August 19, 2014
While the Scots will go through the process of voting on secession for the first time on September 15, 2014, I am in the interesting position of having gone through two such referendi in my lifetime, and I know full well the Scots’ experience in the context of such a historical moment and decision. Indeed, my homeland of Québec organized two such referendi within a span of 15 years, the first was held in 1980, and the second in 1995.
The referendum of 1995 has a very special meaning to me: It was the first time I was allowed to vote, and it was also my first foray into “local” politics. As such, I got to experience such a democratic process to its full extent, and the Scottish referendum allows me now to reflect on this experience with the benefit of nearly 20 years of hindsight.
The first element one needs to understand about the 1995 Québec referendum is that it was reactionary, and a direct consequence of the results of the referendum of 1980. In 1980, 60% of Québec voters decided against independence, prompting Rene Levesque’s famous words: “Si j’ai bien compris… vous etes en train de dire… ‘a la prochaine fois'” (if I understood you correctly… you are saying… “until next time”). Politically, the referendum sent Canada into a maelstrom, from which it would only recover in the early 2000s. Because of that referendum, the Canadian government had to address the issue of national unity and do good on its promises to recognize Québec’s “special status”. It began this process with the repatriation of its constitution from England, a move that had to be negotiated with the provinces and resulted in Québec being isolated in what is known there as the “nuit des longs couteaux” (night of the long knives). The election of the conservative party during the 1984 elections prompted a process of reconciliation known as the “beau risque” (nice risk) that resulted in the much maligned Meech Lake and Charlottetown accords of 1987 and 1992 respectively. In both cases, the agreements sought to give Québec a special status and powers that did not please the RoC (Rest of Canada), or were deemed too little by the sovereignist movements.
The failure of the Meech Lake accords in June of 1990 gave new life to the sovereignist movement in Québec. Feeling betrayed, the Québec PM Robert Bourassa, a man known to be against independence, famously declared that Québec would no longer negotiate collectively, but 1 on 1 with the Canadian government. A few days later, many of the Québec MPs within the conservative government resigned, most famously the former Canadian ambassador to France Lucien Bouchard, who resigned and founded their own party, the sovereignist Bloc Québécois.
Pro-independence parties rode this discontent to a wave of electoral success, resulting in the election of the Bloc Québécois as official opposition party in the Canadian parliament in 1993, while the provincial Parti Québécois was elected to power during the 1994 Québec elections. The stage was now set for the second referendum on independence in a span of 15 years.
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Former Montreal Canadiens goaltender Ken Dryden has a wonderful quote in his book The Game about the effect of the results of the 1976 Québec elections on the crowd attending the hockey game in Montreal on November 15:
“In the middle of the third period, the message board flashed again – “Un Nouveau Gouvernment.”. No longer afraid to hope, thousands stood up and cheered and the Forum organist played the PQ anthem. And when they stood and cheered, thousands of others who had always stood and cheered with them stayed seated and did not cheer. At that moment, people who had sat together for many years in the tight community of season-ticket holders learned something about each that they had not known before. The last few minutes of the game were very difficult. The mood in the Forum had changed.”
When reflecting on the 1995 referendum, it’s hard not to think of this quote and how such a decision brings about a latent tension and a sense of both certainty and insecurity. When the campaign got in full swing in September 1995, it was all people could talk about, and it was all about trying to convince the “other” of voting Yes or No. The tension stemmed from various factors: The uncertainty of the future; the digging of trenches between Yes and No supporters; and of course, the heckling between the groups, seeing in the other much more than an opponent. In fact, those that would not vote with the desired camp were perceived as traitors.
There was also the issue of immigration, which in Canada and Québec remains very sensitive. Migrants or those with a migration background were in a nasty position: They had to choose sides and there was no way for them to win. If they voted Oui, they would often face backlash from members of their communities; if they voted Non, then the stigma of being the other, and not being “one of us” would stick to them forever. And because Québec has a very strong multicultural society, both campaigns focused many of their energies on trying to convince minorities to vote for them. The Ethnic Vote became the source of some of the most fiercely fought battles of the referendum campaign, and the consequences were felt well beyond the night of 30 October. Add to this the language issue in Québec, which is to this day extremely volatile, and the battle lines could not be drawn deeper.
The sense of security came from within the communities. It seemed that everyone voted for your camp. I remember the Yes camp winning the mock referendum at our CEGEP (General and Vocational College) by a score of nearly 90%. It seemed that everywhere one looked, you were on the same team, and that was extremely comforting.
