La petite bourgeoisie de La Tuque et son rôle dans l'exercice du pouvoir local, 1907-1939

The town of La Tuque is located on the Rivière St-Maurice, 165 km north of Trois-Rivières. In 1904 the Brown Corporation, an American paper company, bought the falls and neighbouring lands and in 1907 built a pulp mill powered by electricity from a dam. Attracted by the construction of the pulp and paper mill, French Canadians began settling in the area. The town of La Tuque was incorporated in 1911. The author describes the the formation of a French-speaking petty bourgeoisie in this company town -- business people, small traders and members of liberal professions -- between 1907 to 1939. She shows how social networks, echoing kinship ties, contributed to the cohesion of this Francophone elite core. However, this French-speaking elite also had to deal with the English-speaking managers of the Brown Corporation. These Anglophones, as the owners of the town's economic engine, claimed a right of scrutiny over the municipal administration in order to look after their interests. The author claims that the company's interventions in urban development were tinged with an interested paternalism. Tax exemptions, municipal borrowing, municipal stewardship and the municipalization of public services were issues that revealed the nature of the relationship between the two major linguistic players in the local government. The author examines the different individual and collective strategies implemented by the French-speaking petty bourgeoisie in order to position itself as an elite and to play a leading role within the local decision-making bodies.

Master's thesis

Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières

Trois-Rivières, Qué

2015

206p.

fr