Canadian Foreign Policy Research Articles

The international model citizen and the Syrian war: Canadian identity from a civilian power perspective

Canadian foreign policy analysis has traditionally drawn heavily on the middle power concept. This paper proposes to look at Canadian foreign policy from a new angle: Using the concept of ontological security, it shows how “civilian power” elements such as multilateralism, institution building, and the rule of law, are connected to Canada’s identity and foreign policy development. The article systematically compares public statements and speeches by government officials regarding the Syrian war. The comparison is conducted against the backdrop of the governments’ foreign policy actions. On a theoretical level, the paper contributes to the discussion on Canadian identity and ontological security. Furthermore, it offers a comparison of the Syria policies of the Harper and the Trudeau governments, adding to the literature on differences and continuities between Conservative and Liberal Canadian foreign policy, as well as on empirical analyses of Canadian foreign policy and the Syrian war.

Health in Canadian foreign policy: the role of norms and security interests

ABSTRACTDespite health’s prominent place in Canadian foreign policy, as evidenced in the on-going support for maternal newborn and child health (MNCH) initiatives, little is known about the driving forces behind the integration of health into foreign policy. Based on document analysis and expert interviews, we provide an empirically grounded but theoretically informed perspective on health’s role in Canadian foreign policy. We argue that the integration of health into Canadian foreign policy cannot be understood by drawing on a single theoretical perspective. Instead we suggest that the integration of health into foreign policy follows competing logics, depending on whether or not health concerns intersect with high politics (such as national security and economic interests). In cases where health is directly or indirectly related to major security threats, realist theory (and the securitization logic) can best explain health’s positioning in foreign policy by highlighting the role that state interests play in maximizing security. In instances where health is not related to high politics concerns, liberal internationalism with its focus on the cultural and normative driving forces provides a more useful theoretical understanding of how or why health enters foreign policy prominence.

The origins of Canada’s feminist foreign policy

In January 2019, a leading Canadian foreign policy blog, OpenCanada.org, declared that “[u]nder the government of Justin Trudeau, Canada has embraced a feminist foreign policy—gradually at first, and with fervor over the past year.” Although critics have debated the policy’s effectiveness, the embrace, if not also the fervor, was indisputable. By 2019, the Trudeau government’s second foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, was proclaiming Canada’s feminist approach to international relations openly and regularly. The international community had also noticed. This article investigates the origins of the new Canadian foreign policy “brand.” It finds that, contrary to popular thinking, the prime minister himself played at most a minor role in the initiation of what became a full-fledged transformation of Canada’s global image.

Content analysis of the Russian press before and after the Ukraine crisis: Russian-Canadian relations in the Arctic: hope for better?

ABSTRACTThere has been an ongoing debate about how to handle Russia in a Canadian foreign policy in the Arctic. Despite some speculations about the dynamics of future relations between the Arctic players after the Ukraine crisis, few have looked closely at the domestic reaction of the Russian audience to Canada-Russia relations. This research uses content analysis of the Russian press before and after the events in Ukraine in March 2014. This paper will examine the dynamics of Russian-Canadian diplomatic relations from the perspectives of the Russian public media. The comparison between the current academic literature on the subject with the Russian domestic press showed that both sources came to similar conclusions: Russia is looking for peaceful, non-confrontational cooperation in the Arctic. At the same time, the Russian public media emphasized the importance of the role of a new Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada, Chrystia Freeland in the Arctic politics. This paper is an effort to understand how newspapers have been portraying the two countries when it comes to the Arctic.

The Politics of Travel Advisories


 
 
 Are Canadian travel advisories driven by a benign concern for the safety of Canadians, or are they driven by political motivations? To what extent are travel advisories administered by Canada linked to or guided by Canadian foreign policy? This paper comparatively assesses Canada’s willingness to impose travel advisories on states with which it has strong political relationships and those with which it has poor or weak political relationships. It surveys all Canadian advisories that deem there to be a “threat of terrorism,” representing a relatively constant risk variable in each state as measured by the Global Terrorism Index (GTI) (Institute for Economics & Peace [IEP] 2018). This study finds that Canada’s travel advisories fall into three categories: commensurate, incommensurate-erroneous, and incommensurate-politically motivated. Both types of incommensurate advisories are illustrated with the examples of Mauritania and the United States. Ultimately, Canada’s traveller information program lacks rigorous guidelines and creates opportunities for error or foreign policy influence. This results in inconsistent travel advisories that run the risk of misinforming Canadian travellers, deterring their travel or putting them at risk unwittingly.
 
 

Canada Among Nations 2017: Justin Trudeau and Canadian Foreign Policy by Norman Hillmer and Philippe Lagassé, eds.

Canada Among Nations 2017: Justin Trudeau and Canadian Foreign Policy by Norman Hillmer and Philippe Lagassé, eds.

