Québec Solidaire leader Françoise David quits politics
By
Louis Girard
3 March 2017
The parliamentary leader of Québec Solidaire (QS), Françoise David, has announced that she is leaving politics, citing health reasons, specifically “exhaustion.” David, 69, has been one of the principal leaders of QS and its most prominent spokesperson since the ostensibly leftwing, pro-Quebec independence party was founded more than a decade ago.
Quebec’s political establishment and media responded to David’s resignation with gushing tributes.
Quebec Liberal Premier Philippe Couillard, who has presided over sweeping social spending cuts, praised David for having “contributed greatly” to helping “maintain a civilized tone” even when “we…disagree on the political orientation of Quebec.”
Jean-François Lisée, the leader of the big business, indépendantiste Parti Québécois, said “She (David) has been able to make our political mores gentler.”
The Montreal daily Le Devoir, which serves as a house organ for Quebec’s pro-independence political establishment and intelligentsia, hailed David as “a pragmatic politician,” who was ready to work with her political opponents in the National Assembly.
These ruling-class representatives sized up David accurately, recognizing that her rhetorical “leftism” posed no threat to the existing social order.
Rejecting the fundamental division of society into antagonistic social classes, David promoted the fiction of a “Quebec people” united by a common language (French) and able to act collectively to achieve social progress through parliamentary action—perhaps facilitated by occasional friendly pressure from “the streets”—but without serious social conflict or ever challenging capitalism.
Since its founding…