Idéologies au Canada Français, 1850–1900 ed. by Fernand Dumont, Jean-Paul Montminy, Jean Hamelin (review)

450 THE CANADIAN HISTORICAL REVIEW efforts toplaceherheroinhistorical context invariably failedbecause herinterest, dedication,enthusiasm, and fascinationwere reservedfor Gourlay, her universal gadfly. ELWOOD JONES Trent University Ideologies au CanadaFranfais,x85o--•9oo. Edit• par FERNAND DVMON% JEANPAUL MONT•INV,et J•,AN•A•ELIN..Quebec,LesPresses de l'Universit•Laval, •97I. Pp.327.$•o.oo. Thisbookcomprises seventeen essays, most of themprepared bystudents in a Lavalgraduate seminar in history andsociology. Theywereoriginally published in Recherches Sociographiques, x, 2-3 (mai-d6c.i969). Mostof themresume theeditorial positions of newspapers (or thefundamental principles onwhich those positions werebased),or theideasof individual intellectuals. Their ap-' proach issupposed to beinterdisciplinary; history andsociology areintended tospeak toeachotherandenlighten eachother. Some oftheessays giveinteresting surveys of individual newspapers' positions andimpressive collections ofeditorial quotations. Oneortwoaregood aselementaryintroductions totheintellectual assumptions andgeneral attitudes ofFrench Quebecin thesecond half of thenineteenth century. Nevertheless, thereare a numberof defects - for example,the failureof the interdisciplinary approach. Theworkhereisbasically prettyorthodox intellectual history,and sociology seems to havecontributedlittle but somemumbo-jumbo jargonintroduced gratuitously hereand thereby students who apparentlywant to showthe professor theyhavelearnedsomething from his classes. Speaking of 'leprojetsocietal' (p. I55) whenyoumean'lesbutsde la soci6t6,' or saying that a party 'restructure te rapport valeur-action'(p. I57) when you mean that it 'fondesapolitiquesurde nouvelles valeurs,'doesnot seemuseful.To spend pages explaining thatyouarelookingfor 'modUles d'action'byapplyinga 'technique d'analyse comparative' whichwill enableyouto discover a 'transformationdel 'id•ologieauxdivers niveauxdesastructure,' whenall youaredoing, in fact,isreading a numberoftextsin thestraight-forward waytopickouttheir main ideas - allthis seems unnecess•try, tosay theleast. More serious isa lackof generalorganisation, a failureof oneauthorto take account ofwhat anotherhassaid,sometimes with resulting contradictions. Thus, G•rardBouchard tellsus(p. •I9) thatof Le Nouveau Monde'si87ocirculation of5-6,ooo,'ondevine' thatmostreaders weremembers oftheclergy. YetFernand Dumont,in hisintroductory essay, hassaidthataslateasI88o therewereonly 2ooo 'clercs' in Quebec altogether. Whysuppose, in anycase, thatmost of the readers wereclerics? Fivethousand was,afterall, an unusually largecirculation fora Quebec newspaper in 187o.Perhaps M. Bouchard supposes thatonlyclerics wouldhavereadan ultramontane newspaper. The selection of subjects in this bookmayhaveencouraged sucha supposition. Professor Dumonttellsusthat REVIEWS 451 extremes of opinion werechosen todelineate thelimits.Butthiscreates a false impression of where themiddlelay.'Moderate' papers didnothavea position midway between Ultramontane andRouge but,in fact,shared thebasic assumptions of the former. Perhaps thisisconnected withthefrequent failureofthebook to distinguish between fundamental principles - ideologies - andpolicies onparticularquestions . Thismaybeattributable tothesociological approach which,in attempting to connectideas with the concretesocial and economic situation in .Quebec, encourages toogreata concentration onparticular issues, to theexclusion of basic values andprinciples (which latter,afterall,werewhatthetitlepromised thebookwouldbeabout).Onemighthaveexpected less oncolonisation and moreonthevalues whichmadecolonisation thepreferred methodof checking emigration. Similarly, emphasis ontheimmediate .Quebec situation leads usto forget thatQuebec's ideological struggle wasonlya partoftheEuropean ideological conflict, ofwhich Quebec intellectuals wereaware, andinwhichtheyfelt themselves tobeparticipants. A. I. SILVER GlendonCollege The Politicso[ Chaos:Canadain the Thirties.H. BLAre NEATBY. Toronto, Macmillan,I97•. PP.vi, •96,illus.$Io.oocloth,$3.95paper. Here istheoutlineof an excellent synthesis of Canadianhistoryin the period of the GreatDepression, when'Canadians had become awareof the modem problems of an industrial society andhadsearched for answers.' The resulting workis a modelof comprehensive unityin brief form that is an outstanding tributeto its authorand to the manyotherhistorians who havefilled in the bitsandpieces that Professor Neatbyhasusedsowellin creating hisedifice. Theirwork,some ofwhichfirstappeared in thisjournal,collectively constitutes a convincing demonstration of history asa cumulative discipline. Readers may wonderat timesabout the significance of someof the articleson narrowly focussed subjects appearing in scholarly journalsbut if the Politicso[ Chaos achieves the circulationit deserves the casefor the utility of much scholarly research of thissortcan be easilydocumented. The Thirtieswasan extremely importantdecade, bothfor thosewho lived throughit and bearthe psychological scars throughlife and for thoseborn later. One mightadvocate the particularutility of knowledge of the Great Depression foryoung people nowinouruniversities whograduate intocrowded labourmarkets andfaceuncertain economic prospects. The infalliblejudgment of historians who knowand revealthe ignorance and error of the political leaders of thepastmaybeof smallcomfort to thembut at leasttheycanbe forearmed against naiveacceptance of thepanaceas of ourownday. The structureof this bookalsorevealsthe great strengthof the tradition ofpolitical biography in Canada. Thepointisexplicitly made bytheinclusion of capsule portraits of thepolitical leaders of thetime.These constitute sixof ...