Will Canada one day no longer be a prisonhouse of nationalities? Will national oppression ever be eliminated? Will the different nationalities ever be able to live in equality and mutual respect?
A future like this is possible, and our Party has taken up the struggle to realize it. But the solution is not the status quo nor constitutional reforms of one kind or another. Though it is true that through relentless struggles we can force capitalism to grant some concessions, some softening of national oppression, the capitalists will never fundamentally do away with their reactionary policies toward, oppressed nationalities.
We have a wealth of experience to guide our fight to make Canada free of oppression. The historical example of socialist China and revolutionary Russia in the time of Lenin and Stalin have shown that socialist revolution opens the way to the liberation of peoples and total equality between nationalities.
This road is also opening up for Canada’s nationalities. Just as socialist China and Russia each developed a form of state that corresponded to the specific reality of their nationalities, so must Canada choose a form of state that best guarantees equality between all our peoples according to the country’s concreta conditions.
Unlike the British North America Act, Canada’s present constitution, the constitution of the Canadian socialist state will explicitly enshrine the rights of nationalities: the right of nationalities to absolute equality, whatever the size of their population; respect and preservation of their languages and cultures; and their right to fully flourish as peoples of Canada.
The constitution will also guarantee the right to regional autonomy (ie. an autonomous government in charge of local affairs) for formerly oppressed nationalities in areas where they are concentrated and the right to self-determination for the Quebec nation. If Quebec decides to remain within socialist Canada, it will also exercise its full right to regional autonomy.
Regional autonomy for oppressed nationalities is a right that communists resolutely uphold.
Even before the triumph of the first socialist revolution in the world, the Bolshevik revolution of 1917, the question of regional autonomy was debated by revolutionaries and opportunists. The latter reduced autonomy to a simple question of culture. Lenin emphasized the political and territorial nature of regional autonomy. [1]
One of the resolutions adopted in 1913 by the Central Committee of the Social-Democratic Workers Party of Russia stipulated:
This particularly calls for wide regional autonomy and fully democratic local self-government, with the boundaries of the self-governing and autonomous regions determined by the local inhabitants themselves on the basis of their economic and social conditions, national make-up of the population, etc. [2]
In this way, in a socialist Canada regional autonomy will be granted to the Inuit, Indians, Metis, Quebecois, Acadians, French Canadians, Black and Chinese Canadians, in areas where these nationalities are concentrated.
This means that these nationalities will autonomously control the territory they inhabit. They will be their own masters within the framework of the Canadian state.
Regional autonomy corresponds to self-government. The nationalities will democratically elect their representatives to independent administrative bodies in their regions.
The nationalities will have control over the administration of everything that affects their regions. Within the limits of their power, they will be able to administer the finances of the autonomous regions; establish a framework for regional autonomy – particular rules according to the characteristics and needs of the region’s nationality; take measures to develop their economy, culture, art, schools, public sanitation and roads services, etc.
The nationalities will thus be able to exercise their rights as peoples, within their own institutions.
Let’s look at two concrete examples of what regional autonomy means: Indian people will be able to protect their ancestral lands and determine their own economic development.
The nationalities will also be able to adapt the content of their education programs according to their cultural and historical values. Black-Canadian children will thus learn, for example, the history of their ancestors’ struggles. Indian children will learn Indian languages and will get an education that is linked to their ancestral traditions. Through a uniform point of view in the content of their schooling all Canadian children will learn at an early age to respect the development and cultures of different nationalities.
It’s clear that given the different conditions of the nationalities in Canada, regional autonomy will vary according to their situation, their needs and their desires. It will be applied differently for the Chinese Canadians, concentrated in certain communities of the major cities, than for the Indians, who are spread out over vast territories.
Some people may fear that regional autonomy might divide or split up the nationalities. On the contrary, it in fact favours unity between various nationalities.
Let us look at the example of a region where several nationalities live side by side. Regional autonomy does not mean moving whole populations to create one or more autonomous regions inhabited by one nationality alone. All people in a region, whatever their nationality, would be asked to stay, and everyone would take part in the autonomous region’s political structures.
Look, for example, at the regions where Acadians make up the majority but where there are large numbers of English Canadians. Just like any other resident in the autonomous regions to be formed there, English Canadians will have full democratic rights and fully participate in the life of the region.
