Quebec accommodation debate takes worrisome turn, report's author says
Findings of commission on minorities being twisted: Gérard Bouchard
Last Updated: Tuesday, June 10, 2008 | 1:08 PM ET
CBC News
Quebec sociologist Gérard Bouchard lashed out against what he calls "profound deformations" of an incendiary report he co-authored on cultural and religious accommodations this spring.
The debate that erupted after the Bouchard-Taylor commission report was published in May is worrisome and could "weaken the Québécois nation," Bouchard wrote in an open letter published in several francophone newspapers Tuesday.
The commission report summarized several months of public hearings on the issue of so-called reasonable accommodation by the province's majority population of religious and cultural beliefs of minorities.
Bouchard co-chaired the meetings with philosopher Charles Taylor.
Bouchard's criticism focuses on sovereigntists, especially those he calls the "nationalist tenors" and "representatives of the political class" to which he says he has belonged to for more than four decades.
His political peers are jeopardizing ethnic pluralism and are dragging the debate into a tense, ethnically divided terrain where "all Quebecers risk to lose," Bouchard said.
Some aspects of the report are being twisted, including the responsibility of integrating immigrants into Quebec society.
The commission never recommended that Quebec completely shoulder the burden of integrating immigrants, and people who say it did are telling falsehoods, Bouchard asserts in the letter.
He also defends his use of "French Canadian" as an expression that more accurately represents Caucasian, Roman Catholic Québécois roots than "old-stock" or "pure laine," two commonly used phrases.
The latter expressions make many Quebecers uncomfortable, including "those who have been established here for a few generations and feel completely integrated," Bouchard said.
The provincial commission spent several months examining the question of what constitutes reasonable accommodation of religious and cultural beliefs and practices, particularly in Quebec's public institutions.
Public hearings explored the impact of religious accommodation on Quebec's collective identity and values and exposed anxieties felt by many segments of the population.
The report urged Quebecers to get over their identity crisis and embrace an open, secular, pluralistic society.
With files from the Canadian Press
