Antonia Maioni is a professor of political science at McGill University.

No crystal ball is clear enough to foresee the exact outcome of the next federal election, but one thing is becoming increasingly apparent: The Liberal Party is on the road to nowhere in Quebec.

While Quebeckers have paid scant attention to the party for almost a decade, the Liberal leaders saw this election as their chance for redemption in Quebec. But the "wave" that strategists had counted on is less and less likely to happen.

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For starters, it is a long trek back to the glory days of 1980, the last major sweep of the province by the Liberal Party of Canada just before the first Quebec referendum and Pierre Trudeau's promises of renewed federalism. Since then, the Quebec electoral map has become a checkerboard, with Liberal red bleeding toward Tory blue, Bloc bleu, and NDP orange. The Jean Chrétien interlude was an exception, but it led to the bitter internecine rivalries that still plague the party.

Over decades, the deep roots of the party in francophone ridings have withered. The connection with the much stronger provincial brand is at best moribund. Today, the federal Liberals lack strength throughout Quebec, and very few safe seats are left. And this is why it is no longer a good bet that the Liberal Party will move to the government benches in the House of Commons any time soon.

Every party leader since Paul Martin has attempted – and, arguably, was chosen on that promise – to bring Quebec back as a reliable reservoir of seats on which to build a national majority. The jaw-dropping choice of Stéphane Dion was questionable enough, but the pretense that Michael Ignatieff could even come close was the clincher. From that point, the fate of Justin Trudeau was predictable. With scant support in the regions, his father's baggage on his back, and a winsomeness that could not whitewash the lack of ideas to resonate with francophone voters, Mr. Trudeau has shown no lasting effect on the party's fortunes in Quebec.

Meanwhile, it has become apparent that the NDP's success in 2011 was based on more than the personal appeal of Jack Layton. Behind his charm were clear messages specific to Quebec voters who, over time, had become isolated from federal politics. Support for the New Democrats indicated a new phase in Quebec voters' constant search for parties that can carry their voice to Ottawa. If Canadians are, on the whole, what political scientists refer to as "flexible partisans," Quebeckers are the true acrobats of voter behaviour in Canada. Some may return to the Bloc Québécois if Gilles Duceppe's message of opposition resonates, but others may see the NDP as the true slayers of the Stephen Harper dragon.

This does not mean Quebeckers agree on everything – or anything, for that matter: Divisions between language groups, values, ideology and regions persist.

And yet, the incapacity of the Liberal Party to reconnect with them indicates that the road to redemption through Quebec will take a lot more than a facelift at the top: It needs real foundation work to rebuild from the ground up.

Eds notes: An earlier version incorrectly stated that the 1980 election followed the first Quebec referendum.