Trudeau Government Research Articles

The SNC-Lavalin Affair: Justin Trudeau, Ministerial Resignations and Party Discipline

The SNC-Lavalin affair ranks among the most spectacular cases of ministerial resignations and party discipline in Canadian history. In 2019, discord plunged Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government into turmoil amid explosive news stories, cabinet shuffles, committee testimony, an ethics investigation and party discipline. SNC-Lavalin, a Quebec-based company, faced criminal charges and urged the Trudeau government to negotiate an alternative, or else jobs might be lost. The Prime Minister’s Office, the clerk of the Privy Council and the minister of finance were at loggerheads with Attorney General Jody Wilson-Raybould over her refusal to do so. This chronicle situates the political events among antecedent cabinet crises of the Manitoba schools question in 1896, the conscription crisis in 1944 and nuclear armament in 1963. The 2019 episode was the first involving women ministers and social media, and the only one to erupt over a relatively obscure policy issue. All cases were a prelude to the governing party losing seats in the next election.

Debunking the Myth of Canada as a Non-Colonial Power

ABSTRACT This article proposes that the understanding of Canada as a non-colonial power articulated by federal leaders representing Canada to the world is based on a myth. Foundational to contemporary understandings of the state, this myth is founded on a reproduction of a specific form of historical amnesia. When taken at face value, this myth-making both enables and promotes a false image of Canada, one which erases the persistent reinforcement of a domesticated settler colonialism. To begin deconstructing this myth we sketch out its parameters and permutations. In doing so we consider the implications of this myth promotion, and link this analysis to a specific framing of domestic sovereignty. Through this, we argue that this myth-making enables the continued dispossession of Indigenous nations by erasing the colonial relations of power through which their relationships with the state operate today. Drawing on the discourse articulated by the Harper government, recent emphasis on Nation-to-Nation relationships by the Trudeau government, and the work of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Inquiry, this analysis offers a window into how these national myths and imaginaries made and remake a settler coloniality.

“The personal is political!”: exploring the limits of Canada’s feminist international assistance policy under occupation and blockade

ABSTRACT “The personal is political!” This now infamous second-wave feminist slogan highlighted the connections between everyday personal experiences to larger social and political structures. As Enloe ([1990]. Bananas, beaches and bases: Making feminist sense of international politics. University of California Press) reminds us, the personal is political, but the personal is also international and, the international is personal. To this end, in 2015, Justin Trudeau took Canadian politics by storm with a platform promising change and a commitment to make Canadian international assistance explicitly “feminist”. Feminist scholars have long argued that understanding gender inequality requires more than targeted projects, programs, and interventions; it requires a fundamental shift in the way we understand systems of power shaping our complex international political systems (Tiessen, [2007]. Everywhere/nowhere: Gender mainstreaming in development agencies. Kumarian Press). Despite this, the way in which this commitment has been applied by the Trudeau Government is another question altogether. Using Ferguson’s ([1994]. The anti-politics machine. University of Minnesota) concepts of the “anti-politics machine”, this article explores Canada’s FIAP using the case study of Canadian international assistance in Gaza. It concludes that despite having an international assistance policy predicated on feminist values, Canadian development and humanitarian initiatives in Gaza are scrubbed of political dimensions and therefore utterly detached from the reality of the occupation and blockade and the subsequent impact on the lives of women and girls.

Canada’s feminist foreign policy and human security compared

Canadian federal governments regularly try to craft a unique image of Canada in the world; however, the Trudeau government’s embrace of feminist foreign policy feels strikingly similar to the late 1990s when human security was embraced. There seems to be a “sameness” in the promotion of a progressive values-based discourse that has transformative potential for Canadian foreign policy. The question is, does this sense of sameness bear out when we dig into the comparison? Drawing on speeches given by government ministers; policy documents, such as the Feminist International Assistance Policy (FIAP); media; and scholarship, we compare and contrast analyses of the sources of the human security and feminist foreign policy discourses and then identify common critiques. We also examine two significant differences. We find there is consistent Liberal articulation of values-based discourses and policies that have unmet transformative potential. In both cases, style and rhetoric are privileged over transformative change.

