Maîtres chez nous – Part 2: An Essay on Post-1995 Quebec-Federal Policy
Photo by Adrien Olichon on Unsplash
Photo par Adrien Olichon sur Unsplash
Boris Kyrychenko
(FR) En examinant l’histoire plus récente du fédéralisme canadien en ce qui concerne le nationalisme québécois, cet article avance que depuis le référendum de 1995 sur la souveraineté, le gouvernement fédéral canadien a cherché à diminuer l’attrait du séparatisme québécois en évitant le fédéralisme mégaconstitutionnel de Trudeau et Mulroney (qui ont échoué à résoudre la question du Québec). Le gouvernement canadien a plutôt fait des compromis sur certaines demandes historiques des nationalistes et a modifié le fédéralisme de Trudeau, en faveur d’un fédéralisme plus asymétrique dans un contexte néolibéral.
“What is at stake is our heritage. To break up Canada or build Canada. To remain Canadian or no longer be Canadian. To stay or to leave. This is the issue of the referendum.”[1] This was the last-minute plea for national unity delivered by the then-prime minister Jean Chrétien, who on October 1995, was forced to deal with what was arguably the height of Québécois separatism in the 20th century. The 1995 referendum on Quebec sovereignty eventually resulted in a defeat of the separatists by the slimmest of margins, and became the culmination of a decades long national drama that began with Quebec’s Quiet Revolution in 1960. Since then the political desire for separatism has gradually waned, with even former separatist Parti Québécois leader Pauline Marois acknowledging that “support for the PQ has been eroding since 1994.”[2] And while it is difficult to determine exact causes, what is evident is the response of the federal government to the results of the 1995 referendum, and how the government has sought to diminish the appeal of Québécois separatism since. One can argue that Ottawa has learned from the mistakes of previous governments, notably those of the late Pierre Elliot Trudeau and Brian Mulroney who attempted some compromise and even a reimagining of Canadian federalism built on accommodation and multinationalism. Thus, since the 1995 referendum, the federal government has sought to diminish the appeal of Québécois separatism by avoiding the mega-constitutional federalism of Trudeau and Mulroney (which failed to resolve the Quebec question). It has also compromised on certain historical demands of the nationalists and instead altered Trudeau’s federalism in favor of a more asymmetrical federalism in a neoliberal context.
Before understanding the failure of mega-constitutionalism and the subsequent federal government’s response to Québécois separatism post-1995, one must first establish some brief historical context to the rocky relationship between Quebec and the rest of Canada. While not all French Canadians reside in Quebec (notably Acadians and Franco Ontarians), it is Quebec which finds itself as the only remaining French majority region in North America. Quebec is thus an island of francophones, surrounded by a continent of anglophones.[3] This situation has fueled decades, if not centuries, of fear of the loss of culture, religion, and language at the hands of anglophone Canada. This fear is oftentimes justified by statistics, as the proportion of French language speakers in Canada has dropped from the high-watermark of 29.3% in 1941, to just 21% of the total population in 2016.[4] Additionally, Québécois society developed quite differently from the rest of Canada, and has even been referred to as a ‘feudal fragment’, before the modernization and secularization of the Quiet Revolution.[5] It is for this reason that a young Trudeau proclaimed, in 1958, that: “French Canadians must begin to learn democracy from scratch,”[6] an idea which very much influenced his approach to federalism, and how he chose to deal with Québécois nationalism.
