In his introduction, Alain-G. Gagnon writes that no major work on Canadian federalism has been published in French in the past decade. This collection of essays, many by leading Quebec scholars, fills the void.
The essays are grouped into four parts: foundations and traditions, the Quebec-Canada relationship, intergovernmental relations and the management of diversity. The dominant perspective is the Quebec lens, and this alone makes the collection an extremely valuable one for students of Canadian federalism, in particular, and federalism, in general. The approach employed by many of the authors includes an emphasis on normative aspects of the subject matter and rigorous attention to the definition of terms, old and new. Both the perspective and the approach lend the collection a welcome coherence.
The emphasis on the normative aspect of federalism is a refreshing one, since the legitimacy of the federal system probably depends as much on the good principles with which it is associated in the public mind as on the viability of particular policy outcomes. And in any case, as Dimitrios Karmis states, beliefs about such matters as universal individual rights versus community values, even if not articulated, anchor the public positions of the political actors on the issues of the day. In an essay that includes a detour through John C. Calhoun's theory of states' rights, Karmis concludes that Canada's existential crisis is rooted in the conflict between very different conceptions of federalism (69). By contrast, François Rocher thinks that the game is up and that there is little left of the normative federal project. In a provocative essay in which he anchors the two most influential and contending views of federalism in the reports of the Tremblay commission (autonomy and non-subordination) and the Rowell-Sirois commission (program efficiency), Rocher finds that the country has moved so far to the efficiency side of the ledger that it is now constructed on the refusal of a normative federal project altogether (121). Authors Jean-François Caron, Guy LaForest and Catherine Vallières-Roland demonstrate that Canadian federalism exhibits a significant “federative deficit” (157). In effect, so does Andrée Lajoie, but in addition she looks at the treatment of the claims of social (women, gays and lesbians) and political (Aboriginal peoples and Québécois) minorities by the federal government and the courts and finds that these institutions are not especially hospitable to minority claims (183–84). Michel Seymour covers much of the same ground, in his case by establishing a list of ten reforms required in order to establish a multinational federal system (192–93) and then demonstrating that none is within reach—indeed, even possible now. Both Seymour and Joseph Facal, who argues that Canada is on the road to becoming a unitary political system organized around a dominant central government (213), make the point that many Quebecers still cling to the hope of a renewed federal system in which their historic claims are addressed (219).
José Woehrling's systematic analysis of the effects of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms on democratic life and federalism leads him to conclude that a focus on individual rights weakens community values and thereby federalism, the chief value of which is supposed to be the protection of communities (243). One way of coping with this development would involve the pursuit of asymmetric federalism. Gagnon believes that it offers the kinds of flexibility in governance that is demanded by minority nations. But he cautions that there are legal asymmetries in such matters as, say, the division of powers that are a permanent part of the federal architecture and administrative asymmetries reflected in agreements between governments that are not. Quebec has always sought the former, he says, but unhappily has had to settle for the latter (259).
Several authors address particular public policies, among them federal–provincial financial relations, the social union, the cities, citizenship and Aboriginal self-determination. Perhaps it is not surprising that policy specialists, deeply knowledgeable about the details of their respective fields, see difficulties in the easy resolution of the problems that beset them. For example, writing on the contestation over the division of financial resources between Ottawa and the provinces, Alain Noël concedes that it is impossible in a federation to reach solutions to the conflict that last any length of time, and stresses instead the need for ongoing efforts at consultation and accommodation (296).
The concluding articles in the collection sound a broader comparative note. Michael Burgess discusses the meaning and management of diversity in federal states and emphasizes the importance of pursuing comparative historical studies of the origins and development of contemporary federal systems. Kenneth McRoberts offers a detailed, nuanced analysis of asymmetries in Canada and Spain.
Gagnon is to be congratulated for organizing such a fine collection of essays. It offers English-language readers something that is all too rare, namely, access to Quebec scholarship on Canadian federalism. It is important to stress that this scholarship is anything but parochial. On the contrary, it engages with contemporary scholarship on federalism that is undertaken world wide.
