Competing States: The Use of Public Policy by Minority and Majority Nations by Alexandre Couture Gagnon A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Affairs in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Public Policy Carleton University Ottawa, Ontario © 2013 Alexandre Couture Gagnon Abstract Since the mid-1900's, minority nationalistic movements within larger states have grown throughout the industrialized world. The rise of these minority nations' consciousness confronts their respective majority nation's self-definition. Within a given country, both the minority nation and the majority one thus engage in competition for loyalty. This competition is played out at the level of the state, that is, the minority nation's and the majority nation's governments fight for their citizens' loyalty through public policies. In order to study this phenomenon, this dissertation examines two case studies: Catalonia in Spain and Québec in Canada. A model has been developed to describe the dynamics of competition via public policy between the minority nation and the majority nation. Three policy areas are studied: language, foreign affairs, and immigration policy. The key element to the competition between the minority nation and the majority nation is the incrementalism of the minority nation's request for more power from the majority nation. The smaller the change required, the more the minority nation gains in the long term. Confrontation between a minority nation's and a majority nation's governments will take place when a government thinks that it has an advantage or when it wants to advance a public policy in a significant manner. Macro-confrontation, that is, confrontation across policy fields, happens around referendums on sovereignty and periods of high political tension. This research's objective is two-fold. First, it portends to describe competition between the minority nation's and its respective majority nation's governments over the ii citizens' loyalty through public policies. Second, it asserts that the competition may be modeled for most industrialized federal states. iii Acknowledgements Writing this thesis was challenging both intellectually and emotionally. It would have taken longer and the quality would be lesser without the support from dedicated professors, the financial support from organizations, and my family. It will never be possible to thank Leslie Pal enough for his supervision of my thesis. I cannot imagine the suffering associated with reading the numerous drafts of badly-written chapters with ideas that did not hold together. It is impressive that someone could succeed at providing comments that allowed the improvement of what ended up a dissertation without becoming discouraged or without discouraging the student. On top of that, Dr. Pal wrote many, (many, many!) recommendation letters and filled out no small number of scholarship forms. Thank you a thousand times. Interesting and long conversations occurred with André Lecours and Stanley Winer throughout the writing of this dissertation. Dr. Lecours' knowledge of Spain and autonomous communities was essential to the beginning of this research. Conversations on federalism and the tensions between Madrid and Barcelona were enlightening and, without these, this dissertation would have missed important facts. Dr. Winer's interest for rational models kept my interest and confidence that I could structure my own ideas. I would have given up the model in this dissertation had it not been for the book recommendations, our lengthy discussions, and just feeling that he thought that I could do it. Warm thanks go to Tove Malloy and the European Centre for Minority Issues iv (ECMI) in Flensburg, Germany, for welcoming my husband and me during the summer of 2010. The nice working environment as well as the great comments during the workshop in which I participated, made the journey fruitful for my dissertation. What is more, the organized visits to national minorities in the area awakened me to the ways in which Catalonia and, perhaps more, Québec serve as models for other national minorities' aspirations. The professors at the School of Public Policy and Administration are exceptional. The courses with Frances Abele, Rianne Mahon, Phil Ryan, and Saul Schwartz were particularly important for widening my horizons and helping me learn how to write academically. Formative teaching assistantships took place with Allan Maslove and Stephan Schott. Graeme Auld made the organization of the First David Wink SPPA Ph.D. Conference, with Nick Falvo, easy and fun. Many short and long talks happened in hallways with other faculty members (Calum Carmichael, Marc-André Gagnon, Alexandra Mallett, and Jennifer Stewart) who showed genuine interest. Thank you to Donna Patrick at the School of Canadian Studies at Carleton University for conversations early in the research process and the great course on Language, Culture, and Power in Canada. Thank you very much to the amazing personnel at the School of Public Policy and Administration (SPPA) at