When trying to fix a problem, it is often just as important to know what does not work as it is to know what does. This logic applies to the federal government’s learning from past mistakes, and its avoiding a repeat of the failed mega-constitutional federalism of Trudeau and Mulroney. When Trudeau took power in 1968, he had to deal with an unprecedented rise in Québécois nationalism, thanks to the Quiet Revolution which was transforming and modernizing 1960s Quebec. To tackle this looming crisis, Trudeau went about redefining the role of federalism, arguing that in order for a federalist vision to be successful in Canada: “…the whole of the citizenry must be made to feel that it is only within the framework of the federal state that their language, culture, institutions, sacred traditions, and standard of living can be protected from external attack and internal strife.”[7] Hence, Trudeau’s vision was to try to create a pan-Canadian identity on the federal level which would eventually overpower smaller regional identities, such as being Québécois. This policy of ‘Canadianization’ included everything from less British symbolism on mailboxes and stamps, to switching the national anthem from ‘God Save the Queen’ to ‘O Canada’.[8] In addition, Trudeau’s pan-Canadian strategy needed to tackle the language cleavage, which resulted in the creation of the Official Languages Act in 1969, which transformed the federal government into an officially bilingual institution.[9] Yet despite these changes, Trudeau’s vision had many flaws. The most important flaw by far was the uniform treatment of all provinces as equals, which gave no favoritism or exceptionalism to Quebec, despite its cultural distinctness from the anglophone provinces. This is the reason why, despite winning the 1980 referendum with 60% of the Québécois voting against ‘sovereignty association’, Trudeau’s post-referendum mega-constitutionalism failed to win over the Québécois.[10] This is especially evident in the 1982 controversial repatriation of the constitution from Britain, which caused a great deal of political drama that eventually ended with the repatriation of the constitution without the approval of Quebec and Trudeau’s political rival, René Lévesque. This was seen as a betrayal by Ottawa, to the point that even the Quebec Liberal Party, along with the rest of Quebec, would refuse to officially recognize the 1982 reforms,[11] and Quebec never officially accepted the 1982 constitution and subsequent charter.[12] In other words, while the constitutional federalism of Trudeau helped Canada survive the 1980 referendum, it ultimately failed to reconcile Quebec with the rest of Canada, and simply pushed the political and legal tensions down to road to the next generation of politicians, the generation of prime minister Brian Mulroney and Quebec prime minister Henri Bourassa.[13]
The mega-constitutionalism of Mulroney was an even greater failure than that of Trudeau, as it resulted in two failed constitutional accords and another referendum, which the federalist side nearly lost. After being elected in 1984, Mulroney began preparing for a second referendum by working with Quebec’s Henri Bourassa on a constitutional reform which would add Quebec’s ‘distinct society’ clause to the constitution.[14] This distinction was very important to the Quebec nationalists, as it would have many far-reaching implications such as increasing Quebec’s constitutional powers. This reform became known as the Meech Lake Accord of 1987. This accord, which was meant to bring Quebec back into the constitutional fold with the rest of Canada, ended up doing the opposite. It aggravated many anglophone Canadians and supporters of federal powers, who were worried that Quebec would receive too much special treatment.[15] Despite being popular in Quebec, it failed to pass in other provincial legislatures, thus killing the Accord, and the federal conservatives began to fracture into regional parties such as the Bloc Québécois, a separatist party which would eventually become the official opposition in Parliament.[16] Thus, instead of unifying Canada, the Meech Lake Accord worsened Canadian divisions along linguistic lines, and forced the Mulroney government to try another accord.
This second mega-constitutional failure became known as the 1992 Charlottetown Accord, which was a more publicized attempt at constitutional reform by the Mulroney government, which by then was deeply unpopular.[17] This became known as the ‘Canada Round’ of constitutional reform, as it contained a plethora of constitutional amendments pertaining to many provinces and interest groups, such as the aboriginals.[18] Regardless, its main purpose was still to provide closure to the constitutional conundrum of 1982.[19] However, this time around, to make the process more democratic, the accord was to be decided by a national referendum. This ended up backfiring on the government as many came out to vote against the accord (especially in Quebec) and the political fallout from this failed referendum was immense.[20] The already unpopular Mulroney was forced to retire, the Bloc Québécois became the official opposition in Ottawa, and Quebec nearly voted to separate in 1995. Thus, the mega-constitutional reforms attempted by Brain Mulroney, while they might have seemed necessary at the time, ended up harming national unity, further alienating Quebec, and not solving any constitutional problems. It is for these reasons that no government since those of Trudeau and Mulroney has attempted to reopen any constitutional debates in Canada, and instead they have opted for more practical, reconciliatory approaches.
