Unveiling the Nation by Emily Laxer

Author:Emily Laxer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: MQUP
Published: 2019-03-18T16:00:00+00:00

5

“They Are Genetically Incapable” of Defending Québécois Values

Unresolved Struggles to “Own” the Nation in Quebec’s Charter of Values Debate

From the time the press leaked its major orientations in August 2013 until the Parti Québécois’ (PQ) electoral defeat in April 2014, the Charter of Values monopolized Quebec’s airwaves, becoming the central focus of democratic debate, at the levels of both party politics and in much of civil society. Even before the government presented its bill to parliament, Quebec’s newer, non-traditional opposition parties – the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) and Québec solidaire (QS) – issued alternative legislative proposals. Dated 9 October 2013, Québec Solidaire’s Bill 398 proposed to adopt the Bouchard-Taylor report’s recommended restriction of religious signs among public employees whose work embodies the authority and coercive powers of the state (namely the president and vice-president of the National Assembly, judges, Crown prosecutors, police officers, and prison guards). The Coalition avenir Québec quickly followed suit with Bill 492, in which it outlined a similarly narrowed restriction, although one that would also apply to schoolteachers and principals.1 Only the Parti libéral du Québec – the main opposition to the Parti Québécois government – refrained from drafting its own bill, a move that exposed the party to damaging critiques.2

Unable – perhaps even unwilling – to forge a consensus based on its opponents’ own proposals, the Parti Québécois forged ahead with its original project, presenting Bill 60 to Quebec’s National Assembly on 7 November 2013. As anticipated, article 5 of the document outlined a proposal to restrict “ostentatious” religious signs in all public service employment.3 When the opposition parties persevered in their objections to this measure, the government launched a series of public hearings to gauge the opinions of civil society actors and ordinary citizens on the Charter of Values. Taking place between January and March 2014, these hearings featured presentations by various groups, including feminists, legal experts, pro-sovereignty activists, unions, and social service providers.

This chapter unfolds in two parts. In the first part, I analyze the positions taken by concerned citizens and civil society actors in the public hearings on the Charter of Values. Drawing on a combination of textual and interview data, I show that, as in France’s Gerin commission, there was significant disagreement among participants over the place of religion in the public sphere, the best ways to define gender (in)equality in the context of religious diversity, and the legal viability of outlawing religious signs in public sector employment. In debating all three issues, civil society actors mobilized highly disparate understandings of Quebec’s national past, present, and future. Whereas proponents of the Charter believed the latter to be consistent with the development of a modern and secular national identity, in which women’s equality is paramount, its opponents warned that Bill 60 would undermine secularism and gender equality, by obstructing women’s participation in the workforce. Much more than a disagreement over policy, I argue, these divergent interpretations of the Charter amounted to conflicting ways of envisioning the meanings and boundaries of nationhood in Quebec.

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