The situation would be similar to that in China’s autonomous regions where several nationalities live. In the Mongolian autonomous region, for instance, members of the formerly dominant nation, the Hans, live side by side with the Mongols. Each of the two nationalities takes part in the local government structures, both separate and joint primary schools have been established, and teaching is done in both languages.
Other people reduce the whole question of regional autonomy to one of culture, where the nationalities only have the right to control questions of education, language and culture.
This is an incorrect conception of regional autonomy. Regional autonomy is linked to the question of territory. The powers of the autonomous region are not just limited to cultural questions, but are concerned with all local questions concerning the region and its economy, like the region’s budgetary needs, communications, etc.
Since the inhabitants of an autonomous region already have economic links, one cannot present language and culture as the only “rallying cry” of the nationalities.
What’s more, to claim that each nationality’s autonomy should be limited to cultural or educational questions alone can lead to a dangerous position that encourages national particularism and breaks down the unity between nationalities. It can lead to demands for “cultural autonomy” rather than regional autonomy.
This tendency developed at one point in socialist Russia, and Lenin and Stalin made major criticisms of it.
In 1913, Stalin wrote the following concerning the demand for “cultural-national autonomy” put forward by the Austrian communists:
It means... that the Czechs, Poles, Germans and so on, scattered over the various parts of Austria, taken personally, as individuals, are to be organized into integral nations, and are as such to form part of the Austrian state. In this way Austria would represent not a union of autonomous regions, but a union of autonomous nationalities, constituted irrespective of territory.
It means... that the national institutions which are to be created for this purpose for the Poles, Czechs, and so forth, are to have jurisdiction only over “cultural”, not “political” questions.”
He concluded:
it will be seen from the foregoing that cultural-national autonomy is no solution of the national question. Not only that, it serves to aggravate and confuse the question by creating a situation which favours the destruction of the unity of the labour movement, fosters the segregation of the workers according to nationality and intensifies frictions among them.” [3]
The form the socialist Canadian state will take remains to be defined as well. But it must first and foremost ensure that the historic right of nations to self-determination is respected. In our country this means that the Quebec nation can freely choose whether or not it wishes to remain within the Canadian state. At the same time the form of the state must be adapted according to the concrete conditions in our country, at the same time ensuring the best form of autonomy for the nationalities as well as the greatest possible unity among them.
The experience of socialist China and Russia under Lenin and Stalin have shown that the principles of equality, autonomy and unity of the nationalities can be applied in different ways.
The various constitutions adopted by the socialist Soviet Union under Lenin and Stalin included and guaranteed the rights of the different nationalities. Contrary to the constitutions in capitalist countries, the constitution of the first socialist state “proceeds from the fact that all nations and races have equal rights. It proceeds from the fact that neither difference in colour or language, cultural level or level of political development, nor any other difference between nations and races, can serve as grounds for justifying national inequality of rights.” [4]
The national situation that the new Bolshevik regime faced after the 1917 revolution was very complex. About 60 distinct peoples – already-formed nations, nationalities and national groups – inhabited the vast territory of the old Czarist Empire. They had reached different levels of economic, political and social development. The Russian nation, for example, had reached a relatively-developed stage of capitalist development, as had, for the most part, the Ukrainian people. The peoples of central Asia, like the Turkestans, had not surpassed the pre-capitalist stage. Some other peoples and ethnic groups were chained to feudal or clan societies, living nomadic lives and practising animal husbandry. Some of them still faced slave conditions.
The type of state that the new socialist country would adopt had to take all these factors into consideration, while assuring complete equality for all peoples and favouring their full economic and social development.
As a result, at the 1st Congress of Soviets in 1922, the Union or Soviet Socialist Republics was founded, a multi-national state based on equality and the voluntary union of the peoples of the USSR. It was made up of 11 federated Soviet Republics (now 15) as well as different autonomous republics and regions, assuring regional autonomy for the national minorities.
