La Révolution glorieuse, John Locke et l'impasse constitutionnelle du Canada

Nous commémorons en 1989-1990 le tricentenaire de la Révolution glorieuse et d'un des plus grands manifestes de la philosophie politique, Les deux traités du gouvernement civil de John Locke. L'historiographie la plus actuelle démontre toute l'ampleur du radicalisme dans le libéralisme de Locke. Il a pris part, en Angleterre comme en exil, aux principales luttes politiques de son temps. Il a essayé, sans succès, de tirer la révolution glorieuse dans un sens plus favorable au principe de la souveraineté populaire. Les idées de Locke sur le droit de résistance, sur la nécessité d'un consentement populaire pour légitimer les changements constitutionnels, jettent un éclairage nouveau sur la crise politique qui sévit au Canada.We celebrate in 1989-1990 the tercentenary of the Glorious Revolution and of one of political philosophy's most important manifestos, John Locke's Two Treatises of Government. The most recent historiography demonstrates all the radicalness of Locke's liberalism. In England as well as in exile, he took part in the most crucial political struggles of his time. He tried without success to pull the Glorious Revolution in a direction more favourable to popular sovereignty. Locke's ideas on the right to resist, on the necessity of popular consent to legitimate constitutional changes, shed a new light on the current political crisis in Canada

Interpreting Quebec’s Exile Within the Federation

This book combines the approaches of political theory and of intellectual history to provide a lucid account of Québec’s contemporary situation within the Canadian federation. Guy Laforest considers that the province of Québec, and its inhabitants, are exiled within Canada. They are not fully integrated, politically and constitutionally, nor are they leaving the federation, for now and for the foreseeable future. They are in between these two predicaments. Laforest provides insights into the current workings of the Canadian federation, and some of its key figures of the past fifty years, such as Pierre Elliott Trudeau, René Lévesque, Stephen Harper and Claude Ryan. The book also offers thought-provoking studies of thinkers and intellectuals such as James Tully, Michel Seymour and André Burelle. Laforest revisits some key historical documents and events, such as the Durham Report and the 1867 and 1982 constitutional documents. He offers political and constitutional proposals that could contribute to help Québec moving beyond the current predicament of internal exile

Interpreting Quebec’s Exile Within the Federation

This book combines the approaches of political theory and of intellectual history to provide a lucid account of Québec’s contemporary situation within the Canadian federation. Guy Laforest considers that the province of Québec, and its inhabitants, are exiled within Canada. They are not fully integrated, politically and constitutionally, nor are they leaving the federation, for now and for the foreseeable future. They are in between these two predicaments. Laforest provides insights into the current workings of the Canadian federation, and some of its key figures of the past fifty years, such as Pierre Elliott Trudeau, René Lévesque, Stephen Harper and Claude Ryan. The book also offers thought-provoking studies of thinkers and intellectuals such as James Tully, Michel Seymour and André Burelle. Laforest revisits some key historical documents and events, such as the Durham Report and the 1867 and 1982 constitutional documents. He offers political and constitutional proposals that could contribute to help Québec moving beyond the current predicament of internal exile

THE MEANING OF CANADIAN FEDERALISM IN QUÉBEC: CRITICAL REFLECTIONS

Ever since the federal founding of Canada in 1867, Québec has substantiallycontributed to the various stages in the evolution of the Canadian state and inthe interpretation of Canadian federalism. In the aftermath of the referendumsof 1980 and 1995, and considering that a third sovereignty referendum appearsquite unlikely in Québec, this article provides a survey and critical understandingof current federalist thinking and current academic discourses concerning federalismin Québec. Although the article is mostly about intellectual history, it integratescurrent political developments in the province of Québec, governed bythe Liberals led by Jean Charest since 2003, and in Canada as a whole as well,governed since 2006 by consecutive Conservative minority governments underthe leadership of Stephen Harper. The article shows that in the major academicdiscipines of constitutional law, history, political science and philosophy, Québecinterpretations of Canadian federalism continue to be dominated by a paradigmformulated by the Report of the Tremblay Commission, a forum for enquiry onconstitutional matters created by the Québec government more than fifty yearsago. The dominant paradigm continues to propose an «existential» approachfocusing on greater autonomy and recognition for Québec, while at the sametime adopting an instrumental-utilitarian stance towards Canada. While thisapproach continues to be developed with great academic sophistication, in mostof these disciplines a certain federalist «revival» is under way, attempting topropose a better equilibrium between the requirements of autonomy-recognitionfor Québec and those of solidarity-interdependence with the whole of Canada