Canadian Doctors for Protection from Guns: how physicians contributed to policy change

Physicians played a key role in advancing Canada's recent assault weapons ban. Indeed, after announcing the ban in May 2020, the Trudeau government thanked Dr. Najma Ahmed and the group...

Populist unilateralism and the threat to Canadian power

ABSTRACT The unilateralist approach to foreign policy practiced by populist leaders such as Donald Trump forces Canadians to reconsider the realities of power. For generations, successive governments have maximized our national strength by banding together with allies and institutionalizing the resulting bonds through rules that govern behavior and decisionmaking. The U.S. President now threatens the institutions on which Canada depends, generating a crisis of confidence as Canadians debate how to respond. Critics of the Trudeau government’s faith in multilateralism call for Canada to invest in ties of friendship with leaders of strong countries. A more durable solution would be to pool national power with other states and build new institutional arrangements to bind us together. The so-called “Alliance for Multilateralism” is a pragmatic place to start as it allows major democracies to align their votes in existing institutions. But ultimately a proper alliance structure would offer the best chance for maximizing power. Canada should join other liberal democracies to pool as much power as we can and place it at the service of citizens in what might be called an Alliance for Popular Sovereignty.

Alternatives

In seeking to appease both environmentalists and proponents of Alberta’s oil and gas sector, the Trudeau government’s current approach to combined economic development and climate mitigation is fundamentally flawed. This essay advocates a new strategy aligned with proposals for a Green New Deal—major public investments in the communities hit hardest by Alberta’s economic downturn, aiming to develop the province’s low-carbon resources and create green jobs, yet made expressly on the condition of stranding fossil fuels.

Military Policy of J. Trudeau's Government after Parliamentary Elections 2019: Promises and Reality

Military policy of J. Trudeau's government is prudent and economical. Canada has refused a serious role in UN peacekeeping operations. By 2020 two of the three peacekeeping commitments undertaken by J. Trudeau's government in 2017 were formally fulfilled. In 2018 Canada sent a helicopter squadron to Mali and in 2019 dispatched a military cargo aircraft to Uganda. Both of these two Canadian peacekeeping missions in Africa are limited to one year. Nevertheless the volume of these peacekeeping commitments is so small that it doesn't allow to talk about any serious Canadian participation in UN peacekeeping operations. Canada is also refusing to comply with NATO (and the US) demand for an increase in military spending to 2% of GDP. Prime Minister J. Trudeau like his predecessor S. Harper emphasizes that the role of a country in NATO should not be assessed by the level of military spending as a percentage of GDP but by military contribution of this country in NATO activities. The main impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on Canadian military policy is that J. Trudeau's government may delay or even cancel expensive projects to purchase new military equipment because of massive expenditures for combating the epidemic.

Suspension, not expungement: Rationalizing misguided policy decisions around cannabis amnesty in Canada

AbstractHundreds of thousands of Canadians continue to carry the burden of convictions for minor possession of cannabis obtained prior to legalization. Despite support for an automatic expungement process to eliminate the collateral consequences of punishment, the Trudeau government opted for a less favourable policy instrument – record suspensions. Drawing from parliamentary debate and committee hearings, the author summarizes the discussion and debate on Bill C‐93 and analyzes this misguided decision using Miljan’s work on policy instrument choice and rationality. The emphasis on bureaucratic rationality specifically resulted in a maintenance of the status quo when it comes to criminal justice policy and an uninspiring approach to cannabis amnesty in Canada.

