The Ghettoization of Quebec?

The Ghettoization of Quebec?

“It's not always clear where a healthy patriotism shades into a dangerous nationalism”.

Ross Douthat, New York Times Columnist

The laws of physics are that when a pendulum swings from one extreme, it goes to the other, not to the center.

I remember in the 1960’s my dad commenting that, in his office, when 9 out of 10 people at a meeting were Francophones and one was an Anglophone, only English was spoken.

From the early 1970’s, successive Quebec governments passed increasingly draconian laws not only making French Quebec’s sole official language, but also curtailing the rights of its significant English minority.

Increasingly, the pressure was on Anglophones to leave Quebec. The first major emigration took place in 1976 when the separatist Parti Quebecois took office. Many businesses and professionals left Montreal for Toronto and converted the latter into the country’s new economic and business capital.

Two referenda on independence did little to create business confidence in the province, and its economy suffered for years.

The main objective of the nationalists who governed was to make the French language paramount and to curtail the learning and usage of English. This also ensured that Francophones had limited opportunities to learn English – the language of global commerce and diplomacy – and that only the elites who could afford to send their children to private or out of province schools could give them the language skills that they would need to prosper in an increasingly globalized economy.

After years of whittling away at minority language rights by successive governments, the swing of the nationalist pendulum reached a radical stage during the past few months with two major developments.

First, the Quebec government raised out of province tuition fees at its universities by 30%, affecting primarily McGill University and Concordia University. Both are English language Universities located in Montréal which, unlike the rest of the province, is a cosmopolitan city with a rich history of attracting foreign students and students from other parts of Canada.

This will impact enrollment and not only deprive these universities of an excellent source of operating income, but also deprive both universities of the cosmopolitan atmosphere that I and many others enjoyed. In my experience, foreign students enriched my worldview in ways that no university course could replicate.

These benefits will be lost should out-of-province Canadian and foreign students find other alternatives where their presence is not restricted by arcane language laws or higher costs. What’s more, these same students either stay in Quebec to contribute to its growth or leave taking with them a favourable disposition that can be beneficial to the province as their careers develop – they become ambassadors for Quebec!

Second, the government is about to pass a law that would require manufacturers to put all labels in French on their products. This would include appliances, food products, hardware and software, and other consumer goods.

According to Elaine Elbogin, a Montreal based intellectual property lawyer, this means that many different types of consumer goods may no longer be available in Quebec and, ultimately, it's the Quebec consumer who is going to pay the price with product shortages, service delays, delivery delays, higher prices, less competition on the market.

Why?

The current Quebec government is nationalist and facing increasing criticism for a dysfunctional education system and a medical system in decay.

Rather than address these problems, it has decided to distract the attention of its base which has been slipping toward other nationalist parties. By doing so, it caters to voters’ emotions and panders to a nationalism that the government believes will help them at the polls in the next election.

Both measures will once again drive away investment and the availability of consumer and food products should businesses consider the cost of catering to a relatively small North American Francophone market too high to make it worthwhile.

Moreover, all this could result in an indirect form of “ethnic cleansing” should the result be a further exodus of Anglophone Quebecers and multinational businesses.

Meanwhile the Canadian Federal Government has not taken any steps to date to protect English rights in Quebec even though Canada is an officially bilingual country. Quebec holds 25% of seats in the Canadian Parliament, and embattled Prime Minister Trudeau will require all the support he can garner in the province if his government is to have any chance of winning the next election scheduled for 2025. Unfortunately, Trudeau and his Liberal government who love to virtue signal to others have put politics ahead of human rights.

The future of Quebec’s youth is in jeopardy by these short-sighted moves. The unwillingness of the nationalist government and the federal government’s inaction on minority language rights could cost Quebec plenty. In addition, the Quebec economy as well as the cosmopolitan environment of Montreal that attracts so much tourism and investment will be impacted negatively.

Healthy patriotism of dangerous nationalism?

Quebec’s actions currently reflect a misplaced nationalism at best, and an underscored rejection of all that is English at worst.

Quebec will always have its francophone roots and unique culture.

Although he was not Quebec’s favorite son to many, I recall former Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s vision of Canada: "this beautiful, rich and energetic country of ours can become a model in which every citizen will enjoy his fundamental rights, in which two great linguistic communities and people of many cultures will live in harmony and in which every individual will find fulfilment”.

This may sound démodé to many readers, but Quebec can be a francophone haven. retaining its strong culture and its linguistic pride of place with room for all to prosper and contribute.

There is room for all of us here.

I am a son of immigrants who has always been at home in both English and French, and this is the Quebec to which I aspire.