| In the mid-1950s, the province of Alberta's federal political landscape was destabilized by the economy's shift from agriculture to the lucrative oil and gas industry. The movement of people and economic clout from rural regions to urban centers prompted debates on the province's future in the North American market. The federal Social Credit party, which had long dominated Alberta's federal politics, declined as a new challenger, the Progressive Conservative party, reinvented itself to respond to the socioeconomic exigencies of the postwar era. Under federal leader George Drew and provincial leader W.J.C. Kirby, the Alberta Conservatives revitalized their grassroots organization and crafted a new platform that focused on the key issues of energy export and grain marketing policies, which were each rooted in the changing nature of Alberta's economy. This laid the groundwork for the Conservative sweep of 1958, which permanently dislodged Social Credit from its previously privileged position. |
