To use fashionable expressions these days, Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois has decided to “shake the columns of the temple” of Québec solidaire (QS) and he is demanding the powers of a “ top gun ».
The commotion he created by declaring that QS had to transform into a “government party” was such that he did not have to specify the changes in the structure and program of QS that he wished to make, otherwise to say that we should dust off all this. But still ? As always, the devil is in the details, and the internal life of a political party is made up of a multitude of details.
He himself probably does not know how far he can go in this “modernization” without causing a real hemorrhage. Émilise Lessard-Therrien’s romantic vision of political action is shared by many activists for whom the worst thing would be to see QS become an “old party”.
The deputies who gave their support to GND were undoubtedly very happy to be able to plead ignorance. This saved them from compromising themselves before knowing where the wind would blow. They’ll need the activists to get re-elected, so it’s best to be careful.
Where some see “pragmatism”, others will see “compromise”. In their eyes, GND already appears to be a career politician ready to sacrifice the principles of QS to satisfy his ambition. And then, with the same program, didn’t Manon Massé obtain more votes than him in 2018?
GND says it can accommodate the two-headed leadership of QS, which also seems essential in a party whose feminism is a fundamental value. This is not a problem if the female spokesperson is a member of the caucus, as the parliamentary leader, in this case GND, already has authority over her. Émilise Lessard-Therrien would perhaps not have experienced this existential crisis if she had been re-elected in Rouyn-Noranda–Témiscamingue in October 2022.
Faced with a parliamentary wing that includes a dozen elected officials, what weight can a spokesperson who is not a member of parliament have and what should her role be? That of a watchdog responsible for ensuring that the decisions of activists are respected, or that of a simple ambassador of the party, without real influence, like Mme Lessard-Therrien seemed to be among the regions? The election or coronation of Ruba Ghazal, after the interim of Christine Labrie, would allow the question to be avoided.
If the duumvirate is not a problem, what other element of the GND structure would he want to change? Could it be the National Coordination Committee, this famous “politburo” which was held responsible for the failure of the “convergence” of the independence parties, which GND particularly wanted? One thing is certain, the top gun of QS seems to think that he does not have enough free rein.
The program remains. Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois deplores the fact that certain proposals fall within a horizon of four or five mandates, but there is nothing unusual in that. For how many decades has sovereignty been at the heart of the Parti Québécois (PQ) program or has the renewal of federalism appeared, more and more discreetly, in that of the Liberal Party of Quebec? The Coalition Avenir Québec would probably not have enough ten mandates to carry out its autonomist program. This is why, on the eve of an election, each party, including QS, develops a platform that lists the commitments to be kept over the next four years.
Longer-term objectives allow voters to take stock of the profound transformations of society that are planned. Thus, when the QS program talks about nationalization of mines, forests or banks, we understand that the group wants to get Quebec out of the capitalist system, even if it uses the term “to surpass” in this case.
This is obviously likely to put off a large part of the electorate, but is nonetheless the dream of solidarity activists. If GND wants to erase this kind of thing from the program and transform QS into a social democratic party simply more left than the PQ, it will inevitably lose players. How much ? That’s the whole point.
All things considered, the turn he wants to make at QS is reminiscent of the one that Pierre-Marc Johnson wanted to make at the PQ in 1987, by replacing the objective of sovereignty with that of “national affirmation”.
Initially, more than 80% of delegates to a convention supported it and the number of departures was limited. It had, however, been a Pyrrhic victory. The “orthodox” had not disarmed and worked to undermine his leadership. Barely five months later, seeing that this guerrilla war would never end, he threw in the towel, then was replaced by a “true believer” named Jacques Parizeau.