KSG Grad Leads Quebec Party

Andre Boisclair, who graduated from the Kennedy School of Government (KSG) in June, became the first openly gay leader of a major North American political party earlier this month by winning the leadership of the separatist Parti Quebecois (PQ) in Canada.

Even after Boisclair admitted to using cocaine in office, he secured 58.6 percent of his party’s vote and is promising to put forward a referendum on Quebec’s sovereignty within the next two years.

With his party gaining momentum following the election, Boisclair has his sights set on the Premiership of Quebec. Securing such a position would make the 39-year-old Montreal native the first openly gay official elected to head a state or provincial government in North America (Gov. Jim McGreevey, D-N.J., was outed while in office).

The flashy and urbane Boisclair emerged onto Montreal’s political scene in 1989 at the age of 23, becoming the youngest person ever elected to the Quebec National Assembly. He rose to hold various cabinet-level positions during the 1990s.

Boisclair earned his master’s degree in public administration from the KSG through a mid-career one-year leadership program.

KSG Dean David T. Ellwood ’75 said he sees Boisclair as part of a “proud tradition” of KSG graduates “serving in many different ways.”

“I would like to see even more people who are actively engaged in electoral politics and active in the political arena,” said Ellwood.

Boisclair announced his candidacy on his French-language blog last summer, writing, “Je serai candidat!”

“I have butterflies in my stomach....This is an important decision for my future...the future of the party, that of sovereignty, and of course, for the future of Quebec,” he wrote.

While some observers have noted Boisclair’s unorthodox political background, others like Randall K. Morck, Harvard’s visiting King professor of Canadian studies, feel that Boisclair’s new prominence in Quebec does little to refashion politics or the separatist movement in the French-speaking province.

“This heralds no major changes,” Morck wrote in an e-mail. “Boisclair is very much an insider in the PQ and though his rhetoric may differ, his actions are unlikely to deviate much from PQ’s on-going strategy,” which Morck describes as “obfuscating” the difference between “outright independence” and “sovereignty” and “pray[ing] for continued disarray in federal politics.”

Although Boisclair’s arrival may not make a drastic difference in the direction of his province, Morck said he does believe it reflects a difference between the sensibilities of Americans and Canadians.

“Canadians probably are more tolerant, at least in some ways. Canada has different religious traditions. Most critically, [it] has no ‘South’,” Morck wrote.

Boisclair is the second KSG graduate this month to secure a position of leadership abroad following Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf’s election as Liberia’s next president. Johnson-Sirleaf received a master’s in public administration from the KSG in 1971.