How should citizenship be integrated into high school history programs? Public controversies and the Québec History and Citizenship Education curriculum: an analysis

Oct 15, 2026

An analysis examines how citizenship education is integrated into Québec high school history through the History and Citizenship Education curriculum, focusing on public controversies and “memory wars.” The study traces disputes that followed a draft program’s misleading excerpts, opposition in federal and provincial politics, and concerns over commemorating the French defeat. It argues the program is not indoctrination in Canadian nationalism, and contextualizes identity-building aims amid political and media debates.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages22

Reading Time55 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Public controversies around the curriculum

Memory wars and political uses of history

The 2006 Québec curriculum debate

Purpose of the program and analysis scope

Canadian Social Studies 45(1) Éthier & Lefrançois How should citizenship be integrated into high school history programs? Public controversies and the Québec History and Citizenship Education curriculum: an analysis Marc-André Éthier, Université de Montréal David Lefrançois, Université du Québec en Outaouais Introduction From 30 July to 2 August, 2009, over 2,000 North American tourists had prepared to go to Québec City to re-enact an episode of the Seven Years War: the battle of the Plains of Abraham in Québec City, where two European colonial powers had clashed on 13 September, 1759. As is usual for this type of lay gathering, everything that has fascinated 20th century history scholars was excluded from the planned spectacle, such as issues of family, material culture, and the social structures of the people involved. Such an event illustrates the interest a number of people have, worldwide, in a particular approach to the past, based on what Barton and Levstik (2004) call the exhibition stance. According to Rosenzweig and Thelen (1998), Létourneau (2008), and Conrad, Létourneau and Northrup (2009), such activities are widespread, and might illustrate the centrality of the past for the re-enactors’ identities. This particular event especially encapsulates the popular appeal of this kind of relation to the past, inasmuch as the reenactors devote considerable time to learning their re-enactment roles and spend significant financial resources to buy the accessories they need. The purportedly inconsequential project planned in Québec City nevertheless led to a verbal altercation, with some opposition members of parliament (at both the federal and provincial levels) taking offence upon noting that the commemoration was bestowing a festive character upon a morbid event (there were 1,200 deaths), with some among them suspecting that a federal plot had also led to this “commemoration” of the defeat of the French – or “our defeat”, as Bernard Drainville, a member of the provincial legislative assembly declared (Lessard, 2009)–by the English, and to the revision of the 2006 Québec high school history program (Robitaille, 2009a, 2009b) . The re-enactment was eventually cancelled. This controversy constitutes a manifestation of what Pascal Blanchard and Isabelle Veyrat-Masson (2008) have named memory wars, referring to a phenomenon which has generated widespread analysis since Nora published his article on collective memory (1978) and edited the first volume on the realms of history (1984) that it has become trite in public debate and in the academic world. Similar discussions have persisted in other countries. Indeed, a continuous public debate in Australia relating to post-1788 European colonization has involved well-known historians (Macintyre & Clark, 2004). Throughout the world, memory, commemoration, past and history have become major political and media issues. Using history for political purposes, however, Canadian Social Studies 45(1) Éthier & Lefrançois is nothing new – the idea of history itself most plausibly owing its inception to political purposes. While it remained for a long time an instrument of states, political parties and their leaders, history used for political ends has moved to the periphery and to the people. The debate regarding the Québec history curriculum, which raged on through 2006, is but another manifestation of such a memory war. It began with the 27 April, 2006 publication of misleading excerpts of a draft version of the History and Citizenship Education program by a Le Devoir1 journalist who claimed it would promote Canadian unity (Robitaille, 2006). Many French-speaking Québec historians and indeed, members of the public at large participated in a fight against the supposedly new excessive focus placed on the cultural plurality of their society and on the influence of“British thought”in developing parliamentary institutions, as well as against the alleged concealment of events (t

FAQs

What controversy arose around the Québec history and citizenship curriculum?

Misleading excerpts of a draft program triggered intense debate. Critics argued the curriculum gave excessive focus to cultural plurality and “British thought,” and allegedly concealed key events and institutions, prompting revisions.

How did the Seven Years War reenactment in Québec City become politically contentious?

The reenactment was criticized for giving a festive character to a morbid defeat with many deaths. Some members of parliament suspected it reflected a federal plot and took offense at how the “defeat” was framed.

Does the article claim the curriculum aims to indoctrinate students in Canadian nationalism?

No. The article states that, despite misinterpretations, implementation of History and Citizenship Education is not an attempt to indoctrinate students in Canadian nationalism and it supports this through analysis of the Québec national program.

Oct 15, 2026

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