The evolution of Canada’s cultural exemption in preferential trade agreements

Abstract

ABSTRACT Long concerned about its cultural identity in light of dominant American entertainment exports, when Canada concluded its first preferential free trade agreement (FTA) with the United States in 1987, cultural industries were exempted. This general exemption, albeit coupled with a retaliatory clause, was later incorporated into the North American Free Trade Agreement and recently updated into the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement. Such a cultural exemption, this time unconditional or without provisions for retaliation, has also figured in most Canadian FTAs. Yet, in the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement negotiated with the European Union, the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement negotiated with the United States and ten other countries, and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership implemented with these ten countries, Canada does away with an outright cultural exemption. Instead, these FTAs provide for a more targeted exemption, applying only to the chapters or sectors for which such an exemption is sought. Although this marks a departure from a well-established practice, this move is not so radical, as some analysts of Canadian cultural trade policy claim. Such “chapter-by-chapter” approach may indeed be as efficient to preserve cultural industries from key international trade obligations.