Québec solidaire
Template:Infobox Canada Political Party
Québec solidaire is a socially progressive political party in Québec, Canada, that was created on 4 February 2006 in Montréal. It was formed by the merger of the left-wing party Union des forces progressistes (UFP) and the altermondialist political movement Option Citoyenne led by Françoise David.
The left wing party – which also advocates Quebec sovereignty from Canada – hopes also to appeal to environmentalists, feminists and socialists. It hopes to cut into the support of the Parti Québécois, the main political vehicle for Quebec sovereigntists.
Françoise David and Amir Khadir are the two spokespersons. Danielle Maire has been elected secretary general and will act as party leader for the purposes of the Loi électorale du Québec. Alexa Conradi was elected president. However, as with its predecessors, Option Citoyenne and the Union de Forces Progressistes, there is no "party leader" in this new party. Instead, the duties generally entrusted to the leader are instead divided among the president, secretary general and male and female spokespeople.
Like the UFP before it, QS includes activists drawn from the Rassemblement pour l'alternative progressiste (RAP), the Parti de la démocratie socialiste (PDS), the Parti communiste du Québec (PCQ), and the Quebec-based membership of the International Socialists, as well as anarchist, radical and pacifist tendencies.
The aim of QS is in part to widen the appeal and organizational structure of the UFP, and to give a formal political voice to alter-globalist movements like Option Citoyenne. As such, QS aims to bring together progressive forces across the broad left wing of the Québec political spectrum.
The party's declaration of principles does not specifically endorse social democracy, socialism or communism, although it includes certain activists and tendencies that do.
Quebec's Green Party, the Parti vert du Québec, had tried to avoid running candidates in ridings where there was a UFP candidate, although it reserved the right to run anywhere it wants to (even ridings with a UFP candidate). Such an arrangement may continue with respect to Québec Solidaire.
QS presents itself as an alternative to the main three parties in Quebec: the Parti Québécois, the Parti libéral du Québec, and the conservative Action démocratique du Québec, saying that all three are but different faces of the same right-wing ideology called neoliberalism.
For several months after the party's formation, it had no official colour or logo. After more than an hour of discussion on the subject, the founding congress decided to postpone the vote on these questions until later, with a probable delay until the party's first National Council meeting 3 months later. An official logo was subsequently adopted, along with the colour blue.
Declaration of principles
The party does not yet have a political program or even a platform. However, it inherits the political content of the two merged political entities – UFP and Option Citoyenne. At the party's founding, the congress unanimously adopted a document called the Déclaration de principes which lays out the principles and values that led the two organizations to merge. They are:
- Ecology: Nous sommes écologistes
- Left-wing orientation: Nous sommes de gauche
- Democracy: Nous sommes démocrates
- Feminism: Nous sommes féministes
- Alter-globalism: Nous sommes altermondialistes
- Pluralism in Québec: Nous sommes d'un Québec pluriel
- Québec sovereignty and solidarity: Nous sommes d'un Québec souverain et solidaire
- Electoral engagement on the Québec political scene: Un autre parti pour un autre Québec!
QS spokespeople
Hezbollah affair
In late July 2006, one member of the party, Ginette Lewis, caused controversy when she was quoted as declaring her party's unconditional support for Hezbollah at a Quebec City rally and welcoming Hezbollah's "fierce resistance" as a "sign of hope" (« résistance farouche », « signe d’espoir »).[1] Françoise David, the party's official spokeswoman, dissociated the party from Lewis's statements the following day, emphasizing that the QS is a pacifist party.[2] Lewis herself later claimed that she had been misquoted, but the affair has been a great embarrassment for the new party.[3]
Election results
QS has not yet contested a general election. It has, however, fielded a candidate, Manon Massé, in an April 10, 2006, by-election in Sainte-Marie—Saint-Jacques. She received 22% of the vote, a substantial improvement over the UFP's 6.5% vote in the 2003 election.
See also
- Rassemblement pour l'alternative progressiste
- Parti de la démocratie socialiste
- Parti communiste du Québec
- Politics of Quebec
- List of Quebec leaders of the Opposition
- National Assembly of Quebec
- Political parties in Quebec
- SPQ Libre