From the economic reconquest of French Canada to the “cooperative republic” of Quebec: François-Albert Angers’ ideal of economic cooperation (1937-1976)
This article focuses on the action and cooperative thought of François-Albert Angers (1909-2003). Trained as an economist, professor at the École des hautes études commerciales de Montréal and a nationalist activist, Angers was one of the great promoters of economic cooperation in Quebec between the 1930s and 1970s. As an intellectual aligned with traditionalism, his reflections were greatly influenced by the precepts of Catholic social teaching as well as by the economic nationalism developed at the École des HEC, notably by Esdras Minville. Proposing an economic model based on the concept of a “cooperative republic,” Angers was able to rethink in part the theoretical frameworks proposed by his mentor. Critical of the excesses of liberal capitalism and suspicious of state socialism, he proposed an original economic thought that sought to preserve the cultural and historical heritage of French Canada.