The Trudeau government and the case for multilateralism in an uncertain world

ABSTRACT In an era when multilateral institutions and global cooperation are under attack from the United States and under threat around the world, should Canada restore and maintain its historical commitment to global multilateralism? This paper argues that it should for three reasons: 1) the greatest problems facing the world demand multilateral solutions; 2) multilateral commitments acknowledge and mirror the cosmopolitan nature of Canada; 3) recent NAFTA negotiations have proven the US to be an unreliable ally and dangerous to Canada’s economic well-being. Developing alternatives to the US market is imperative. The Liberal and Conservative parties’ approaches to multilateralism reflect the two parties’ divergent visions of Canada. The Conservatives favor an ethnocentric view of Canada that, increasingly, caters to the right-wing populism sweeping the Western world. The Liberal vision of Canada is more inclusive. This latter view is, ultimately, more sustainable and accepting of Canada’s diverse ethnic and religious reality.

The Nuclear Ban Treaty and the cloud over Trudeau’s ‘feminist’ foreign policy

The Canadian Liberal government of Justin Trudeau claims to be ushering in a new era of a “feminist” foreign policy. While serious steps have been taken in this direction, this paper focuses on the government’s opposition to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, a treaty that has been negotiated with a logic and language explicitly linking issues of disarmament and gender, reframing “security” as fundamentally a question not of state but of human (and environmental) security. Ignoring its own public statements that repeatedly link women with peace and security, the Trudeau government’s opposition to the Treaty exposes the hollowness of its claims.

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.

Russian-Canadian relations during J. Trudeau government: Domestic Political Context

In contrast to Сanadian scientists, Russian researchers majoring in Canadian studies have not paid proper attention to the impact of domestic factors on the Canadian foreign policy-making. To fill this gap, the author examined the policy of Justin Trudeau towards Russia through the prism of political and public debates in Canada. The article looks at the views of the political elite, the positions of political parties, at the public attitudes and recommendations of experts. The analysis has shown that relations with Russia moved to the background of the Justin Trudeau foreign policy agenda, giving priority to relations with the US and China. While in the first years of Justin Trudeau government there was disagreement in the Canadian elite regarding Russian-Canadian relations, after 2017 anti-Russian consensus was reached, including on the question of the so-called Russia's intervention in the democratic process in Canada. At the same time, the research of scholars and experts presents non-trivial assessments and criticisms of the prevailing anti-Russian line. The author thinks that for the elaboration of expert proposals for revival of Canada-Russia dialogue it is relevant to keep track of the evolution taking place in Canada's political and public discussions.

Closing the Gender Gap in Corporate Advancement: Insights and Solutions from Behavioural Economics

Despite evidence that both gender and ethnically diverse leadership is good for businesses’ bottom line, just one in five senior North American business leaders is female, one in thirty a woman of colour. Little literature exists applying behavioural economics [BE] concepts to explain gender gaps. Yet, as demonstrated by the 2010 UK Conservative-Liberal Democrats coalition government, the Obama government in the US and Trudeau government in Canada, lawmakers, policymakers and business leaders are interested in BE’s persuasive power to influence behaviour. My contribution exploits this interest, builds on the excellent existing scholarship analyzing gender gap concepts from a BE perspective, and fills this gap. Applying concepts of bounded rationality, bounded willpower, bounded self-interest, and the endowment effect to 2017’s North American-focused Women in the Workplace report (Report) published by LeanIn and McKinsey, a vast study examining HR practices and pipeline data of 222 companies employing 12 million+ people and surveying 70,000+ employees’ experiences, I find that hiring and promotion decisions are affected by the three bounds and endowment effect, undercutting businesses’ compelling economic interest in diverse leadership. BE offers solutions to tackle biased behaviour and shows how gender gap scholars’ and the Report’s recommendations can be taken further to close the gender gap in advancement. I argue that normative best practice adoption by business and nudges and tax incentives from governments, ideally in combination, can spur businesses to adopt debiasing behaviours and practices that will contribute to closing the gender gap in advancement. Enabling women to achieve their full leadership and economic potential will enhance women’s wellbeing, improve businesses’ performance, and lead to greater social equity.

