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Trotskyist Bulletin No. 7 TrotskyistBulletin No. 7: Marxism & the Quebec National Question International Bolshevik Tendency First published September 1999 Second edition published September 2013 Box 332, Adelaide St. Stn., Toronto, Canada MSC 214 BCM Box 4771, London, WClN 3XX, Britain Box 967 1, Wellington, New Zealand www.bolshevik.org Contents Introduction [First Edition 1999] . .. .1 Introduction to the Second Edition, 2013. .1 IBT/ICL Debate on the Quebec National Question Transcript of 13February 1999Debate. .. .. .. .3 Bolshevik Tendency: Still in the Camp ofAnglo Chauvinism . 18 A Few Additional Points .................... 21 Quebec Nationalism & Class Struggle: Selected Readings, 1976-1996 Not Bourgeois Nationalism, But Proletarian Internationalism!. 25 Quebec Nationalism and the Class Struggle ... 27 'Defend Quebec's Right to Self-Determination!'. .28 Levesque's Labor Lieutenants Push 'Socialist' Nationalism . 28 Leninism vs.Nationalism .... .30 Abolish the War Measures Act!. 33 Federalists Gloat-Levesque Loses. .34 Lessons of the Quebec General Strike . 35 Marxism vs.Quebec Nationalism ... 38 For Working Class Unity Across National Lines! . 43 Further Readings, 2001-2012 2001FTA A Demonstration in Quebec: For Socialist Globalization!. .48 Letter to Workers Vanguard on the 2004CN Rail Strike. 49 Workers Vanguard Replies . 50 IBT Rejoinder . .. .. 50 Letter to the IG on the Quebec Student Struggle of2012. 51 Mass Struggle Repels Austerity Attack: Quebec Students Fight Back . 52 2009-2012 APPENDIX- Strikes involving Quebecois and Anglo workers .............. ..... 58 Introduction On 13 February 1999, the International Bolshevik Tendency Spartacist tendency. (IBT) and the Trotskyist League, Canadian affi liate of the This debate is likely to be of particular interest to people who International Communist League (TL/ICL), held a public debate believe (as we do) that the now thoroughly degenerate Spartacist at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario. We had for many League once represented an important link in the chain of revo­ years unsuccessfully sought to debate the Spartacist League lutionary continuity after Trotsky. The issues raised are of criti­ (SL) and/or its affi liates. In the introduction to Tr otskyist Bulletin cal importance to the development of a viable revolutionary No.5, we commented: movement in North America. Whatever one's opinion on the "The SL/ICL leadership's attitude toward us is profoundly history of the Spartacist tendency, the Quebec national question contradictory. They have written more polemics against us poses anew many of the problems Lenin and the Bolsheviks suc­ than any other political tendency, yet we are the only leftist cessfully addressed as part of their struggle to explode the Tsarist group that they refused to debate in public. They obviously prisonhouse of nations. feel that a full and free exchange might not be advantageous to them." The first item in this bulletin is a transcript of the debate at The ICL leadership finally reversed its policy when the Brock Brock, which has been posted on our website (www.bolshevik. Socialists, an unaffiliated campus group, offered to sponsor a org) since April [1999] . The second item is the ICL's account of public debate. The TL accepted, on condition that the topic be the debate, which appeared simultaneously in Wo rkers Va nguard the issue of Quebec separation-a question which the TL had and Spartacist Canada. The third item is our own commentary abruptly changed its long-held position on a few years earlier. (which initially appeared on our web page) on some of the We agreed to this condition, but at the debate many TL support­ issues posed. Finally, we have included a selection of articles on ers tended to ignore Quebec and instead rattled off lists of unre­ Quebec from Spartacist Canada and 1917. lated accusations. This scatter-gun polemical technique is one that will be familiar to those acquainted with the contemporary -International Bolshevik Tendency, August 1999 Introduction to the Second Edition This edition contains documents related to the Quebec nation­ strike has been broken as a result of national/linguistic antago­ al question published since the appearance of the first edition nisms among trade unionists. This simple fact refutes the ICL/IG in 1999. The new material includes a 2004 polemical exchange claim that "successful proletarian struggle demands separation with the SL/ICL and a 2012 letter to the Internationalist Group into two independent nation-states" (Spartacist No.52, Autumn (IG) (a New York-based SL offshoot) challenging their rationale 1995). for advocating independence for Quebec. The Winter 1997/98 issue of Spartacist Canada proclaimed It also includes our previously published commentary on two Quebec independence to be "the means to cut through the barrier important political events that took place in Quebec since the which sets worker against