Summary: Québec - The Confident Francophone Nation within Canada between Federal Partnership and Sovereignty
Martin Pabst
The Québec-problem has been a constant topic in Canadian politics for 40 years. In spite of many different approaches so far politicians have not been successful in negotiating an acceptable solution concerning the francophone province - within or without the Canadian state. Being one of Canada’s four founder provinces it was dominated by the Catholic Church; the political alignment was conservative and directed against reforms and trade unions.
Only in the sixties the power of the Church was restrained by Jean Lesage’s liberal government. The country was modernized in the course of the Révolution tranquille (the quiet revolution), focussing on social, economical and political matters. In 1968 French was adopted as the second Canadian official language in addition to English. At the same time the first separatist movements of Québec were founded, the Rassemblement pour l’Independence Nationale (RIN), and the Front pour la Libération du Québec (FLQ), which uselessly tried to achieve Québec’s independence.
In the democratic spectrum - the Québec Liberal Party - nationalist tendencies expressed themselves as well. In 1967 the former cabinet minister René Lévesque left and founded the Parti Québecois (PQ) in 1968. A certain orientation towards the left was the distinguishing feature of the Francophone nationalism in Québec represented by him. Two referendums concerning the separation from Canada were lost in 1980 and 1995, the latter, however, was a close shave.
The federal government under the Prime Minister Jean Chrétien (Liberal Party) adopted a different strategy. Québec’s striving for independence was to not be controlled by concessions any longer, but by sterner actions placed by the federal government. Undisguised warnings were directed to Québec. Since 2003 a liberal government has been acting under Jean Charest, who had been the leader of the Canadian Progressive Conservative Party from 1993 to 1998. This government also tries to push additional rights through for Québec in constitutional negotiations.
The lack of a "repressive" central state is undoubtedly a weak spot of the Québecers. In the course of the last years economical topics have pushed the sovereignty problem into the background. If Québec approved of the separation of the north, which is thinly populated by Red Indians and Eskimos, and of the region in the west which is populated mainly by Anglo-Canadians, a referendum for independence would almost certainly be positive. On the other hand, a loss of the energy reserves in the north as well as of the industrial potential in the west would be disastrous for economy.
Irrespective of the results of another possible independence referendum Québec has established itself as a strong political, economical and cultural power, which is internationally perceived. Whether initiatives can be expected from the conservative government - which has been acting since January 2006 - under the Prime Minister Stephen Harper is still up in the air. Considering the past numerous failures all Canadian politicians shrink back from grasping the nettle - the reform of the constitution.
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