Affirmation without Recognition: Assessing Quebec’s Recent Initiative for Constitutional Engagement

ABSTRACT

In 2017, the government of Quebec revisited the seemingly dormant question of Quebec’s place in Canada by releasing a Policy on Quebec Affirmation and Canadian Relations. While the policy statement checks off most of the boxes associated with Quebec’s traditional positions on federalism, I contend that it fails to diagnose the crux of the obstacles confronting Quebec and therefore it is likely to be reduced to a mere footnote in our ongoing deliberations around Canada’s constitutional impasse. Following an examination of the policy statement, the chapter turns to an exploration of the growing gulf between Quebec and its federal partners with regards to the purposes of federalism.

KEYWORDS:

• Quebec-Canada relations
• constitution
• federalism
• national pluralism
• distinct society

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. For a detailed study on the federal spending power and its root cause, the vertical fiscal imbalance, see the Commission on Fiscal Imbalance (2002).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Raffaele Iacovino

Raffaele Iacovino is Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at Carleton University. His interests include Canadian and Quebec politics, federalism, citizenship and immigration, and citizenship education. He has also held the positions of Invited Professor of Quebec Studies at McGill University; Postdoctoral Fellow at the Canada Research Chair on Democracy and Sovereignty at l’Université du Québec À Chicoutimi; and Skelton-Clark postdoctoral fellow of Canadian Affairs in the Department of Political Studies at Queen’s University. He is the coauthor, with Alain-G. Gagnon, of Federalism, Citizenship and Quebec: Debating Multinationalism, (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2007).