The insecurity came from the flood of information and propaganda battle both sides were waging, especially in economic terms. “You can’t afford independence!” – “Yes we can! We have numerous resources and the taxes we currently pay to you will be ours to keep”; “What money will you use? You won’t get the Canadian dollar!” – “Who cares about the dollar. We can use any currency we want. Also, you guys can’t afford to dismiss us so you’ll still let us use the dollar.”; “You’ll lose your Canadian passports!” – “So what? A Québec passport is just as good”.
While the campaign was a fascinating experience in itself, nothing will beat being caught in the “Canadian Love-In” of 27 October, 1995, and the day of the referendum itself, October 30.
The CLI was completely nuts, to put it mildly. Downtown Montreal was swarmed by people coming from all over Canada in a show of love for Québec and asked its citizens to stay in the country. Some took it very seriously and did all they could to try to sway potential voters their way, while others just used the opportunity to go to Montreal and party.
The mood in the centre-ville that night was so odd, so unique. On the one hand drunken party goers, on the other worried and nearly desperate people working really hard to keep their country together. The mood was heightened by the steady stream of cold October rain that poured on the streets.
Clusters of people debating late into the night under the rain, impervious to the nasty conditions. Some angry, some crying. Individuals debating with 3, 4, 10 people at a time, most often in English. Québecois defending their choice for independence while others responded with questions about rejection, tears mixing in the rain dripping on their heads. “How am I to tell my son on Tuesday that he no longer has a country?”; “Why do you want to break away from us, we don’t hate you.”; ‘I don’t want to lose my country, why can’t you live with us?”;“We need to manage things on our own. We have unique needs and a culture that living in Canada prevents us from fully asserting.”; “We don’t hate you. We just want to live on our own terms.”.
Under the city’s neon-lights and the pouring rain, I truly understood what the expression “two solitudes” meant, when it’s used to describe the Québec/Canada relationship. Thousands of people standing together yet they couldn’t have been further apart.
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The day of the referendum was also quite unique. Beyond the excitement of voting for the first time, there was also the excitement of having contributed to what one hoped would be the right outcome.
The excitement and tension were palpable everywhere. I don’t remember people discussing much on that day, and all were looking rather serious. I felt the closing of the polling stations couldn’t come soon enough, so that we could finally know where we stood. My friends and I met, not knowing what to do with ourselves as we waited for the results.
The first results came in, and the mixture of cautious hope and rational analysis kicked in. We also realized that we needed to attend one of the rallies, somewhere big, somewhere we could feel the collective experience. We had to go downtown.
The results were extremely close and there would be no way to determine the winner until all the votes were counted, and that meant we would have to wait for the late evening. You spend time trying to predict, vacillating between hope and fear. You rally onto others, share thoughts with absolute strangers yet united by a common desire. It’s one of the most singular and extraordinary moments of collective solidarity I ever experienced.
And then came the results, which could not have been worse for such a decision, such a polarized society: 49,4 Yes to 50,6 No. Québec’s society was now officially torn and divided right down the middle.
There was no winner. Everybody was angry and disappointed. Some expressed their anger physically, others through words. And all became chaos, and the identity turmoil that plagued Québec’s society since the 1960s got thicker.
I remember hearing Québec Prime Minister Jacques Parizeau’s words that night: “Nous sommes battus, c’est vrai! Mais, dans le fond, par quoi? L’argent et des votes ethniques” (We are defeated it’s true. But by what in the end? Money and the ethnic vote). Yet the impact of those words only hit me the next day at school as friends of mine (of migrant origin) would ask me and others why the Prime Minister would say something like that. “I voted Yes! Why would he say people like me cost him the vote? I really felt like I belong here. Now I’m not so certain…
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While the result of 1980 initiated a phase of certainty and a series of political attempts to solve the issue, the 1995 referendum only resulted in creating more insecurity. Sovereignist movements no longer knew what to do to finally win. Decision makers became tentative. The Canadian government responded by voting for a series of measures designed to avoid another referendum and to control its outcome (Loi sur la clarté référendaire). And various allegations of fraud and voter manipulation would be discussed for years.
In short, the only tangible result was sociopolitical fear and mistrust, and it came from both sides.
What the Scots are currently going through is a unique event, and it should be experienced to its fullest. It truly is a life changing decision, that can have extremely positive and negative outcomes, but whose social consequences will reverberate for decades, regardless of the result. I would not hesitate to describe my experience of the 1995 referendum as one of the most extraordinary moments of my life, one that I will never forget.
Savour the moment Scotland, this is your time. You are about to find out more about yourselves than you ever did before.