Quebec: A high stakes election

Fightback has received the following article by the Communist Party of Québec on the upcoming Québec elections. We are translating it into English because, while we do not agree 100% with all of the formulations, it contains very interesting analysis that should be made available to activists in English Canada and around the world. We will have the English translation available in a couple of days.

We find it very encouraging that the Communists in Québec have reached similar conclusions to those of the International Marxist Tendency on some issues. Neither the bourgeois federalist Liberals, nor the petit-bourgeois nationalist Parti Québécois, show any way forward for the working class. It is an indictment of the Péquistes that despite the terrible attacks the workers have suffered under the Liberals, the PQ has not been able to gain in popularity by offering an alternative. This is because the workers understand that in the last analysis, there is no difference between the Liberals and PQ on social questions.

In this gap, created by the failure of the establishment parties, we see the disturbing rise of the right-wing ADQ. They say that nature abhors a vacuum and Mario Dumont of the ADQ has filled this vacuum with the mantra of prejudice and privatization. However, in a negative fashion, the rise of the ADQ proves what the Marxists have said all along. The Québec working class is sick of the sterile debate between the Liberals and PQ and are looking for alternatives. If the unions would split from the old-line parties and form a party of labour, then working class policies would begin to dominate the debate in Québec.

The most encouraging aspect of this election is the formation of the new left party, Québec Solidaire. Together with the PCQ, we understand that Marxists must have a central role in the formation of this party and that the key issue is building links with the trade unions. It is vitally important that QS gain a toe-hold during this election so as to build support and union affiliations, to become a genuine party of labour.

Finally, Fightback and the PCQ share a common opposition to the Canadian federal state. As the PCQ say, this state was built upon national oppression and must be destroyed. A new state can only be built by the working class and that is why there can be no class-collaborationist coalition with the PQ. Fightback has always agreed with one fundamental idea that the PCQ presents in its article, "A full and complete national liberation is inseparable from the capturing of power by the workers."

Lenin, all the way back in 1903, advised revolutionaries to pay special attention to the right of self-determination of nations and the self-determination of the proletariat. It doesn't matter to the workers whether the gendarmes breaking up a picket line wear red or blue jackets. Genuine self-determination only comes when the workers have control of their communities and their workplaces. The working class will determine an end to discrimination and racism. The working class will determine full employment, free education, and decent housing for all. The working class will take militant action against war and imperialism, in solidarity with the oppressed peoples of the world.

In light of this, while we fight for the rights of the Québecois, as Marxists and internationalists, we believe their struggle must be linked to that of the workers across national boundaries. Communists in Québec should raise their sights a little higher than Québec's separation igniting a wave of separations across North America. It matters deeply what kind of self-determination this is. The splintering of states on a capitalist basis, as we saw in Yugoslavia, is no blow to the imperialists and is of no benefit to the workers. The coming to power of the working class in Québec would send shock waves across the continent. The main enemy of this new workers' state would be the Canadian federal state, supported by the other imperialist states, in particular the United States. The main friend of the Québec workers would be the working class in English Canada and around the world. Workers must not separate their fight, but unite against the common enemy. We must not take the nationalist/Stalinist view of socialism in one country, but instead adopt Trotsky's theory of the permanent revolution. It is not an accident that Hugo Chávez has realized the correctness of this theory in struggle. The permanent revolution states that independence from imperialism is impossible without the workers coming to power, and workers' power is impossible without spreading the revolution in unity with the workers of other countries.

We hope that there can be increasing collaboration between the Québec Communists and the Marxists in English Canada. Through a healthy discussion of ideas and united action in areas of agreement, we can fight to overthrow the oppressive Canadian federal state and bring genuine self-determination to the workers of Québec, Canada, and around the world.

-- Fightback Editorial board (23rd Mar. 2007)

The Quebec elections are in full swing. Jean Charest seeks re-election, Andre Boisclair is trying to prove to his own base that he is capable of governing, while Mario Dumont drags his campaign through the most crass populism. A great electoral campaign from the perspective of humorists and caricature artists is unravelling itself right before our eyes!

Quebec's political situation is complex. After an unprecedented pillage of our social safety net (the result of forty years of struggle) and a slew of rabidly anti-union legislation, Charest is attempting to be the Quebec version of Mike Harris: to be re-elected while presenting neo-liberal hysteria as a "common sense revolution". During pre-election advertisements, Charest explained that Quebec was "doing well" and "doing better".

Meanwhile, Quebec is doing better in reality only for large corporations. Subcontracting and outsourcing have flourished in Quebec since modifications were made to article 45; hence working conditions are deteriorating. Charest also gave a great song and dance in previous elections about health care being his top priority, yet the C difficile bacteria has never wreaked so much havoc and emergency rooms are no less overcrowded.

Charest had promised municipal demergers on a massive scale in order to rally right-wing populists to his side. Yet the demergers passed due to a special system of referenda, of which the methods and results were questionable. Charest's mandate wasn't therefore so much one of realizing promises made to the electorate as it was about undertaking promised engagements towards the bosses.

