No prime minister has used the expression “Quebec nation” as much as François Legault.
When the Liberal Robert Bourassa wanted to solemnly evoke the nation, 35 years ago, he spoke of a “distinct society”, a prudish version of the nation. Because the distinct society wanted to go beyond the legal banality of the “province”, but by wearing as many clothes as possible, lest we see its constitutional buttocks.
The PQ prime ministers talked about Quebec, no doubt, a national entity, but a country in the making, in the antechamber of the UN.
In a spectacular reversal that we owe to the Conservatives, the federal government officially recognized the Quebec “nation”, an expression considered quasi-secessionist a generation earlier.
When François Legault speaks of the “Quebec nation” in 2023, it is therefore not the former separatist who is emerging. He is the heir to the tradition of French-Canadian nationalism, which draws from the same sources as the distinct society of Bourassa, the national affirmation of Pierre Marc Johnson, the “beau risque” of René Lévesque, the Quiet Revolution of Jean Lesage, the provincial autonomy of Maurice Duplessis.
By this I mean the strong expression of a national identity, but without breaking the Canadian federal link.
The most recent Léger poll (June 13) shows us that the majority of CAQ voters are not sovereignists. When asked what they would vote for if a referendum on sovereignty were held today, they answered “no” to 50% and “yes” to 39%. The CAQ is really just that: a coalition. François Legault succeeds in satisfying her by balancing on this rallying point: the Quebec nation.
The national question is not the only factor of political choice, of course. Attacks on the integrity of the Liberal government contributed to its downfall. The economic credibility of the Legault government, blessed by a period of full employment, is perhaps even more important.
But if there is a lesson that the Liberals are learning, it is that we cannot aspire to govern Quebec in the long term by acting as if the “national question” was settled, old-fashioned, outdated.
It’s a bit like what Philippe Couillard’s government did: sovereignty was at its lowest, it was an old baby-boomer thing, so we no longer had to worry about national identity, of language, etc. We could finally talk about “real business”. The language question is an existential issue, by definition impossible to “settle”.
Philippe Couillard’s error is to have believed that the collapse of sovereignism was tantamount to the shelving of nationalism – except for Jean-Marc Fournier’s attempt to define nationalist federalism. This party can no longer recover from these years of denial and is still trying to define its nationalism. Which is not the identity nationalism of the CAQ, nor the neoconservative sovereignism of the PQ…
PHOTO JOSIE DESMARAIS, LA PRESSE ARCHIVES
Former Premier of Quebec Philippe Couillard
The case of Québec solidaire is interesting. The Parti Québécois accuses him of not being “really” sovereigntist, and this is not entirely false, even if it is the official position of the party. The same Léger poll indicates that only 35% of QS voters identify as sovereignists, compared to 55% who would vote “no”. It is better not to put too much emphasis on this portion of the program, which is clearly not the electoral engine… Especially since this party is number 1 among 18-34 year olds (by more than 20 points), age group where sovereignty is the least popular (28% “yes”).
I have already written here that I agree with the “Bouchardian” vision, expressed among others in the Bouchard-Taylor report and in the writings of Gérard Bouchard. A kind of progressive middle ground that draws on the historical sources of Quebec, but that combines its myths by making room for First Nations and minorities. A nation that is reinventing itself, looking to the future, in short, instead of cultivating a nostalgic Quebec, fearful of the world to come – and of the world that is coming here.
I’m not sure that’s François Legault’s national vision. But he understood this, deeply, and he is right: we cannot pretend to govern Quebec by ignoring the national question.