Ideology: Fostering understanding on its influence on the 2018 Quebec general election

Résumé

Politics in Quebec have long been depicted as being polarized, with federalists on one side and sovereigntists on the other. The 2018 election put an end to forty years of bipartisanship between the two main opposing groups in this divide. The victory of Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) was a major shift as the party sidestepped questions regarding Quebec’s status and independence. This research paper focuses on the rise of ideology as an explanatory factor in the voting behaviour of people in Quebec. From this perspective, do ideological factors (such as the division between the left and the right, moral conservatism, and managing diversity) have a significant influence on voting in the last election when compared to the 2012 general election? These factors appear to influence CAQ’s victory as well as the rise of Québec solidaire (QS). This research paper is based on the Michigan model and uses binomial logistic regression to evaluate the impact of independent variables on voting. After obtaining the results and comparing them with the 2012 election, it appears that moral conservatism and diversity management were the two most significant ideological factors for the CAQ and QS, which are parties with conflicting positions on these matters. These factors seem to partially explain the CAQ’s victory and the rise of QS in 2018.