Les invasions barbares

In Quebec, only 42% of voters chose to mark their ballots for the separatist Bloc Quebecois. The Conservative party, with all of its baggage, was able to gain ten seats in la belle province, which, while not a breakthrough, is certainly a foothold.

I think that Quebec is going to be on the leading edge of libertarian politics in Canada for the next few years. As is well-known, Quebecers have more hedonistic, live-and-let-live social values that do the rest of Canada, which is very much in keeping with the libertarian ethos of "do whatever you want, as long as I don't have to pay for it". On economic issues, public sector unions still run the state apparatus, but even that is slowly beginning to erode despite Premier Jean Charest's unpopularity due to his attempts to rein them in. Witness the Chaoulli decision, very much supported by Quebecers, which suggests that excessive waits for health care services are a violation of the province's Charter. And, as someone much more prescient in these matters than I am once told me, the tipping point was the phenomenal success of the film "Les invasions barbares". Over at the Western Standard, a blogger makes the same point.

If you haven't seen the film, I strongly suggest you do so. It lampooned the Quebec intellectual class, which had historically been so enamoured of all the various "isms" that came in and out of fashion on the Left - socialism, Marxism, Maoism, whatever. However, at the end of the day, the characters in the film soon learn that the free market is the only realistic way forward. The film demonstrates the follies of central planning through the prism of the health care system, and it clearly struck a nerve with Quebecois. What this means for the future of right-of-centre politics in Quebec is unclear, but one has to wonder if the federal Conservatives can harness this emerging desire for less statism in Quebec, combine it with the laissez-faire social values of Quebecois, and use their small victories on Monday night as a platform from which to advance the libertarian option in "la belle province".