Canadian Sovereignty in the Arctic: A Comment on The Arctic in Question

Abstract

The international lawyer sometimes reads the current literature on the Canadian Arctic with a sense of uneasiness. A wide range of writers and scholars maintain an active discourse on questions relating to what is usually called “Arctic sovereignty.” It is not that the lawyer feels he has any special wisdom or monopoly on discussions of questions of “sovereignty.” The sovereignty concept has several layers of meaning, only one of which can be said to be the special preserve of the lawyer. Public discussion in Canada is largely, and legitimately, focussed on policy questions that flow from sovereignty, from Canada's right to exercise authority, to the exclusion of that of any other state, over vast areas of arctic lands and waters. If war is too important a matter to be left to the generals, perhaps sovereignty is too important a matter to be left to the lawyers. Nevertheless, the lawyer is sometimes troubled by a tendency of non-legal commentators to blur his favourite distinctions and to question some of his most firmly held assumptions.