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Radio-Québec: A Case Study of Institution-Building

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 November 2009

Kenneth Cabatoff
Kenneth Cabatoff
Affiliation:
Université du Québec à Montréal
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Extract

Radio-Québec, or the Office de Radio-Télédiffusion du Québec, was founded by the Quebec government in 1969 as an educational television service. This meant that it was parallel, in some respects, to the Ontario Educational Communications Authority or to the “ETV” stations of the Public Broadcasting Service in the United States. It was also perceived (within Quebec) as an historic affirmation of Quebec's constitutional rights in the field of broadcasting.

Type
Notes
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 11 , Issue 1 , March 1978 , pp. 125 - 138
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 1978

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References

1 This term is used by Esman, Milton in his “The Elements of Institution Building,” in Eaton, J. W. (ed.), Institution Building and Development (Beverly Hills, California: Sage, 1972), 25.Google Scholar

2 Talcott Parsons defines an “institution” as consisting of “proper, legitimate or expected modes of action or social relationships” (Essays in Sociological Theory [Glencoe: Free Press, 1949])Google Scholar. Selznick, Philip defines it as “an organization which is infused with value beyond the technical requirements of the task at hand,” Leadership in Administration (Evanston: Row, Peterson, 1957), 17.Google Scholar

3 Weber, Max, “The Three Types of Legitimate Rule,” trans, by Gerth, Hans, Etzioni, A. (ed.), A Sociological Reader on Complex Organizations (2nd ed.; New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1969), 6–14.Google Scholar

4 Norman T. Uphoff and W. F. Ilchman, “The Time Dimension in Institution- Building,” in Eaton (ed.), Institution Building and Development, 12.

5 Sol Levine and Paul E. White, “Exchange as a Conceptual Framework for the Study of Interorganizational Relationships,” in Etzioni(ed.), Sociological Reader, 129–31.

6 A considerable degree of latitude is possible in the negotiation of jurisdictional frontiers. For example, the health agencies studied by Levine and White could agree to distinguish between themselves in terms of (a) disease treated, (b) population served, or (c) services rendered. See Levine and White, “Exchange as a Conceptual Framework,” 129.

7 Although the “division of labour” between organizations and components of organizations has an important technical element, organizational units may also desire demarcation of frontiers for reasons that relate more to security and the desire to be free of entangling relationships with other individuals or organizations. See Cyert, Richard M. and March, James G., “The Goal Formation Process,” in Hill, W. A. and Egan, D. M. (eds.), Readings in Organizational Theory (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1967), 105Google Scholar. See also Crozier, Michel, The Bureaucratic Phenomenon (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1964), 187–91.Google Scholar

8 “Programs of action tend to be formulated in response to legal mandates, environmental demands, opportunities, or the priorities held by leadership. Their priorities are usually instrumental to the innovations to which leadership is committed. But programs are not formulated in a vacuum. They must be so designed and managed that they build support for the organization among prospective ‘publics’ and minimize opposition” (Esman, “The Elements of Institution Building,” 30).

9 Stinchcombe, Arthur L., “Social Structure and Organizations,” in Meyer, M. W. (ed.), Structures, Symbols and Systems (Boston: Little, Brown, 1971), 269.Google Scholar

10 These terms are used here in the sense intended by Esman, “The Elements of Institution Building,” 33.

11 Levine and White, “Exchange as a Conceptual Framework,” 129.

12 Esman, “The Elements of Institution Building,” 28–34.

13 Ibid., 33.

14 Quoted in Rapport Annuel 1971–72, ORTQ, Ministère des Communications, Gouvernement du Québec, 28. This and all subsequent quotations from the ORTQ publications are translated by the author.

15 The Quebec government had opposed the efforts of the late 1920's and early 1930'sto establish a national Canadian radio network, on the grounds that radio was “educational” and was hence a provincial matter. In 1945, Maurice Duplessis, furious at the “pro-war” propaganda of the CBC, had the Quebec legislature pass the Radio- Québec Act. This Act was never carried into effect—until the 1968 order-in-council adopted by the Daniel Johnson cabinet. The history of Quebec-Canada relations in the field of broadcasting is well presented in Peers, Frank, The Politics of Canadian Broadcasting 1920–1951 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1969).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 Daniel Johnson died in September 1968.

17 Rapport Annuel 1970–71, 15.

18 Ibid., 11.

19 Rapport Annuel 1971–72,22.

20 Ibid., 22–23.

21 ORTQ, Service des relations publiques et d'information, “Radio-Québec en bref,” juillet 1974, 17.Google Scholar

22 See Rapport Annuel 1971–72, 22. This “Special relationship” with the ministry of education had important consequences for Radio-Québec in several fields. See the author's “Radio-Québec: Une institution publique à la recherche d'une mission,” in Canadian Public Administration 19 (1976), 542–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

23 ORTQ, “Présentation,” Nouvelle structure administrative (1974), 3.Google Scholar

24 Rapport Annuel 1971–72, 22.

25 Ibid., 19.

26 Ibid., 12.

27 “Radio-Québec en bref,” 1.

28 Rapport Annuel 1972–73, 9–10.

29 Ibid., 58.

30 According to Radio-Québec Pourquoi? (Montreal: Institut canadien d'éducation des adultes, 1974), Annexe H, 2.Google Scholar