“Soviet autonomy,” Stalin wrote, “is not a rigid thing fixed once and for all time; it permits the most varied forms and degrees of development. It passes from narrow, administrative autonomy (the Volga Germand, the Chuvashes, the Karelians) to a wider, political autonomy (the Bashkirs, the Volga Tatars, the Kirghiz); from wide political autonomy to a still wider form of it (the Ukraine, Turkestan); and lastly, from the Ukrainian type of autonomy to a still wider form of autonomy – to contractual relations (Azerbaijan).” [5]
Applying a just proletarian policy toward nations means, as Lenin showed, granting each nation the right to choose its own future. It is this principle that the then-revolutionary USSR under its federative form respected, recognizing each republic’s right to secede from the union if it so chose.
Each republic could adopt its own constitution; its territory could not be modified without its approval.
The Republic, independently exercising power over all questions affecting its territory, had its own legislative, executive and administrative bodies. It ran the local branches of the state administration according to its capacity, administering local industry, agriculture, trade and international affairs of the Republic, the judicial system, health services, education, etc. In addition, each republic participated directly in the central government through the Soviet of Nationalities, one of the two houses in the USSR legislature (Supreme Soviet).
But the Bolshevik Party under Lenin and Stalin, taking into account the huge differences in economic, cultural and social development, saw clearly that political rights are not enough to ensure complete equality among nationalities.
So important economic measures were taken. At the party’s 12th Congress in 1923, Lenin emphasized the importance of creating industrial bases, the transfer of enterprises and factories from the centre to the underdeveloped peripheral regions.
Different Five-Year economic plans were elaborated, each one according particular importance to the balanced economic development of the different republics.
Systematic measures were also taken to develop the cultures of different nationalities; for example, to provide many of them with written languages.
After the revolution in 1949, socialist China opted for a form of unitary multinational state, ensuring regional autonomy for the different nationalities.
In China, 94% of the population belongs to the Han nation; the other 6% are made up of 55 different minority nationalities. The nationalities vary greatly in size, from the 10 million-member Chang nationality to the 700-member Hoche group. Before the revolution some of them were on the brink of extinction.
The unitary state form ensures the equality of all the nationalities, no matter how small, preserves their unity and enables each nationality to develop economically, politically and socially.
In line with this, the Constitution of the People’s Republic of China stipulates: “All the nationalities are equal... Regional autonomy applies in an area where a minority nationality lives in a compact community. All the autonomous national areas are inalienable parts of the People’s Republic of China.” [6]
There are five autonomous regions in China, each with the status of a province, 29 autonomous prefectures and 69 autonomous counties.
In cases where several nationalities live in the same region, each one has autonomous powers or, if they are equal in size, they share the power.
When concentrations of nationalities live outside an autonomous region, (as is the case of the Mongolian groups who live outside the territory of Inner Mongolia), they benefit from their own form of government inside an autonomous district.
The organs of the state in the autonomous regions (organs of self-government) enable the nationalities to take in hand those issues which affect their regions. The autonomous regions can thus adapt the laws of the state to the local conditions and take specific measures to fill the economic and cultural gaps of the nationalities.
In financial matters, for example, the bodies of self-government administer revenues and expenditures. In the Xinjiang Autonomous Region it was decided that all the region’s revenue would be spent in the region itself, and that the central state would help with major subsidies.
Self-government also enables the nationalities to draw up specific regulations reflecting their national characteristics, which become law as soon as they are passed by China’s National People’s Congress. Thus in the Tibet Autonomous Region special measures were taken to ensure totally free medical care to the population.
In economic construction, the autonomous region can take the measures necessary to adapt the central plan to its own conditions.
The organs of self-government also have the right to use the written and spoken languages of the nationalities of that area. For example, the courts use the different national languages.
China’s national minorities participate fully in the highest organ of state power, the National People’s Congress. Though they make up only 6% of the Chinese population, their representatives make up 10.9% of the delegates to the NPC.
The Chinese state pays particular attention to the economic development of the autonomous regions.
For example, Inner Mongolia, which in 1947 was the first autonomous region to be set up, benefits from an administrative budget higher than the budgets allotted to provinces and municipalities inhabited by the Han people. It also receives large investments for basic construction and loans for farming and husbandry.
Many engineers and technicians were sent to Inner Mongolia to set up an industrial base and train Mongol specialists.
Today the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region has a developed industry, with 3600 factories and mines. The overall value of industrial production is 100 times greater than what it was in 1949.
