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CONFLICT AND DIVERSITY: CANADA / QUÉBEC 441

during that period was of course the prime equilibrium born of various struggles and
mover, but the emergence of a more consul- compromises that culminated in the 1867
tative approach to federal policymaking also settlement. Bluntly put, immigration was fre-
played a role. The 2002 Immigration and quently perceived by Canada’s Francophones
Refugee Protection Act continues, for instance, as a plot to dissolve their culture into a rap-
the tradition of provincial consultation first idly expanding Anglophone majority
mandated in its 1976 predecessor. The result (Grenier, 2003; Kelley and Trebilcock, 1998:
of these forces has been an increasingly 20). This perception was partly based on
diverse immigration policy, with various facts. The first two great waves of immigra-
provinces, and even cities, clamouring to tion were almost entirely of British origin,
play a role. British Columbia and Manitoba contributing to the emergence of new
have obtained some control over parts of provinces, while the next two massively inte-
immigration policy, and Ontario has been grated into Canada’s Anglophone majority,
negotiating for both more input and funding until very recently (Henripin, 1994). Even
for decades (Beach et al., 2003: section III). within Québec’s borders, in Montréal in par-
But Québec is the sole jurisdiction to have ticular, most immigrants tended to gravitate
obtained nearly complete policy control. towards the vast North American (English-
Canada is therefore the only major immigra- speaking) cultural hegemon. And during
tion country to have a ‘bifurcated’ immigra- most of its history, Canada’s immigration
tion system, with two distinct administrative policy was blithely unconcerned with its
units having different policies, goals, and effect on Québec or French-Canadians in
institutional structures (Garcea, 1998). Since general. This was of course just one of many
immigration has traditionally been one of the shortcomings of what was, until the 1960s, not
defining prerogatives of national states, this so much a coherent policy but an essentially
policy fragmentation (dualism, really) raises arbitrary series of Cabinet or department-level
a number of questions, but also hints at larger regulations, explicitly exclusionary, driven by
trends, which will be briefly explored. an uneasy mix of short-term economic
Historically, immigration has affected imperatives (supplementing the labour force)
Canada’s two settler communities very dif- and larger strategic objectives (populating
ferently. It was a tool in the settlement of the the West) (Green, 1976; Green and Green,
Canadian West, a way to counter US expan- 2004).
sionism, and an instrument of economic It comes as no surprise then, that the rising
growth for the federation as a whole. After political fortunes of Québec nationalism in
initial colonization by the French and the the 1960s and 1970s moved immigration to
British, largely in separate regions of the the centre of the political stage. A number of
country, the four great phases of immigration Québec politicians had long felt that federal
to Canada – the settlement of loyalists (to immigration policies were not in line with
Britain) fleeing the American revolution in the province’s needs. Even before the elec-
19
the late 1700s, the immigration of workers tion of the first Parti Québécois government
and paupers from the British Isles (chiefly in 1976, the province took steps to enhance
Ireland) during the early to mid-1800s, the its role in this area. Québec created its own
great migratory influx of the early 1900s immigration department in 1968, a century
from Europe, especially Britain, and most after the first federal law on immigration was
recently the sustained and increasingly passed in 1869, and began to negotiate a
diverse immigration of the post-WWII series of agreements with federal authorities
ˆ
period – have had uneven consequences for (Paquet, 1997). The first of these was signed
Canada’s English and French ‘founding’ in 1971, and led to the permanent 1991 agree-
(colonizing) groups. 18 Each of those four ment, granting Québec nearly unilateral
phases created a particular challenge to the responsibility for the selection and integration