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The Politics of Nationalism in Quebec

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2011

Hudson Meadwell
Hudson Meadwell
Affiliation:
Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at McGill University
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Abstract

The central argument of this article is straightforward. (1) The contemporary Quebec nationalist movement has moved through phases of mobilization, demobilization, and remobilization. (2) Interpretations of Quebec nationalism do not successfully explain all three phases. (3) A new model of mobilization can provide a more satisfactory account. The goal is to construct a model that is useful for all three phases and that can say something about nationalism and political mobilization more generally.

Type
Research Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 45 , Issue 2 , January 1993 , pp. 203 - 241
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1993

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References

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32 Horowitz (fn. 29), 132. For a more detailed discussion that takes into account the different strategic structures of secessionist movements in the developing world and in the developed West, see Meadwell, Hudson, “Transitions to Independence and Ethnic Nationalist Mobilization,” in Booth, William James, James, Patrick, and Meadwell, Hudson, eds., Politics and Rationality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming).Google Scholar

33 Calhoun, Craig, “The Problem of Identity in Collective Action,” in Huber, Joan, ed., Macro-Micro Linkages in Sociology (Newbury Park and London: Sage Publications, 1991), 51ff.Google Scholar As I hope is clear, I am reluctant to accept this interpretation of the consequences of identity. I have suggested elsewhere that this argument is quasi-functionalist: identity is needed when the barriers to change are so high that they cannot be surmounted without it. See Meadwell (fn. 32). I think the reasoning here is dubious. There is a further conceptual problem. I have suggested that institutions and identity are dual moments of counterhege-mony. Much of the discussion about identity proceeds as if collective identity can be identified independently of the institutional infrastructure of the group. I prefer to think of identity assimply a restatement at a different conceptual level of patterns of group organization and structuration. Identity then becomes a principle of representation in a symbolic field, rather than an independent cause of, or reason for, action. Perhaps we need two-place predicates that include just institutions and practices, rather than three-place predicates extended to include identity.

34 Gunther, Richard, Sani, Giacomo, and Shabad, Goldie, Spain after Franco (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1986), 360Google Scholar; Lancaster, Thomas D., “Comparative Nationalism: The Basques in Spain and France,” European Journal of Political Research 15, no. 5 (1987).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

35 Le Devoir, April 9, 1991, p. A3.

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39 This relative absence of repression has meant that one source of grievance, rooted in the reaction to repression, is less relevant in Quebec. In other cases, authoritarian regimes providea common focus and target that foster a basis for solidarity among diverse kinds of dissent.At the same time, the democratic regime in Canada opens up space for the expression of group identity and nationalist demands. In this pattern, political mobilization in the public sphere is easier, but there is likely greater division within the group over the degree of decentralization to demand.

40 The mixed effects of federalism can also be seen in the Québécois reaction to the failure of the Meech Lake Accord. The symbolic politics of this issue engaged different elements of collective identity. On the one hand, the failure represented an unwillingness on the part of many Canadians to recognize the distinctiveness of Quebec within Canada. On the otherhand, it represented to Québécois the rejection of Quebec's contribution to Canada. See Taylor, Charles, “Shared and Divergent Values,” in Watts, Ronald and Brown, David, eds., Options for a New Canada (Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press, 1991).Google Scholar

41 Bergeron, Gérard and Pelletier, Réjean, L'État du Québec en devenir (The evolving Quebec state) (Montreal: Boréal Express, 1980).Google Scholar There are several interesting similarities between the project of modernization associated with the Quiet Revolution in Quebec and economic modernization in postwar France. Both projects were tied to industrial strategies that were basically statist, growth-oriented, and characterized by increasing sectoral concentration and support for superfirms (“national champions”). Both were dependent on policy networks that linked bureaucrats and business. And both projects have involved important changes in foreign economic policy as economic openness came to be accepted in each case.