Pierre Trudeau and Canada’s Pacific tilt, 1945–1984

Canadian international history is currently enjoying an Asian moment. A handful of younger scholars have cast their attention eastward, generating exciting new work on Canadian relations with specific countries and regions across the Pacific region. This article draws on some of their work, as well as the author’s own long-standing research on Canada’s Department of External Affairs, to weigh the Pacific’s changing importance to Canada. The article argues that the domestic and foreign policies of Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, elected in 1968, were truly transformational. Trudeau swept away the traditional hesitations and confining North Atlanticism that characterized the diplomacy of his postwar predecessors. Instead, he pursued a full-throttled policy of strategic engagement that repositioned Asia front and centre of contemporary Canadian foreign policy.

A confusion, not a system: the organizational evolution of strategic intelligence assessment in Canada, 1943 to 2003

ABSTRACT Recently released documentation has for the first time made it possible to describe the organizational evolution of strategic intelligence assessment in Canada. During the 60-year period surveyed in this article, the analytical groups involved in strategic assessment and the interdepartmental intelligence committee structure underwent a number of changes. These were almost invariably incremental steps—shaped by bureaucratic factors and resource constraints—rather than initiatives guided by a broader vision of the role of intelligence assessment in support of Canadian foreign and defence policy. This organizational study provides the foundation for long-overdue research into the foreign intelligence function in Canada.

Внешняя политика Канады: долгосрочные тенденции и помежуточные результаты

Внешняя политика Канады: долгосрочные тенденции и помежуточные результаты

The Canadian Policy on the Protection of Foreign Investment and the Canada-China Bilateral Investment Treaty

For a trading nation such as Canada, access to foreign markets has long been a key concern. In 2012, the Canadian government concluded a bilateral investment treaty (BIT) with China, so as to better protect Canada’s investments in this big expanding market. China’s communist regime, coupled with the importance of the country, has seemingly caused the Canada-China BIT to differ from the Canadian BIT model, both in terms of substantive provisions and the investor-state dispute settlement mechanism. Drawing on a legal-political analytical approach, the article: 1) looks at some key provisions on investment protection in the Canada-China BIT and 2) discusses the ways in which this BIT marks a departure in Canadian foreign investment policy. It also considers disagreements among legal scholars and commentators as to the implications of these differences, particularly with respect to the non-reciprocal character of the BIT to China’s advantage.

Зачем Канаде санкции? Определяющие факторы современной внешней политики Канады в отношении России

Зачем Канаде санкции? Определяющие факторы современной внешней политики Канады в отношении России

From disaster to development?: The role of the Second World War in shaping Canadian humanitarian aid

War is antithetical to development. Development, for most mainstream observers, means economic growth, or at least stability, and an increasing quality of life for all, and it cannot exist in a state of war. Yet official development assistance (ODA), one of the primary mechanisms by which many governments and civil society organizations attempt to achieve development in impoverished economies, has a history rooted in war. This paper will explore how the Second World War and its aftermath influenced the creation of Canadian ODA and international development NGOs. While Canada's aid history is most commonly associated with the Canadian International Development Agency, examining this earlier period helps contextualize current debates about the securitization of aid and its harmonization with other aspects of Canadian foreign policy. Using the Unitarian Service Committee (USC) Canada as a case study, this paper will also track its transition from a postwar humanitarian relief agency to a mainstream international development NGO. For Canadian ODA and civil society organizations, the Second World War shaped the legacy of the postwar aid regime and created lasting consequences for its operation.

“Six mois à Hanoi”: Marcel Cadieux, Canada, and the International Commission for Supervision and Control in Vietnam, 1954–5

Drawing on an unpublished memoir by Marcel Cadieux entitled “Six mois à Hanoi,” this article offers the first biographical study of a Canadian diplomat to serve on the International Commission for Supervision and Control in Vietnam. It argues that Cadieux's pioneering experience on that commission during its first months in 1954–5 shaped his pro-American views on the Vietnam War as under-secretary of state for external affairs between 1964 and 1970. It also uses Cadieux's tenure in Hanoi as a lens through which to explore larger issues of both long-standing and more recent interest to Canadian international historians, including the bureaucratic culture of the Department of External Affairs, Canadian diplomacy's relationship with the decolonizing countries of the Third World, and the role of race, culture, religion, and anti-communism in the making of Canadian foreign policy.

Substantive but inconsistent: Canada’s role in global environmental governance, 1968–2017

ABSTRACTCanada has played a key leadership role in global environmental governance during specific periods since 1968, but has frequently faded from view or reversed direction as economic competiveness remained the central pillar of Canadian foreign policy. Canadian leadership on climate change and other environmental issues has proven inconsistent, torn between pressures for maximal resource extraction and the green agenda first advanced in the 1970s. Three international contextual dimensions have shaped Canadian foreign policy on environmental issues since Liberal Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau was first elected in 1968. Each of these in turn is further shaped by the domestic policy context, including the party in power, federal–provincial relations, and the state of the economy. The contextual dimensions include the Canadian–American relationship (or, more broadly, the continental dimension); the global ecopolitical context defined primarily by environmental multilateralism and Canada–United Nations collaboration; and the advent of climate change as the predominant environmental issue in the post-1992 period. This paper discusses these three dimensions and offers a panoramic viewpoint on Canada’s contribution to global environmental governance in the age of globalization.