Since the concrete conditions in our country are different from those in the USSR after 1917 and those in socialist China, Canada must develop its own form of state that guarantees the full rights of nationalities, in particular their right to regional autonomy. But it will also have to ensure that nationalities have the concrete means to exercise these rights.
That is why the Canadian proletarian state will take measures to eliminate the economic inequalities left over from capitalism and allow the nationalities to develop economically, politically and culturally.
Take for example the Maritime regions where Acadian communities are concentrated. Today they are economically underdeveloped and their industrial base is weak. In northeastern New Brunswick, where Acadians make up the majority, unemployment in May 1979 was 14% whereas it was 7.8% in the southwest of the province, where 90% of the population is English-speaking.
These regional disparities are caused by the unequal development of capitalism: capital is invested where there is the most profit to be made. The resulting economic underdevelopment accentuates the national oppression of the Acadians.
Under socialism, on the other hand, central state planning will enable part of the funds accumulated in the highly productive centres of the country to be used to help economically develop the underdeveloped regions, even if this results in deficits in the beginning.
The Acadian regions of the Maritimes could be granted special credit in order to establish a solid industrial base to supplement traditional economic activities like fishing. French technical schools would be set up to train Acadians as skilled workers and technicians, thus enabling the community to independently take in hand its economic developement.
The struggle for regional autonomy for the oppressed nationalities in Canada in areas where they are concentrated must be taken up right now.
This demand is included in the WCP’s program. Party activists are working to make this demand known among the nationalities, just as they did at the Acadians’ National Orientation Convention in Edmundston, New Brunswick at the beginning of October.
It is all the more important to explain this demand to English-Canadian workers so as to combat great-nation chauvinism and bring them to firmly defend this right.
Some workers who have read the program have criticized the fact that we demand regional autonomy under capitalism. Their reasoning is that demanding regional autonomy today would lead the national movement down a reformist path because capitalism would never grant this right.
Regional autonomy is by nature the same as any other democratic right. It is incorrect to think that mass struggles cannot force the capitalists to concede rights like these. Unemployment insurance, for example, is a democratic right that the people have won.
But communists know that such rights remain at the mercy of the capitalists, who have always tried and always will try to take them away from the working people.
This is being shown today by the capitalists, as they deny hundreds of workers their right to unemployment insurance and erode our medicare system little by little.
That’s why communists, along with their workmates, don’t stop at demanding these democratic rights. They also show that these rights, like regional autonomy, will only be guaranteed under socialism.
The working class in power in a socialist state has no interest in maintaining the oppression of nationalities. On the contrary it strives to insure their full development and equality. A proletarian policy has nothing to do with the policy of the handful of millionaires who rule Canada today, profiting from exploitation and constantly restricting the rights of nationalities.
The working class’s final goal is the liberation of all people from all forms of exploitation, including equality for all nations and an end to national oppression. This is why under socialism, all democratic rights, and rights of nationalities like the right to regional autonomy, are guaranteed and maintained by the working class in power.
[1] It is amusing to look at what the In Struggle group thinks of the demand for regional autonomy. As far as they are concerned, it is no more than an invention of the WCP. In their attempt to criticize our program, they write: “It is a whole other question to... push the idiocy as far as inventing demands like “regional autonomy” for Chinese Canadians.” (IS, No. 164, p. 8. Our translation)
IS goes even further. They call the demand for regional autonomy for the Acadian people defended by the WCP a “nationalist recruiting trick.” (IS supplement in No. 173, p. 3)
[2] Lenin, Resolutions of the 1913 Joint Conference of the Central Committee of the RSDLP and Party Officials, Collected Works, Vol. 19, pp. 427-8.
[3] Stalin, Marxism and the National Question, Works, Vol. 2, Red Star Press, pp. 343-4.
[4] It was with these words that in 1936 Stalin presented the draft for the new constitution of the USSR to the delegates at the Eight Congress of Soviets.
This constitution is no longer the constitution of the USSR. First it was deformed by the revisionists in the early ’60s and then scrapped totally by Brezhnev on June 9, 1977. The new constitution sanctions the present fascist regime in the USSR.
[5] Stalin, “The Policy of the Soviet Government on the National Question in Russia” in Marxism and the National-Colonial Question, Proletarian Publishers, p. 126.
[6] Documents from the 1st session of the 5th National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China, Beijing, Foreign Languages Press, 1978.