42 The interest in establishing provincial jurisdiction in the North was expressed by a provincial cabinet minister prior to the signing of the James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement. “The Agreement has enabled us to accomplish two great tasks to which the government committed itself. It enables us to fulfill our obligations to the native peoples who inhabit our North and to affirm finally Quebec's presence through its entire territory.” Ciaccia, John, Opening Remarks to the Standing Parliamentary Committee of the National Assembly of Quebec convened to examine the Agreement with the James Bay Crees and the lnuit of Quebec prior to its signature, November, 1975, in The James Bay and Northern Quebec Agreement (Quebec: Editeur Officiel du Québec, 1976).Google Scholar

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45 David, Hélène, “La grève et le bon Dieu” (The strike and the good lord), in Harvey, Fernand, ed., Le mouvement ouvrier au Québec (The worker's movement in Quebec) (Montreal: Boréal, 1980).Google Scholar

46 In 1949 there was a wildcat strike that lasted five months in the asbestos mines at Asbestos and Thetford. It engaged the attention and support of a group of intellectuals and trade union activists who would later become key players in the French Canadian political class. They included André Laurendeau, an editor at Le Devoir in the late 1940s, Gérard Pelletier, the reporter for Le Devoir who covered the strike, Jean Marchand, secretary-general of Conféderation des travailleurs catholiques du Canada, and Pierre-Elliott Trudeau, who had recently returned from doing graduate work at the London School of Economics and Ecole des sciences politiques in Paris. The strike was a major impetus for the founding of Cité Libre in 1950, the forum for a liberal critique of traditional French Canadian nationalism. Another line of criticism, expressed for example by Laurendeau, sought to disengage nationalism from the control of the Catholic church (at least from the conservative elements within the church) and from Premier Duplessis. See Behiels, Michael D., Prelude to Quebec's Quiet Revolution (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1985).Google Scholar

47 The federal Bloc québécois, composed primarily of former Conservative members of Parliament from Quebec, may well be a temporary, unstable phenomenon created by the failure of Meech Lake. The party is unlikely to be able to create an activist base of support where local politics are centered in the province, and it may draw support only as a protest vote. This does not mean, however, that it could not have leverage in a hung parliament after the next federal election.

48 Geekie, Jack and Levy, Roger, “Devolution and the Tartanisation of the Labour Party, Parliamentary Affairs 42 (July 1989).Google Scholar

49 Parizeau, Jacques, “Interview,” in Riggs, Austin R. and Velk, Tom, eds., Canadian-American Free Trade: Historical, Political and Economic Dimensions (Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy, 1987),Google Scholar

50 Le Devoir, July 15, 1978; La Presse, January 12, 1981.

51 Tremblay, Réjean, Indépendance et marché commun Québec-Etats-Unis (Independence and a Quebec-United States common market) (Quebec: Editions du Jour, 1970)Google Scholar; idem, “Souveraineté, marché commun, libre-échange” (Sovereignty, common market, free trade), L'Action Nationale 81 (January 1991).

52 Boisvert, Michel, Les implications économiques de la souveraineté-association (The economic implications of sovereignty-association) (Montreal: Les presses de l'Université de Montréal, 1980).Google Scholar

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56 Nationale, Assemblée, débats, Journal des, Commission sur l'Avenir Politique et Constitu tionnel du Québec (Commission on the political and constitutional future of Quebec) (Bélan-ger-Campeau Commission), November 1990, 3:140.Google Scholar

57 Ibid., December 11, 1990, 18:1261.

58 This is implied in the way Parizeau places the issue of free trade in the context of a referendum: “Once a free trade area in North America has been set up, no premier of other provinces could come to Québec in the midst of a referendum campaign and say, ‘If you vote this way, no commercial deal with us.’ I suppose we'd say, ‘It really doesn't matter, old boy.’” Parizeau (fn. 49).

59 Deposition from the Coopérative fédérée du Québec (Federal cooperative of Queb Commission sur l'Avenir Politique et Constitutionnel du Québec, December 11, 1990, 18:128

60 Ibid., December 11, 1990, 18:1297. Deposition from the Association provinciale de dustrie du bois ouvré du Québec (Provincial association of the woodworking industr Quebec).

61 The Globe and Mail Report on Business, April 1991. There is some reason for cau because the support for sovereignty-association is likely inflated. The survey polls subscri to Affaires Plus, a business magazine. Not all subscribers are businesspersons, and many have owned small businesses.

