Accommodating difference: Canadian liberal discourse and the politics of linguistic duality

This thesis argues that the growing cultural diversity in Canada poses a challenge to the dominant liberal discourse formulated by Pierre Trudeau and that new modes of accommodation have to be sought to address the claims of this diverse society. The 'Canadian Multiculturalism Policy' attempts to accommodate ethnocultural difference within a liberal framework which proves inadequate as it is blind to its own biases and its underlying power structures and thus incapable of considering radical difference other than through a veil of neutrality. Taking the particular case of the Canadian francophone/anglophone duality, the way difference is created as otherness is explored through deconstruction and psychoanalysis. This binary opposition is unsettled to demonstrate the logic of supplementarity between the two communities, the interrelatedness of Self and Other and the fluidity at the heart of issues of identity/difference. It calls for a radical reinterpretation of the role of the Other in the Self, particularly with respect to the francophone/anglophone duality, and for a new mode of accommodation of difference: agonistic democracy. Practical ways are then proposed to implement agonistic democracy in Canada, with a focus on public policy processes, constitutionalism and historiography.