Cultural imperialism has taken on many faces through the ages, but never will it have seemed so sprawling and deadly as in the field of digital platforms where a handful of giants rule the roost. We should be delighted with the recent combativeness of the Minister of Culture and Communications, Mathieu Lacombe. His conference at the Council of International Relations in Montreal, Friday, crossed duty of memory and duty of continuation in an alloy which betrays a salutary change of tone.
We concede that the heyday of Robert Bourassa’s cultural sovereignty is behind us. In front of the Netflix, Spotify and YouTube of this world, there she is repeatedly crushed, denied to her very face. How can we compete with giants who evolve on the margins of our sensibilities, without limits and without constraints, a fortiori on a terrain where we, ourselves, have our hands and feet tied by a number of duties and obligations? This is the thorny question to which the four aces that the minister has called for reinforcements will have to answer.
The mandate of this group of experts is open, and that is a good thing. He will thus be able to move all the stones: laws, regulations, agreements with the federal government or internationally, financial levers, tax credits, discoverability, lark! Everything can be reviewed, improved or invented, with the sole obsession of protecting access to Quebec culture in the digital age. Never before had such a mandate been the object of such ambition in Quebec. The Legault government is finally taking the digital scarecrow head on.
The roadmap of the quartet chosen by Mr. Lacombe aligns expertise that commands admiration. Professors Véronique Guèvremont and Patrick Taillon are luminaries. Former flamboyant minister, Louise Beaudoin was also delegate general of Quebec in Paris like Clément Duhaime who, for his part, made the heyday of the International Organization of La Francophonie (OIF) as an administrator.
Both played — and excelled — in politics and diplomacy. We owe them many good cultural hits of the early 2000s, here and abroad. If they can tap into the spirit that presided over these essential fights, Mme Beaudoin and Mr. Duhaime will face a reputedly indomitable hydra that has grown considerably. The lighting of a handful of great digital clerics from the new generation of cultural battlers seems essential.
This will help compensate for the moderate, or even absent, appetites of our allies on this file. On the international scene, negotiations at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development for a tax on digital giants are stalling. In February, they were even declared deadlocked. In Paris, the OIF welcomed its new administrator against a background of crisis.
The GAFAMs can sleep soundly. Pronouncing digital Francophonie” every two sentences to draw out an action plan woven with good intentions, as we did at the most recent Francophonie summit, will not be enough. The climate seems paradoxically more promising in Ottawa, where Bill C-11 has just been adopted, which will force these giants to contribute to the Canadian cultural ecosystem.
This is a major step forward, conceded Minister Lacombe, taking the trouble to specify that his objective is not “to oppose the work done by Ottawa”, but rather “to improve it”. His outstretched hand to the Minister of Heritage would be almost touching if we did not know how little the Trudeau government disregards the hopes and desires of the CAQ government. Ditto for its skills, judging by Bill C-18 on online communication platforms, which ventures into media territory hitherto unexplored by the federal government by involving newspapers in the field of action of the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Council.
Minister Lacombe knows this all too well. Again in February, he was storming because his colleague from Heritage did not deign to acknowledge receipt of his legitimate request to provide for a “compulsory and official consultation mechanism of the Government of Quebec” in the application of C-11. Additional locks adapted to our minority Francophone culture are nevertheless vital.
It is not for nothing that Mr. Lacombe took the trouble to add that “it is out of the question that the future of Quebec culture will be decided in Ottawa” and that Quebecers cannot afford “to ‘mere spectators’ in this debate. We plussoie, our collective future in French depends on it.
In doing so, the minister himself names the elephant in the room. Quebec may multiply committees, tax credits and other financial levers, toughen its laws, multiply agreements and claim again and again and on all platforms, it will always miss the essentials. The ultimate remedy here is again the repatriation of full powers in culture. Nothing less.