62 La Presse, November 24, 1991, p. A9; La Presse, November 23, 1991, p. A2.

63 Most importantly, this evidence probably does not pick up the full effects of production for the American market. However, four of the associations are large and diversified enough for many of their members to have American markets. A more detailed analysis would take into account the fact that some of these associations are sectoral, while others are multi-sectoral.

64 McCallum, John and Greene, Christopher, Parting as Friends: The Economic Consequences for Quebec (Toronto: C. D. Howe Institute, 1991).Google Scholar

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66 I have not discussed the consequences of varying levels of difference between Y and some preferred level of support. So I would argue that the model can hold at different levels of difference. The recruitment history of the organization and the history of the stability of political preferences in the group may be more important than the size of the difference.Even when the gap between Y and some target level of support is large, purists may resist ideological change (and carry the day within the organization) when the history of the group is punctuated by periods of preference volatility and dealignment. When the gap is small, even purists may tolerate some recruitment based on the modification of the political program, when the organization has had a relatively constant level of support for some time and the group has demonstrated relatively stable political preferences.

67 This result assumes no protest vote for the party in Y*. This could be taken into account with no loss in generality.

68 Murray, Vera, Le Parti québécois: de la formation à la prise du pouvoir (The Parti québécois: From formation to the seizure of power) (Montreal: Hurtubise: HMH, 1976).Google Scholar

69 Hamilton, Richard and Pinard, Maurice, “The Quebec Independence Movement,” in Williams, Colin H., ed., National Separatism (Vancouver and London: University of British Columbia Press, 1982), 219.Google Scholar See also the comprehensive review of polls and survey results in Cloutier, Guay, and Latouche (fn.18).

70 Hamilton and Pinard (fn. 69), 211, Table 1.

71 Levy, Roger, Scottish Nationalism at the Crossroads (Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1990).Google Scholar

72 Meadwell, Hudson, “Nationalism and Rationality” (Manuscript, McGill University, 1993).Google Scholar

73 Monahan, Patrick, Meech Lake: The Inside Story (Toronto and London: University of Toronto Press, 1991), 267.Google Scholar

74 Ibid., 20; Fournier, Pierre, A Meech Lake Post-Mortemy, trans. Fischman, Sheila (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press, 1991), 4Google Scholar; Courchene, Thomas J., “Forever Amber,” in Smith, David E., MacKinnon, Peter, and Courtney, James C., eds., After MeechLake: Lessons for the Future (Saskatoon, Sask.: Fifth House Publishers, 1991), 33.Google Scholar

75 Gagnon and Montcalm (fn. 25), 158.

76 Cairns, Alan C., “The Charter, Interest Groups, Executive Federalism and Constitutional Reform,” in Smith, MacKinnon, and Courtney (fn. 74), 16.Google Scholar

77 Gagnon and Montcalm (fn. 25), 159.

78 Russell, Peter H., Knopff, Rainer, and Morton, Ted, Federalism and the Charter (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1989), 708.Google Scholar

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80 Cairns (fn.76).

81 The 1982 Constitution Act allowed withdrawal with compensation only with respect to eduation and “other cultural matters.” The Meech Lake Accord would have extended this possibility to all jurisdictional transfers from the provinces to the federal government. Imbeau, Louis, “Voting Games and Constitutional Decision: The 1981 Constitutional Negotiation in Canada,” Journal of Commonwealth and Comparative Politics 28 (March 1990), 93.Google Scholar

82 For Quebec's point of view on the November 1981 constitutional talks, see Morin, Claude, Lendemains piégés: du referendum à la nuit des longs couteaux (Ambushed future: From the referendum to the night of the long knives) (Montreal: Borélal, 1988).Google Scholar

83 This point needs more discussion than can be provided here. One interpretation suggests that the Gang of Eight broke apart because Quebec had no sincere interest in an agreement. When the other provinces in this group had an opportunity to make a deal that would produce an agreement, they took it because they preferred a deal to no agreement at all. Another interpretation suggests that Quebec had a sincere interest in the proposal of the Gang of Eight but was unable to convince the others of their sincerity; Imbeau (fn. 81). The argument for insincerity on the part of Quebec in the first interpretation is the argument for uncertainty among the other provinces in the second interpretation. Both depend on the fact that the Quebec government supported sovereignty-association. This can account for both why they were insincere, preferring no agreement at all, and why it was difficult to convince others that they were sincere.

