The CAQ is a non-traditional party which succeeded in making two of the great parties of power in Quebec almost obsolete, and which swallowed Mario Dumont’s ADQ, this third way which had surprised without succeeding in imposing itself. The CAQ is in a way its successful mutation.
It is however a very conformist party. Breaking the ban with the usual parties, but which manufactures the ordinary by the shovelful. We did not see it coming, nor settling in, and yet, on October 3, we [avons assisté] to a Caquiste tsunami. And this, despite a more than questionable six-month curfew, pre- (and post-) election gift certificates with Duplessis overtones, despite the drama national around a possible “Louisianization” of Quebec, despite an obstinacy to promote the third link to Quebec against the most elementary reason.
The caquist paradoxes
The Coalition nevertheless presents many paradoxes. She has the socially acceptable audacity. She advocates change in continuity. It quickly became, from 2012, the party of the suburbs, crowns, regions. The CAQ is rooted in the territory, in Quebec real — as if Montreal had been unreal: too much of this, not enough of that, actually not enough Quebec…
The CAQ is rooted, and yet it floats above the history of Quebec, neither the past nor the future really interests it. She has her nose glued to the present, in a manner of “courtesy”. The CAQ appears, by its language, its proposals, its good-natured aspect, as a simple and accessible party. However, it is not a party with a clear and limpid line. The CAQ excels in clouding reality. There are layers of meaning in the assertions of the prime minister and his ministers that sometimes contradict each other; one thing and its opposite, whether it is about the extremely confused and variable notion of nationalism or about the endless mess that is the question of the third link in Quebec.
The CAQ introduces confusion into the discourse: it is politics against science, emotion against public health. For some, this tension simply reflects the fact that the party is a coalition, where all ideological shades are recognized and heard. For my part, I see in it the sign of troubled, unfinished thought.
The warm center
The CAQ stands out as THE party of the center (even if some position it rather on the right), occupying all the space, while the traditionally center or center left parties, the PLQ and the PQ, are falling apart. The ends of the spectrum, they see formations arise, QS on the left, and the PCQ fiercely camped on the right. For a short decade, the political scene has been reconfigured, parties and ideas that we thought were stainless are seeing their clientele reposition themselves.
Many citizens disillusioned with traditional politics no longer go to vote, suspicious of elites and parties, and find their happiness in the margins and interstices of democratic life, in more or less formal movements of protest, as we have seen. found during the pandemic. In this effervescent climate of open defiance, mistrust and rage, the CAQ, calm and reassuring, surfs on a nationalism of minimum service, speaks the language of the people. She takes her equal gas. […]
This government, apparently so close to the reality of the middle class, close to the people, is in truth a government of communication, in the advertising sense of the term, with an extraordinary nose for the ordinary. The Caquiste administration gives itself the air of good casual, seems driven by common sense, even if it means regularly making amends about some of its positions, to adapt. But basically, it works according to the principle of painting by numbers, the course following the polls.
The time is at broil, but the CAQ is lukewarm. Calculator. She can choose to set fire to the powder in full knowledge of the facts, for example with Bill 96 — which defends itself perfectly in its function of reaffirming and consolidating the Francophone fact in Quebec, but whose details are irritating immoderately.
And in this stubbornness of the CAQ to defend the details that annoy, despite the warnings of several observers, we can read a complacency, a way of feeding the extremes of all allegiances. By fueling the opinions and the most heated factions on various subjects (Law 96 is only the most telling example), the CAQ stands out as a symbolic place of comfort, appeasement and reason for majority. It fights disorder and becomes like a rampart, while the extremes make their bed in chaos.
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