Carleton University: Meghan Innes, Nicki Enouy, Tabbatha Malouin, and Mary Au. From helping with scholarship deadlines, academic registration, to organizing a students' conferences, I always felt – and tested a few times – that they genuinely cared and wanted me to finish a great dissertation. v Merci à la professeure Lynda Khalaf du Département d'économique de l'Université Carleton pour l'accueil chaleureux (et le délicieux café) ainsi que les conseils judicieux dans les moments difficiles des premières années du doctorat. Merci au professeur James Meadowcroft et à Stephanie DuRant pour les encouragements, les bons repas et les discussions fascinantes. Merci à mes anciens professeurs de l'École nationale d'administration publique, en particulier Luc Bernier et Filip Palda, qui ont toujours eu à coeur mon succès et ont guidé mes décisions académiques, bien après mes études à Québec. Moltes gracies a la Thaïs Martín per a les classes de català. Gràcies a vostè, vaig aprendre molt sobre la cultura catalana i això em va ajudar amb les entrevistes a Barcelona. Thank you to Jenn Hartzog for the amazing proof-reading. She proof-read the whole dissertation at a fast pace and gave me an advanced English class at the same time. I knew that she cared about my dissertation and felt “en confiance” during the whole process. The doctoral studies that led to the completion of this dissertation have been funded by the Fonds québécois de la recherche sur la société et la culture (FQRSC), the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), and the Ontario Graduate Scholarships (OGS). Moreover, various organizations provided financial help to attend conferences and visit the ECMI, thus fostering the research of this thesis: Carleton University, the Association internationale d'études québécoises (AIEQ), and the Centre vi for European Studies at Carleton University (the latter involving a partial contribution from a European Union grant). Many participants to academic conferences provided thorough comments of parts of this dissertation. Most notably, in 2011, Alain-G. Gagnon invited me at the Séminaire de la relève of the Groupe de recherche sur les sociétés plurinationales (with the collaboration of the Chaire de recherche du Canada en études québécoises et canadiennes), where I was challenged by academics who I admired (Alain Dieckhoff, Alain-G. Gagnon, and Michel Seymour) in a friendly setting; Guy Laforest discussed enthusiastically the chapter on foreign policy at the conference of the Société québécoise de science politique and suggested the concept of macro-confrontation – which filled previous gaps in my dissertation. Linda Cardinal engaged me in a very detailed and a helpful conversation of the chapter on linguistic policy. All incoherences, all mistakes, and all opinions in this dissertation are my sole responsibility. Sur une note plus personnelle (et je ne m'épancherai pas, vous savez déjà que je suis trop sensible), je dois la fin de ce grand projet d'études à ma famille. Mes grands- parents ont souligné mes moindres succès depuis ma naissance et m'ont toujours enveloppée d'un amour inébranlable. L'un de mes grands-pères m'a donné très jeune envie d'apprendre l'anglais. L'autre de mes grands-pères adore la politique; j'aimerais en connaître autant que lui. Mes grands-mères m'ont souvent raconté qu'elles avaient étudié autant qu'il ne leur était permis à leur époque; ces histoires m'ont donné envie d'aller à l'école aussi longtemps que possible. Owen chéri, merci pour les discussions intelligentes et critiques, les corrections de vii tonnes de versions et de courriels ainsi que les encouragements quotidiens, même dans les pires épisodes d'abattement. Merci surtout pour l'inspiration journalière. Chers parents, ah !, je vous dois tout. Vous m'avez donné le goût d'apprendre, payé mes études, encouragée chaque fois que je voulais laisser tomber, instillé la confiance nécessaire à l'achèvement d'un projet de plusieurs années. Votre joie de vivre et l'importance que vous accordez à l'équilibre m'ont permis de demeurer saine d'esprit pendant le doctorat. Élaine et Serge, je ne pourrai jamais vous remercier de tout ce que vous avez fait pour moi. Vous m'avez accueillie dans les grands stress de fins de session pour des repas de homard; vous avez assisté à la soutenance de mon mémoire; vous m'avez recueillie après mon bénévolat sud-américain. Et vous avez offert votre demeure pour la réception de notre mariage, à Owen et à moi. Maintenant que je suis adulte (!?), vous continuez de m'accueillir. Sans vous, mon parcours universitaire aurait été pénible. Xav, merci de toutes les copies de ma thèse, de tes excellentes blagues et de prendre soin de mon chat adoré, toujours à la dernière minute. Ton souci du détail, ton perfectionnisme sont au-delà de ce que je ne pourrai jamais atteindre. Lolo, merci des encouragements à profusion et en continu, même de l'autre bout du monde, de tes notes de cours sur l'ex-URSS et de l'organisation de mes premières entrevues avec tes voisins de bureau de la Catalogne à New York.