84 Monahan (fn. 73), 26.

85 Since this limited veto arose in a section expanding the number of items requiring unanimous consent, it meant that the other provinces would have had the same veto as Quebec.

86 The likelihood of ratification declined sharply in December 1988, when Bourassa used the notwithstanding clause to override a Supreme Court decision that held that provincial legislation on public language use violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

87 Monahan (fn. 73), 27.

88 The aboriginal peoples are now key participants in Canadian constitutional politics.Generally, they opposed both the “distinct society” definition of Quebec in the absence of similar recognition for their communities and the language of the accord that referred to French-and English-speaking Canadians as “a fundamental characteristic of Canada.” They have also exploited the use by Quebec of the right to self-determination as a legitimating convention by broadening the extension of this right to their communities. Aboriginal politics played a very direct role in the failure of Meech Lake. In the process of ratification in Manitoba, the government needed unanimous consent in the legislature to hold a series of public hearings. A native member of the provincial legislature voted against the motion to send the issue to a committee for public hearings.

89 La Presse, June 21, 1990, pp. A1–A2.

90 Ibid., November 26, 1990, pp. A1–A2.

91 Le Devoir, April, 1991.

92 Globe and Mail, April 22, 1991, pp. A1–A5.

93 Bourassa is required to hold a referendum by October 26, 1992, and must table a question in the National Assembly by September 9, 1992, either on Quebec sovereignty or constitutional offers from the rest of Canada. A postponement would require debate and a vote in the National Assembly. It is clear that Bourassa would prefer a referendum on constitutional proposals from Canada.

94 However, as the recession deepened since the failure of Meech Lake, Parizeau acknowledged in an interview in the late spring of 1992 that he would prefer a referendum “in a year or two,” because he expected the Quebec economy to be in an upturn by that time. He was confident enough, however, to have supported the circulation of a provincewide petition demanding a referendum as scheduled for the fall of 1992, as a means of continuing to pressure Bourassa. There is therefore an interesting dilemma built into the time horizons of federalists and indépendantistes as they consider the joint effects of the failure of Meech Lake and the economic recession: each of these factors pushes them in different directions. For the federalists, an ideal time for a referendum would be long enough after Meech Lake for its symbolic effects to be weakened, but not so late that the referendum is held in a period of economic expansion.

95 If a referendum on sovereignty is held and sovererignty is supported, Bourassa may have a fallback. He may be able to accept this statement of the attitudes of Québécois and argue that the provincial Liberal Party is simply the best choice of party to lead Quebec (part of the way) out of confederation and also the most suitable party of government in a politically independent Quebec.

96 As of August 3, 1992, it appears that the federal government will present a constitutional package designed to satisfy a wide range of territorial and nonterritorial interests in the early fall of 1992, and there is a strong possibility that a national referendum on these constitutional reforms will follow. Aside from the question of Quebec's status, the constitutional proposals include a reformed Senate (designed to placate the Western provinces), a commitment to aboriginal self-government, and a social charter.

97 Le Devoir, July 17, 1990, p. 2; Le Devoir, February 2, 1991, p. 1.

98 Interview with Liberal youth activist, March 1991.

99 Le Devoir, June 30, 1990, p. A1; Le Devoir, November 17, 1990, p. A3.

100 In an April 1991 poll commissioned by the Toronto Globe and Mail and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, 76 percent of the sample of respondents from the rest of Canada said “no” to the question, “Should the rest of Canada agree to give Quebec some powers that the other provinces would not have if that's what it takes to keep Quebec within Canada?”

101 Cairns, Alan C., “The Charter, Interest Groups, Executive Federalism and Constitutional Reform,” in Smith, MacKinnon, and Courtney (fn. 74)Google Scholar; and idem, “Political Science, Ethnicity, and the Constitution,” in Shugarman, David P. and Whitaker, Reg, eds., Federalism and Political Community (Peterborough, Ont.: Broadview Press, 1989).Google Scholar

102 Meadwell (fn. 32).

103 The final draft of this article was completed on August 3, 1992.