Chartre des valeurs - Quebec Charter of Values

  The debate regarding Quebec’s proposed Charter of values has taken a preoccupying turn in the last few days. The time has come to attempt to adjust the aim and, hopefully , come to a more fruitful dialogue about the proposal.

Photo from Radio-Canada

     First of all, I am of the opinion that the proposed charter is not in any way racist. The reason is because of the context. I am of the school that understands racism to be discrimination by a group holding dominant power in society; it is directed against an oppressed people, often a minority, because of an incidental element (for example, skin colour).  The Charter cannot be racist because Quebec is itself an oppressed minority struggling for its survival as a francophone society. An oppressed society cannot be racist.

     However, and for me this is extremely important, any society, including an oppressed and marginalized society, can be discriminatory. Discrimination is a larger term of which racism is one expression.

     It is my view that the Quebec government has decided to invoke its constitutional right to discriminate. This is written into the charter of rights through the notwithstanding clause. It has done so by invoking the important character of its unique status as a religiously neutral state within Canada. This is seen as a way of assuring Quebec’s continuing identity within the larger context of North America. In other words, the Quebec government seems prepared to discriminate for the good of the societal project to which it claims most people in Quebec are in agreement.

     However, the question then becomes whether or not the Quebec government is justified in such discrimination. My answer would be a resounding no. My reason for rejecting the proposed charter then, is that I cannot accept that the discrimination invoked here will advance the special character of the project of society at work in Quebec. It will, in fact, work much to its detriment. This is not at all like the passage of Law 101 that resulted in the exit of many Anglophones from Quebec. They were in fact part of the dominant force in North American society.  The Charter proposal goes much further in discriminating against some of the most vulnerable people in Quebec: immigrants, women, and religious minorities.

     I am convinced that the Quebec government has shot itself in the foot by proposing this Charter. It has lost whatever support and credibility it might have among religious minorities as also among a good part of the religious majority (Christians) and, not least, among many immigrants and women.   

The only motivation I can find behind the proposal is strictly electoral: The government is under the impression that the proposal will strongly unite its bases within the regions of Quebec outside of Montreal and within all the traditional Quebec society - those identified as “de souche.”  And it may well be that the debate will provide the Partie québecois with a chance to become a majority government after the next election. However, in that case, what will be left of the famous inclusive project of society for Quebec. I fear: very little.