What is surprising is that Charest and his Liberals might even win once again! This despite his promises to do away with tuition freezes which have already elicited the ire of the student movement. Charest doesn't appear to have understood the message sent during the last student strike; which goes to show the credit for Charest's success belongs not so much to Charest himself but rather to his opponents.

The PQ versus itself

The new Parti Quebecois leader, Andre Boisclair, is still incapable of pleasing his own troops. The Parti Quebecois still more or less manages to convince unions that it is indeed a pro-independence party, but not all is well within the pequiste "family".

Firstly, Boisclair's openly anti-labour comments made before the elections didn't help his supposed cause. Among other things, Boisclair declared that "the days in which negotiations between the PQ and Labour ended in lavish, festive dinners are over". Leaders from the main unions had a difficult time swallowing utterances such as these. Some had even declared that "progressives are in no great rush to get out and vote for the Parti Quebecois in the next elections." Not to mention the PQ has yet to make a statement on Olymel as well as Boisclair's clear refusal to go back on the changes to article 45. These sorts of things will likely bring repercussions!

The myth that the Parti Quebecois is a class coalition struggling for Quebec's independence is crumbling. More than ever the PQ is showing workers its true colours as a bourgeois party. Add to this the fact that in its platform, the word referendum has been replaced by "popular consultation". The PQ no longer has the wherewithal to rally the workers to its project of "sovereignty-association". In any case, shouldn't it be expected that "independentists" react with great skepticism to a project one-half or perhaps one-third "independentist" without a single guarantee of social gains?

Andre Boisclair's recent calls to "progressives" to come back to the PQ ring hollow. Never has the PQ leader carried on this theme before; that he is doing so now goes to show things aren't going as well for the PQ as their leadership would like to think.

The ADQ: to the right of the right

While many pro-independence Quebecers will stay home next election day, some nationalists might find themselves tempted by the Action Democratique du Quebec(ADQ). Born of an early-90s split in the Liberal party, it sinks as deeply as it can into the most crass populism. A few months before the elections, Mario Dumont went on a crusade against reasonable accomodation for immigrants. Unfortunately, Dumont benefited greatly from this exploitation of xenophobic prejudices. Dumont, like Charest, praised a referee who expelled a Muslim player from a soccer game for wearing the hijab. The fact that anywhere else in the world this young girl would have been able to play soccer in peace like anybody else doesn't faze the adequistes who, just like their leader, have applauded this intolerant gesture with enthusiasm.

Nationalist without being "independentist", Dumont makes himself the champion of an "open federalism". This seems about as logical as vegetarian cannibalism, but we've yet to finish scratching the surface of the ADQ's absurdities.

This position of Dumont's, which puts him in league with Levesque's "beau risque" and Duplessis' chauvinistic tomfoolery, has earned him the epithet of "separatist" from Jean Charest.

As for the Quebec Liberals, having only survived this long in Quebec politics thanks to their maniacal anti-independentism, it's hardly surprising Charest is seeing separatists everywhere. Who will be next? Perhaps Judge Gomery or the Queen of England herself... We've long ago stopped being surprised by the musings of federalist leaders.

The ADQ's financial situation was precarious one year ago; but extreme-right talk show hosts in the Quebec City region allowed the party to survive this long; surely because in Dumont's organization they can recognize themselves and their interests. This is a party which never hesitates to ride waves of discontent based on the lowest prejudices and ignorance in order to gain popularity. One Liberal even compared Dumont to Jean-Marie Le Pen in the early stages of the campaign. While a direct comparison might be an exaggeration, the ADQ plays a remarkably similar role to the Front National in positioning itself as more right than right, in order to render the "mainstream" right more socially acceptable.

About the Green Party

The 2007 election does give us a new player on the political scene as the Green Party gains popularity. As the public becomes more and more alarmed by global warming, the party naturally has gained a great deal of the electorate's attention. This being said, the Québec Greens are very different from those found in Europe. The party offers no real solutions. Were a Green candidate to be elected, they would likely not be given the surname of "khmer green" as some have come to be known in France.

The Greens, who in Europe often form alliances with communists and anti-globalisation activists, have refused any alliance whatsoever with Québec Solidaire. The party's leadership here represents a very petit-bourgeois ideological current. The Green platform incorporates the "polluter pays" principle, but only insofar as private individuals are concerned (for example, those who would drive an SUV rather than take public transit); corporations are not targeted. Strange, isn't it? By the same token the Greens have had no reservations criticizing Québec Solidaire's platform as too radical and socialist, notably in regards to the initiative to nationalize wind energy.

The Québec Greens, not unlike their federal counterparts, do not understand and certainly do not want to understand that environmental issues cannot be separated from struggles against social inequalities.

