Governing the Island of Montreal

Language Differences and Metropolitan Politics

Andrew Sancton

• Publisher: University of California Press
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN:
  9780520305779
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9780520310766
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Located at the junction of the St. Lawrence and Ottawa rivers, Montreal Island is the main contact point between French and English Canadians. Prior to Quebec's "Quiet Revolution" of the 1960s, local governments in Montreal both reflected and perpetuated the mutual isolation of French and English. Residential concentration in autonomous suburbs, together with self-contained networks of schools and social services, enabled English-speaking Montrealers to control the city's economy and to conduct their community's affairs with little regard for the French-speaking majority. The modernization of the Quebec state in the 1960s dramatically challenged this arrangement.The author demonstrates how the English-speaking politicians in cooperation with certain French-speaking allies have succeeded in preventing the wholesale adoption of ambitious schemes for metropolitan reorganization. He describes the workings of a society divided by language and ethnicity, where the pervasiveness of the politics of language impedes all plans for comprehensive metropolitan reform.This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press's mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1985.

Table of contents

• Contents
• Tables and Maps
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• Abbreviations
• 1. Introduction: The Environment for Metropolitan Reform
• Alliances of Convenience
• Comparisons with the United States
• Political Will
• Political Will
• I. French and English in Montreal prior to 1960
• 2. The Emergence of the "Two Solitudes"
• Montreal's Ethnic Balance
• Ethnic Diversity Without Conflict
• Evidence of English Dominance
• Mutual Isolation
• 3. Municipal Government in Montreal
• The English Retreat to the Suburbs
• Annexations
• The Montreal Metropolitan Commission
• Twentieth-Century Populist Mayors
• Camiliien Houde
• Proposals for Metropolitan Reform
• The Municipal Service Bureau and the Borough System
• The Paquette Report
• The Suburbs Begin to Organize
• The Montreal Metropolitan Corporation
• The Politics of Caution
• 4 Schools and Social Services
• School Boards
• School Boards and the Constitution
• Jews: Catholic or Protestant?
• English-Speaking Catholics
• Growing Demand for Educational Reform, 1925-1960
• Social Services: The Public Charities Act
• The Welfare State Comes to Quebec
• The Welfare State Comes to Quebec
• II. The Quiet Revolution
• 5. Quebec Politics and the Politicization of Language, 1960-1981
• The Quiet Revolution
• English Canada Responds
• English Canada Responds
• Provincial Politics in Turmoil, 1966-1970
• Montreal's Language Groups
• Francophones: A Homogeneous Ethnic Group
• Anglophones: Only a Language Group
• "Others": French or English?
• Montreal: Bilingual City?
• Language: The Territorial Dimension
• Bills 63 and 22: Language in the Political Arena
• Robert Bourassa and Bill 22
• The Impact of the Parti Québécois
• René Lévesque and Bill 101
• French: The New Language of Work
• The 1980 Referendum and the 1981 Provincial Election
• Anglophones and Language Legislation
• III. Reorganizing Montreal's Local Government
• 6. Creating the Montreal Urban Community
• Drapeau's Metropolitan Strategies
• Establishing the Blier Commission
• Annexation Battles
• Searching for a Solution
• Blier's Final Compromise
• The Lack of Provincial Action
• The Montreal Urban Community: First Version
• Another Retreat
• The Police Strike of October 1969
• Saulnier's Solution
• Weakness on All Fronts
• The Creation of the MUC
• Bill 75 and the Legislative Process
• Functions of the MUC
• The Montreal Urban Community Transit Commission
• A Noncontroversial Reform
• 7. The Montreal Urban Community in Operation
• Saulnier as MUC Chair
• Hanigan and DesMarais
• The MUC: Accomplishments and Failures
• The Quality of Air and Water
• Public Transit
• Regional Planning
• The Montreal Urban Community Police Department
• Problems with Police-Cost Sharing
• Police Force Unification
• Quebec Municipal Commission: 1972 MUC Budget
• Language and Policing
• Attempts at Municipal Consolidation
• The Westmount "Bourg" Plan
• Lochine's Seven Cities Plan
• Hanigan's Suggested Mergers
• Tinkering with MUC Structures
• Pointe-aux-Trembles Annexation
• The Suburban Alliance
• 8. The Reorganization of Montreal's School Boards
• Seculcurization of School Boards
• The Page Report
• Bill 62: Eleven Unified School Boards
• Opposition Grows
• The Liberal Proposal: Bill 28
• Bill 28 in Committee
• Bill 71: The School Council of the Island of Montreal
• Bill 71: Passage and Implementation
• School Board Reorganization: An Unresolved Problem
• 9. Social Services
• The First Version of Bill 65
• Castonguay Makes Concessions
• The Council of Health and Social Services of Metropolitan Montreal
• Language Issues
• Social Service Centers for Montreal
• Three Centers: French, English, and Jewish
• Sectorization
• Drawing Linguistic Boundaries
• The Private Politics of Public Social Services
• 10 Conclusion: Language Differences and Metropolitan Reform in Montreal
• The Policing Controversy
• Uniqueness of Social Services
• School Boards: Pressure from Quebec Nationalists
• Appendix: Political Parties in Canada, Quebec, and Montreal