Quiet Revolution
A primary change was an effort by the provincial government to assume greater control over healthcare and education, both of which had previously been under the purview of the Catholic Church.
Furthermore, during this period, French Canadians in Quebec adopted the term Québécois to distinguish themselves from both the rest of Canada and France, solidifying their identity as a reformed province.
The 1950s tenure of Quebec Premier Maurice Duplessis epitomized the conservative ideal of a religiously and culturally pure Québec, and became known among liberals as the Grande Noirceur ('Great Darkness'), although the Richard Riot of 1955 may have signaled growing submerged forces.
[5] Radio-Canada, the newspaper Le Devoir and political journal Cité Libre were intellectual forums for critics of the Duplessis Government.
[4] Prior to the Quiet Revolution, the province's natural resources were developed mainly by foreign investors,[citation needed] such as the US-based Iron Ore Company of Canada.
They were supported by Joseph Charbonneau (Bishop of Montreal), the Québécois nationalist newspaper Le Devoir, and a small group of intellectuals.
The Liberal Party, led by Jean Lesage and campaigning under the slogans Il faut que ça change ("Things have to change") and Maîtres chez nous ("Masters of our own house", a phrase coined by Le Devoir editor André Laurendeau), was voted into power within a year of Duplessis's death.
It is generally accepted that the revolution ended before the October Crisis of 1970, but Québec society has continued to change dramatically since then, notably with the rise of the sovereignty movement, evidenced by the election of the sovereigntist Parti Québécois (first in 1976 by René Lévesque),[7] the formation of a sovereigntist political party representing Québec on the federal level, the Bloc Québécois (founded in 1991 by Lucien Bouchard),[7] as well as the 1980 and 1995 sovereignty referendums.
[11] Following World War II, while most of the United States and Canada was enjoying a long period of prosperity and modernization, economic growth was slower in Québec.
The publication of his book Les insolences du Frère Untel (1960) quickly sold over 100,000 copies and has come to be recognized as having important impact on the beginning of the Quiet Revolution.
[10] Additionally, more emphasis was placed on the hard sciences, and there was now work for the Québécois who had previously needed to leave the province in order to find jobs in their preferred fields.
[14] Also during the time of the Quiet Revolution, Quebec experienced a large drop in the total fertility rate (known as TFR: the lifetime average number of live births per woman of child-bearing age) falling from 3.8 in 1960 to 1.9 in 1970.
[18] Seeking a mandate for its most daring reform, the nationalization of the province's electric companies under Hydro-Québec, the Liberal Party called for a new election in 1962.
The Liberal party was returned to power with an increased majority in the Legislative Assembly of Québec and within six months, René Lévesque, Minister of Natural Resources, enacted his plans for Hydro-Québec.
It demonstrated the strength and initiative of the Québec government and was a symbol of the ingenuity of Québécois in their capability to complete such an ambitious project.
[19] The original Hydro-Québec project ushered in an era of "megaprojects" that would continue until 1984, seeing Québéc's hydroelectric network grow and become a strong pillar of the province.
The public companies SIDBEC (iron and steel), SOQUEM (mining), REXFOR (forestry) and SOQUIP (petroleum) were created to exploit the province's natural resources.
Duplessis' policy was to sell off untransformed natural resources at bargain prices in order to create more employment in Québec's regions.
[22] The shift in mentality of the Quiet Revolution allowed Québec to gain further financial autonomy by accessing this area of the economy which, as is evidenced by Hydro-Québec, is extremely profitable.
The Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ, 'Québec Deposit and Investment Fund') was created in 1965 to manage the considerable revenues generated by the RRQ and to provide the capital necessary for various projects in the public and private sectors.
The societal and economic innovations of the Quiet Revolution, which empowered Québec society, emboldened certain nationalists to push for political independence.
Though the improvements made to Québec society during this era make it seem like an extremely innovative period, it has been posited that these changes follow a logical revolutionary movement occurring throughout the Western world in the 1960s.
Québec historian Jacques Rouillard [fr] took this revisionist stance in arguing that the Quiet Revolution may have accelerated the natural evolution of Quebec's francophone society rather than having turned it on its head.
Its achievements include nationalizing the electricity distribution network of the city of Montreal, granting universal suffrage, instituting mandatory schooling until the age of 14 and establishing various social programs in Québec.
[32][33] Dale Thomson, for his part, noted that Jean Lesage, far from seeking to dismantle the traditional order, negotiated a transition with (and sought to accommodate) Québéc's Catholic Church.
