as either the Cross-Provincial Project or the Project). Among other things, the 30 studies examine the nature and extent of health care reform that occurred during that period and the factors that help to explain why reform did, or did not, occur. The purpose of this introductory paper is three-fold: to provide the rationale and context for the Project; to describe the research methodology used; and to outline some preliminary results. In so doing, it is intended to provide some framework for the remainder of this special edition.

Is there common ground in intergovernmental fiscal relations? This question is tackled by examining the ongoing federal-provincial debate about the most appropriate way to allocate resources among governments and the related issue of vertical and horizontal fiscal imbalance. It turns out that the provinces have found common ground with respect to vertical imbalance and the need to limit Ottawa's spending power. The Equalization program, however, illuminates significant differences not only between Quebec and the western provinces but also among the four western provinces themselves. Fiscal federalism raises too many divisive issues for anyone to hope that these differences can all be settled in the foreseeable future.

Rules, Rules, Rules, Rules: Multilevel Regulatory Governance,
G. Bruce Doern and Robert Johnson, eds., Studies in Comparative Political
Economy and Public Policy; Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006, xi,
372.The first stated purpose of this edited collection is to
"clarify conceptually the nature, causes, and dynamics of regulatory
governance in, or affecting, Canada" in a world where the
international, federal, provincial and local spheres are
"interacting, reinforcing and colliding." The second is to
"contribute practically to the debate on what kinds of principles
and institutional approaches and changes can lessen the problems of
multilevel regulatory governance" (3).