The North Atlantic anchor: Canada and the Pacific Century

This paper surveys Canada’s ambivalence towards the Asia Pacific, and seeks to put that ambivalence into the broader context of the dominant strategic perspective in Canada that has privileged, and continues to privilege, a North Atlantic focus for Canadian foreign and defence policy. It argues that Canada’s laggardly approach to Asia Pacific diplomacy can be best explained by the widespread perception among Canadians—and their government—that the North Atlantic alliance should remain the key driver of Canadian foreign and defence policy. Indeed, this geostrategic outlook has actually intensified with the election of Donald J. Trump and his unorthodox approach to the transatlantic alliance and the liberal international order. I argue that this North Atlantic outlook, so dominant for so much of Canada’s history, will continue to anchor Canadian foreign and defence policy, making Canada’s engagement in the Asia Pacific more problematic.

Canadian provinces and foreign policy in Asia

Non-central governments in Canada have become increasingly active on the world stage, most notably in the Asia Pacific region. The scholarly works on Canada’s foreign policy in Asia tend to focus either on the federal government as the main actor, or on the “other diplomacies” of non-governmental actors; little attention has been paid to the increasing role of non-central governments in Asia. This article, therefore, contributes to the discussion by documenting and evaluating Canadian provinces’ international activities in the Asia Pacific. It also situates these activities within Canada’s foreign policy in the region, and assesses how important provinces have become in Canada–Asia relations. This paper first reviews the literature on non-central governments and foreign policy to expose the key forces pushing and pulling Canadian provinces to be increasingly active internationally. It then details the provinces’ international activities in Asia, and locates them within Canada’s foreign policy in the region.

US partisan perceptions of Stephen Harper’s shift in foreign policy

While Stephen Harper’s foreign policy sparked heated debates during his entire tenure as prime minister, these debates were mainly confined to Canadian foreign policy circles. Little attention was paid to allies’ perceptions of these developments and, more specifically, to the perception of the United States, Canada’s main economic and security partner. How did the Bush and Obama administrations perceive these changes? Were they seen as a break from Canada’s past? Did Harper’s handling of foreign policy alter White House calculations with respect to Canada? Based on a series of semi-structured interviews conducted in Washington DC with executive officials a few months prior to the end of the Harper era in 2015, this essay shows that despite a widespread perception in Washington that Canada’s foreign policy approach had changed under Harper, partisanship was the main dividing line in terms of how this approach was perceived and assessed.

Canada goes global: building transnational relations between Canada and the world, 1968–2017

ABSTRACTWhile theorists of global civil society champion the rise of non-state actors and their role in changing global systems, Canadian foreign policy scholarship regularly minimizes the role of civil society in influencing the international activities of the Canadian state. Drawing on international relations scholarship regarding the relationship between globalization and transnational civil society relationships, this article provides an overview of the growing role of Canadian civil society actors in the process of foreign policy decision-making since 1968. The article focuses on three policy areas – trade, security and development policy – and argues that while civil society actors’ influence has varied across administration and policy areas, there is a general pattern of increased government–civil society interaction and of transnationalization of Canadian civil society actors over this time period.

Neither adapting nor innovating: the limited transformation of Canadian foreign trade policy since 1984

ABSTRACTCanada failed to respond with innovative solutions to shifting international economic pressures emerging in the 1970s. Canadian trade policy embraced offensive solutions in areas of comparative advantage but not in sectors with high political and economic costs, thereby limiting opportunities to join emerging supply chains outside of North America and hampering goals of reducing reliance on the American market. International trade disputes resulting from these policies also restricted innovation, as did the structures of Canadian federalism, Canada’s regional political economy, the country’s industrial policy and internal trade regimes, limits on bureaucratic capacity, and pressures from non-governmental interests. Where innovation did exist, it occurred incrementally and asymmetrically across sectors, while usually prioritizing offensive economic interests.

Canada's twenty-first century discovery of China: Canadian media coverage of China and Japan

ABSTRACTChinese government officials and some Canadian foreign policy experts have challenged the content and tone of Canadian media's coverage of China. Canadian media coverage is thought to negatively bias public opinion and thereby constrain foreign policy choices available to policymakers. Scholars of Canada–Japan relations worry that decreasing media attention could have longer term effects on bilateral ties. Through an analysis of over 30,000 articles appearing in three major Canadian news publications over a 15-year time span (2000–2015), we identify how news about these countries is framed to the Canadian public and how these frames change over time. Our central finding is that the Canadian media experienced a “twenty-first century discovery of China” in 2004–2005. The volume of coverage of Chinese economic news spiked, while coverage of political rights declined, portraying China as a leader in the global economy and therefore a viable economic partner. Yet we find that media coverage is only loosely tied to public opinion. Counterintuitively, Canadian attitudes toward China have become more negative with increased positive news coverage, while declining coverage of Japan is correlated with increasingly positive views of the country.