CANADA,QUEBEC AND THEORIES OF INTERNAL WAR

Abstract

The past several years have been marked by renewed signs of significant political unrest and separatist activity in Quebec. In the same period of time a number of scholars in different disciplines have revivified the study of domestic violence or internal war. In spite of this temporal co-occurrence, students of Canadian affairs have done little to place that Quebec independence movement in the context of a theory which would make it understandable as a “type” of behavior rather than as a completely unique activity. This paper discusses some of the requirements of such theories, as they relate to political stability and internal war, categorizes a number of existing works in regard to how they explain the sources of political resistance and revolt and attempts to relate them to the current Quebec-Canada difficulties.