worker along national lines, thereby 1999 debate-a militant 2001 mass demonstration in Quebec laying a basis for bringing the decisive class questions to the City protesting the imperialist "Free Trade Area of the Americas" fore." In the 1999 debate, the IBT challenged the ICL to explain scheme, and the 2012 Quebec student strike. Finally, we have how it was that joint class struggle occurred repeatedly if there appended excerpts from the bourgeois press on recent strikes was no "basis" for it. The historical record both before, and after, by rail, postal and airline unions involving both Quebecois and our 1999 debate confirms that a "basis" does exist "for bringing English-Canadian workers. the decisive class questions to the fore,"contrary to the I CL/I G's Despite national differences and backward attitudes within the pessimistic denials. The proof is in the living experience of the class struggle, which this bulletin seeks to document. working class, there has been a consistent pattern ofjoint struggle since the 1960s. We are not aware of a single instance in which a -International Bolshevik Tendency, August 2013 IBT-ICL Debate on the Quebec National Question Debate Transcript The fo llowing is a transcript of the 13 February debate at issue between us and the comrades of the TL, is whether or Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, between the not Marxists should have consistently advocated that Quebec Trotskyist League (Canadian section of the International separate, and constitute a separate nation-state, since approx­ Communist League-TL/ICL) and the International imately the early 1960s. My understanding is that's when the Bolshevik Tendency (I BT). We have reproduced the remarks of comrades date it from-[a TL comrade] is shaking his head. all speakers in the debate with only minor corrections fo r Well, let's say from thetime of the inception of the Trotskyist grammar and syntax. League, which would be the mid-1970s, I think I'm not mis­ taken there. I've found that the dates move around a bit in the Chair: documentation. Now, in the 1960s and '70s, many Quebecois feared that On behalf of the Brock Socialists I'd like to welcome you without independence they risked assimilation, that is, disap­ and thank you all for coming. The topic for tonight's debate is pearance as a people. And this fear tended to fuel the desire "The Quebec National Question and the Case for Socialism." for separation and for the establishment of a separate Quebec The debate tonight will be conducted by speakers from the national entity. This sentiment has abated significantly, as is Trotskyist League and the International Bolshevik Tendency. From the TL we have Charles Galarneau and from the IBT we widely recognized, with the imposition in the late '70s of the have Tom Riley .... Quebec language laws which have enshrined French as the dominant language and have significantly arrested the ten­ Tom Riley (IBT): dency toward assimilation and therefore tended to attenuate the fears of assimilation and remove it therefore as as pressing Thank you very much. It's been a long time, and we appre­ an issue as it would otherwise have been. ciate the fact that the Trotskyist League has agreed to debate So, as I say, the nub of the difference we are debating to­ with us. night is whether or not for the past 35 years, 25 years, or what­ When we set up the Trotskyist League in the mid-'70s (a ever it is, joint class struggle has been possible-or whether few of us in this room were present and involved in that pro­ Quebec needs to separate before it is possible. cess) one of the first things that we had to develop was a There is certainly no question that among the most mili­ Marxist analysis and a program on the question of Quebec. tant sections of the Quebec working class nationalist senti­ The existing Marxist groups had atrocious positions which ment is popular and has been popular during the period that pointed in different directions. we're talking about. But despite the fact that this nationalist As Leninists, we began fromthe recognition that Quebec is sentiment has been popular, we have seen repeated instances a nation, and that all nations have the right to self­ of joint class struggle. I think this is extremely important. determination: that is, the right to separate and form their The first article that Spartacist Canada ever wrote on Que­ own state at any point when they determine that they wish to bec appeared in December 1976, and in that article the obser­ do so. As Lenin said, however, the right to self-determination vation was made that: is a bit like the right to divorce-you have a right to do it but it "Quebec workers notably spearheaded militant action by doesn't mean that you are required to do it; that is, to exercise the entire Canadian proletariat against [Liberal prime min­ that right at any given time. Nor are Marxists required to ad­ ister Pierre] Tr udeau's wage controls.
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