Preparing for peace: Myths and realities of Canadian peacekeeping training

During the Harper years (2006–2015), Canada significantly reduced the training, preparation, and deployment of military personnel for United Nations (UN) peacekeeping. Now, despite the Trudeau government’s pledge to lead an international peacekeeping training effort, Canada’s capabilities have increased only marginally. A survey of the curricula in the country’s training institutions shows that the military provides less than a quarter of the peacekeeping training activities that it provided in 2005. The primary cause of these reductions was the central focus on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s Afghanistan operation and several lingering myths about peacekeeping, common to many Western militaries. As the Trudeau government has committed to reengaging Canada in UN operations, these misperceptions must be addressed, and a renewed training and education initiative is necessary. This paper describes the challenges of modern peace operations, addresses the limiting myths surrounding peacekeeping training, and makes recommendations so that military personnel in Canada and other nations can once again be prepared for peace.

Determinants of housing prices: evidence from Ontario cities, 2001-2011

Determinants of housing prices: evidence from Ontario cities, 2001-2011

Canada’s foreign policy and bureaucratic (un)responsiveness: public diplomacy in the digital domain

ABSTRACTThe Trudeau government’s foreign policy seeks to return Canada to its liberal internationalist roots. Executing this agenda falls upon the foreign affairs bureaucracy, particularly the missions and diplomats abroad. Recognizing this, Trudeau “ungagged” bureaucrats, thereby empowering them to engage in public diplomacy that promotes his stated agenda. How responsive have the bureaucratic agents been to the new political directive? We examine available evidence from digital diplomacy to assess whether the new foreign policy agenda and the change in communication policy have altered the public diplomacy of the foreign affairs bureaucracy. Analysis of over 400,000 tweets from the 296 major Twitter accounts associated with Global Affairs Canada points to few signs of a significant shift in levels of engagement, content of diplomatic outreach, independence of missions, or user interaction with tweets. We argue that despite the key policy change and global visibility of Trudeau’s professed agenda, institutional stickiness has inhibited a concomitant shift in the bureaucracy, thereby limiting the impact of the political directives.

Friend or faux? Trudeau, Indigenous issues and Canada’s brand

ABSTRACTCanada and Canadians often consider themselves to be a force for good in the world. Does that self-perception hold true with Indigenous issues? This article evaluates Canada’s brand with respect to international Indigenous issues historically, as well as contemporarily under the leadership of the Trudeau government, with a focus on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the Arctic Council. Canada’s record is shown to be mixed, with a history of diminishment of Indigenous rights on the world stage, paired with real leadership and commitment to partnership in regional Arctic governance. However, there is little evidence that Canada’s treatment of its Indigenous peoples, which has risen as a key domestic policy issue in the wake of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, has affected its international brand. More concretely, domestic angst and discomfiture with regards to Canada’s relationship with its Indigenous peoples could lead to a downplaying of Canada’s reputational strengths of diversity and tolerance.

Why Canada is best explained as a ‘reliable ally’ in 2017

The Trudeau government has a deep philosophical attachment to liberal internationalism, yet its actions suggest otherwise. In 2017, its behaviour, operationalised in terms of changes to defence spe...

A nation of feminist arms dealers? Canada and military exports

The Canada-Saudi light armoured vehicles deal is likely to be remembered as the Trudeau government’s first scandal. Situating this deal in a historical-comparative context and using the best available quantitative arms trade data, this analysis advances two main claims. First, Canada’s Liberal governments are just as likely as Conservative governments to encourage exports of Canadian military goods, including goods going to human rights-abusing customers. Second, Canada’s overall arms exporting behaviour is similar to the behaviour of its “international do-gooder” peers, Sweden and the Netherlands. How Canadian governments will respond to the ever-increasing international demands for accountability in this area remains to be seen.