The very clear refusal expressed by Green Party leader Scott MacKay to even consider the possibility of an eventual alliance with Québec Solidaire, as brought up in the March 17th edition of Le Devoir, confirms the very sectarian attitude held by the Québec Greens' current leadership. From a purely legal standpoint, such a last minute move wasn't possible due to election deadlines; yet the Greens, by way of their leader, could have nevertheless shown a bit more openness of spirit, at least in principle, Québec Solidaire itself being an environmentalist party. However, the leadership took the exact opposite approach. In so doing, the Green Party leader is objectively working against those fighting for ecological causes.

Another vision

By far the most interesting party in this election is a new voice on the left: Québec Solidaire. Québec Solidaire (QS) was born out of the fusion of the Option Citoyenne movement led by Francoise David with the Union des forces progressistes, of whom the principal spokesperson was Amir Khadir. QS brings an entirely new vision to Québec politics. The platform is daring in its feminist, ecologist, and socially progressive tendencies. Amongst other propositions, one finds Pharma Québec, a state company which would have as its task the production of medicine for the public health system. Savings under this plan for the health care system have been valued at 1 billion dollars, a sum which surely would be invested in other areas of the public health system.

However, QS are innovative not only from a social and environmental point of view. More green than the Greens, QS is actually "independentist" unlike the PQ. The "constituent" strategy shows that Québec Solidaire is surely determined to put an end to the prison Québecers know as the current federal political structure. Of course QS will bring forward a referendum, but the referendum will be put in place in order to enact a constitution of an independent Québec, which will have been written following a vast popular consultation over 12 to 18 months, to ensure that Québec's workers lay the founding bricks of their new country. A constitution written by and for the popular masses cannot lose a referendum; the workers certainly will not sacrifice "their own child" after having put so much effort to bring it into the world. It is a strategy which of course the PQ cannot permit.

Due to its class nature, the PQ cannot give workers the mandate to directly involve themselves in the writing of the state's fundamental law; it would be suicide! But as Québec Solidaire is not a bourgeois party, it is happy to do so. Without being nationalist, Québec Solidaire is the only true "independentist" mass political party in Québec today.

A state built upon national oppression

We mustn't forget that the Canadian federal state is one built upon national oppression. As Stanley Ryerson wrote in Capitalism and confederation, it was in order to assimilate francophones and rid themselves of aboriginals that the British crown carried out Canadian "confederation". The national question is therefore a crucial part in the destruction of this imperialist state. Québec's independence will put into question the Canadian bourgeois state; such a movement could be the spark that lights a vast liberation movement for North America's nations. It's not a coincidence that the whole of Canada's bourgeoisie categorically opposes Québec's independence and that Québec's national bourgeoisie always has something more urgent to accomplish other than Québec's independence. Given its central position in the Canadian state, Québec's independence would render the Canadian federal system all the more fragile. This is precisely why the bourgeoisie want nothing to do with Québec's independence and why only a worker's party can lead this movement to its end. A full and complete national liberation is inseparable from the capturing of power by the workers, and political power being taken by the workers is inseparable from the struggle for Québec's national liberation.

Québec Solidaire is not a homogeneous party. Many tendencies exist in its ranks. Many socialist tendencies are represented : Gauche Socialiste of the Fourth International, the International Socialists, the Collective for a Critical Mass, as well as the Communist Party of Québec. While the issue of the collectives has yet to be resolved, the Communist party is proud to have put all of its efforts into Québec Solidaire's entry onto the political scene and even the election of its candidates. André Parizeau and Francis Gagnon Bergman, members of the Executive Committee and Central Committee of the Party, are running in this election under the banner of Québec Solidaire. For Marxists, Québec Solidaire plays a front and centre role, as historically speaking, there is no culture in Québec of the mass workers' party.

Most leaders in the heart of the union movement have for years supported the Parti Québecois, yet even yesterday's most fervent PQ defenders must recognize today that it is becoming more and more difficult to justify the continuation of such an endorsement. More and more we hear talk about a circumstantial and critical support being given to the party, under the pretext that there really is no other alternative capable of taking power in the short term. With time, the support given has become much more lukewarm; some in the movement find themselves in an out-of-place neutrality, which nevertheless shows a clear malaise with the PQ.

A gap on the left

The current situation could definitely become quite profitable for Québec Solidaire. There is more and more of a gap on the left in Québec which QS can fill. The stakes are high. For the first time in Québec, there is a party which intends to act as a mass party, not directed by the bourgeoisie. Workers are at last learning to organise upon their own base in every region of Québec without trembling before the dictates of the multinationals. And, in the very heart of the unions, one can discern a movement for closer ties with Québec Solidaire; the movement is weak, but it exists.

However, Québec Solidaire's platform isn't explicitly socialist. Yet it is not impossible that in the future, the socialist project should become an integral part of the party's program. Currently the debate is lively in the heart of the organization and day-by-day QS activists are being politically enriched. This is where the role of Marxists within QS becomes crucial. Many members of Québec Solidaire are people who, never having recognized themselves in the discourse of bourgeois politicians, feel as if they have found their place in political life thanks to this party. Many of them are completely new to politics as a whole. Here is where Marxists have an important role to play.