This reconciliatory approach by the federal government has been to compromise on some of the historical demands of the nationalists, in an attempt to reduce separatism in Quebec. Some of these demands are for limits on federal spending power and provincial control over immigration.[21] The most important of these demands however, has been the recognition of Quebec as a nation and a distinct society within Canada. This demand was partially met after the referendum, when Chrétien called on: “all members of the House to support the motion of the government, which wants the House of Commons to recognize Quebec as a distinct society within Canada.”[22] While it was not as binding as a constitutional reform, this law was passed by Parliament. This was also reaffirmed by later governments, such as the government of conservative prime minister Stephen Harper, who in 2006 declared before Parliament that: “Mr. Speaker…. The question is a straightforward one: do the Québécois form a nation within a united Canada? The answer is yes.”[23] Once again, while the motion was not a constitutional amendment, it was still a significant and symbolic act in which Parliament officially recognized Quebec’s distinctiveness.[24] The latter recognition was also followed up by another compromise from the Harper government, which addressed the nationalist’s desire for international recognition. This included assistance in establishing a formal role for Quebec in UNESCO, despite international organizations traditionally being a domain of the federal, and not provincial, governments.[25]
In addition to the recognition of Quebec as a distinct society, another post-1995 concession by Ottawa has been the withdrawal of federal spending power. This has been a point of concern for nationalists, mostly because Ottawa has often used its greater spending power to influence concessions within traditionally provincial domains such as healthcare and education.[26] This exercise of federal soft power on Quebec has been gradually limited and reduced since 1995. This can be seen by some of the policy approaches of the Paul Martin government, which created new social programs relating to youth allowances and student loans in Quebec. The Quebec government was given the independence to operate the program on its own, while maintaining the same level of funding as other provinces.[27] A similar special arrangement can be seen in the First Minister’s agreement on Health Care in 2004, and the use of employment insurance funds for parental leave in 2005.[28] With that being said, federal spending is not always met with disdain, as exemplified by the 2.3B dollar increase in transfers to Quebec by the Harper government in 2007.[29] Thus, since 1995, the federal government has attempted to compromise on some of the demands of Québécois nationalists, by recognizing Quebec as a distinct society and by recognizing their grievances regarding federal spending. All these actions are part of a reimagining of federalism in the Canadian political system, in order to promote national unity in Quebec.
This reimagining of the mega-constitutionalism of the past, within a neoliberal economic context, into a new, asymmetrical federalism, is Ottawa’s attempt to accommodate Quebec instead of integrating it. In other words, the world has changed drastically since the 1990s, with Canada undertaking many neoliberal reforms such as the signing of NAFTA which went into effect in 1994. [30] This economic rearrangement has helped push the federal government into a policy of asymmetrical federalism, which means that while all provinces are subject to the same constitution, certain provinces (Quebec) are allowed certain privileges, if not outright exceptions.[31] The aforementioned policies of the Martin government are prime examples of this type of accommodating federalism. Furthermore, as mentioned in the UNESCO case, this federalism has accommodated nationalist desires for international legitimacy, such as in the case of the 2001 Summit of the Americas being hosted in Quebec City.[32] And while this perceived favoritism is understandably unpopular with anglophone provinces, it has given many nationalists an alternative to outright separatism. An alternative that is within the federalist framework; an alternative so seducing it has even pushed the Bloc Québécois to change its focus from sovereignty to merely advocating for Québécois interests in Ottawa.[33] Furthermore, as Canada underwent neoliberal reforms, there was a significant reduction in federal spending towards social policies run by provincial governments, which in the case of Quebec, gave the Québécois much needed autonomy and fiscal independence in regard to how they run their programs.[34] Thus, the asymmetrical and later fiscal federalism of the Chrétien and Martin governments has helped considerably reduce many economic tensions between Ottawa and Quebec, and helped increase provincial power in relation to federal power, a trend which continued under Harper’s open federalism.
Harper, whose government embraced open federalism within Canada, continued down a similar path of accommodation and gave away even more federal power to provincial governments. This was done with the belief that more decentralized decision-making would empower the less radical nationalists and weaken the threat of separatism.[35] This seems to have worked, with Quebec subscribing very much to this type of provincial-federal relationship. A good example of is Quebec using the no-strings attached Green Initiatives Fund created in May 2009, which gave federal assistance to broad environmental projects that are considered priorities by municipal and provincial governments.[36] After nearly a decade of this type of ‘open’ federalism, the political feasibility of a resurgent Quebec independence movement has hit all-time lows.[37] In combination with a rise in neoliberalism across the provinces and Ottawa, it becomes clear that while not perfect, tensions between Quebec and Ottawa have been reduced, and that asymmetrical and open federalism is a federalism which might actually work for the Québécois, and tame their sovereigntist passions.
To sum up, by altering Trudeau and Mulroney’s constitutional federalism in favor of a more asymmetrical federalism, compromising on certain historical demands of the Quebec nationalists and by avoiding a repeat of mega-constitutional federalist drama, the federal government has successfully diminished the appeal of Québécois separatism. These policies can therefore be considered a success, in the sense that as of 2020, Quebec is still part of Canada. And while some may argue that these post-referendum policies have been less than perfect, for example, French language use outside Quebec continues to decline as previously stated, at the end of the day, Quebec remains part of the Canadian federal dream. Indubitably, much more is needed to be done, especially in respect to official bilingualism, preventing a future alienation of Quebec, and improving Québécois economic prosperity. But for now, considering the track record of oppressed peoples across history, the Canadian experiment is one which many in the world could learn from.