This article analyzes the principal features of industrial policy in the post-war advanced capitalist economies. Industrial policy is defined as a series of discriminatory measures developed by the state to promote industrial growth. Four main directions are outlined: increased financial aid to replace tariff protection; preference accorded to the more concentrated industries, particularly those related to, or in association with, national defense; new interest in the development of peripheral regions; and priority accorded to large corporations.

A number of explanations are proposed for each of these main policies. The common thread running through them is the process of internationalization of production and trade liberalization. These lead each national economy to redefine its role in the global system. The analysis also underlines the ambivalent position of the state vis-à-vis a free market. Capitalist states rely upon the market to assure economic growth. The growth, nevertheless, is accompanied by regional and sectoral disequilibria which can reduce the political legitimacy of the state. This is why the state seeks to regulate growth, with a minimum of social conflict. State intervention is not designed solely to promote the interests of a class of large capitalists, but corresponds at the same time to the logic of capitalist accumulation and the requirements of political legitimacy.

The cybernetic approach used here rests on the concept of the feedback loop. In contrast to the classical models of political science, the perspective adopted here is not oriented toward the construction of a taxonomy, but toward a more advanced formulation of interaction among the elements of a given system. The analysis develops around eight main principal problems: location; information-consultation; institutional constraints; ecology; agriculture; the economy; health; and the controlling agency. Each of these problems is treated as a sub-system of a model which constitutes a simplified replica of the problems which the participants confronted.

The major empirical results of this research are as follows: (1) as expected, the various actors did not pursue the same kinds of regulations; (2) contrary to what one might have expected, the perception of the position of Hydro-Quebec articulated by the groups which contested the project did not question the desired impacts of the state agency; (3) contrary to what one might have anticipated, the contesting groups anticipated effects which were opposite to those expected by Hydro for most of the options considered in the analysis; (4) contrary to an intuitive expectation, the conflict of perceptions between Hydro and the opposition groups did not reach maximum intensity on environmental questions; (5) the positions advanced by the opposing groups did not differ radically from positions taken by Hydro—again contrary to expectations; (6) the interconnections of sub-systems may lead to undesirable consequences, contrary to those one might have anticipated intuitively; (7) the behaviour of the global system is less dependent upon the regulation of sub-systems than upon the network of connections among the sub-systems.

It is generally recognized that the theoretical status of studies on political culture is precarious. But the importance of the latter as a dimension of political societies is such that, despite its gaps, we must continue to use it as an analytical concept. After establishing the elements of a conceptual schema of culture and showing the interaction of political culture and social and political structures, this article offers a number of methodological considerations capable of strengthening empirical research against the biases inherent in functionalism.

The study of social classes in the nineteenth century requires the development of conceptual tools able to explain the impact of the Conquest on the pre-existant social structures in determining transformations of the class structure during the subsequent decades.

This article examines the work done on this question by Marxist writers. The author criticizes certain conclusions which have been drawn and which suggest deficiencies at a theoretical level. The objections relate to the marked tendency of these conclusions to perceive the structural effects of the Conquest in terms of the formation of a double-class structure characterized by “ethnic origins.” Specifically, the author challenges the notion of the division itself, as well as the criterion on which the division is based.

The author proposes that an analysis centred upon the concepts relating to a problem of the transition and linkage of different modes of production permits a more satisfying interpretation, if accompanied by a certain number of considerations of the “upside” and “downside” of the Conquest. To this end, the argument is based on a characterization of New France in terms of the domination of the relations of production of the feudal type and on an analysis of metropolitan centres with intent to evaluate their level of capitalist development at the moment of their respective colonial penetration in Canada. The results of this approach permit one to posit the existence of a single-class structure, characterized principally by the existence of elements connecting diverse modes and forms of production, whose origin reflects the unequal state of economic development in the two metropolitan centres.

The empirical demonstration rests on the census data of 1851–1852 and on the complementary information drawn from the works of historians.

This article first presents a brief survey of the role and functions filled by the personal aide (chef de cabinet) of a minister in Quebec. The analysis continues, in a comparative perspective, by tracing a sociological and professional portrait of the Liberal“chefs de cabinet” in April 1976 and their successors in the pequiste government in July 1977.

We then test the hypothesis that the cleavage between the government and the dominant economic forces has increased since November 15, 1976 as a result of the ideology articulated by the“chefs de cabinet” regarding the social and economic aims of the state. This hypothesis was confirmed.

The hypothesis that the pequiste“chefs de cabinet” exercise a more pronounced influence on the decision-making process is also confirmed. Nevertheless, one cannot argue that the pequiste“chefs de cabinet” usurped the power of the legislators; their influence is more political than technocratic. The growing influence of the pequiste“chefs de cabinet” neverthelsss helps to accentuate the tensions and conflicts between the higher civil service and the ministerial aides.