The Canadian Foreign Policy Podcast: Recent Episodes
David Tabachnick
Each episode covers important events in the political history of Canadian foreign policy starting around 1945 and ending in 2021. I am now including episodes related to my new course American foreign policy in the 21st century.
In this last episode of the season, I bring my analysis right up to 2021. With the election of Justin Trudeau's government, there is a concerted effort to return Canada to its multilateral roots; in rhetoric if not also reality.
This includes embracing a "Feminist Foreign Policy" which includes funding abortion services, something that the previous government refused to include in their official development assistance commitments.
It also means reengaging with NATO by sending troops to Latvia and the United Nations by sending peacekeepers to Mali.
However much the new government wants to differentiate itself from Harper's Conservatives, they still inherited the difficult task of procuring new fighter jets, perhaps the longest, most expensive, and most complex effort to buy military equipment to date.
This episode explores Prime Minister Harper's efforts to move Canada away from the tradition of multilateralism. Instead, he attempted to assert a "Canada First" strategy which included criticism of the United Nations, increased spending on defence, and a restructuring of foreign aid priorities.
However, by most measures, this effort was unsuccessful; somewhat similar to the results achieved by Pierre Trudeau's Third Option in the 1970s.
Not only does Canada alienate the international community, resulting in the first time loss of a Security Council seat bid, it also engenders a domestic political scandal for the Conservatives as they tried to purge "left-leaning" organizations from its aid partnerships.
This episode continues my analysis of Canada's decision to go to war in Afghanistan. This time the focus is on bilateral support for their American neighbours as well as national self-interest. I add the complicating factor of the 2003 Iraq War and explore why Canada does not participate and how they attempted to placate the upset Americans.
I then shift to the related issue of the consequences of the 9/11 attacks on Canada/U.S. relations. Would Canada have to abandon elements of its sovereignty to ease American concerns about continental security? Was Canada really a "club med for terrorists"?
Finally, I take yet another run at the complex and exciting world of military procurement. With wind in his sails, Stephen Harper promises to right the wrongs of the "decade of darkness" including building and buying multi-billion dollar military grade icebreakers to defend the Arctic. Will he succeed where others failed? Will he meet the new 2% NATO target for defence spending?
In part, this episode is devoted to the way in which the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States influenced Canadian foreign policy.
While much of the 1990s was spent on pushing through neoliberal policies and agreements, failures in Somalia, Yugoslavia and Rwanda led Canada to develop a human security agenda that came to be known as the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). Embraced by the international community, this seemed both a way for Canada to regain lost prestige as well as participate on the global diplomatic stage without spending billions on new military equipment.
However, after 9/11, the country had to quickly pivot and join the costly and dangerous war in Afghanistan. United Nations and NATO commitments meant going to war in Afghanistan while avoiding the ill advised American led invasion of Iraq.
In this episode, I continue my analysis of Canada's post-Cold War foreign policy with consideration of the difficult and dangerous operation in Yugoslavia and the disastrous mission in Rwanda. I also introduce another chapter in the story of military procurement: the cancellation of the EH101 helicopter by the new Prime Minister, Jean Chrétien.
Problematically, the 1990s was a period of increased commitments and decreased budgets, which is why it is sometimes called a "decade of darkness" for Canada's defence and foreign policy.
In this episode, I consider the 1988 federal election, otherwise known as the Free Trade Election. Would free trade with the United States bring economic prosperity or change Canada into the 51st state?
I then weigh the consequences of a second momentous event: the end of the Cold War. The first big test of the post-Cold War period was the Persian Gulf War which promised to usher in a new world order. What would become of NATO? How would the Canadian military adapt?
On the second question, the Somalia Affair would highlight huge problems in the military that would not be easy to solve.
This episode moves our study firmly into the 1980s and provides an analysis of the successes and failures of the Mulroney government. Exclaiming that “Canada is open for business again," Mulroney set out to mend relations with the United States, which he claimed had been damaged by Trudeau's economic nationalism.
However, things were never going to be easy. Negotiating an agreement to stop "Acid Rain," trying to buy nuclear powered submarines, and pushing the United States and the United Kingdom to sanction the apartheid regime in South Africa were among the many challenges.
As the title of this episode indicates, there was some real success as well as abject failure.
This episode explores the foreign policy legacy of Pierre Trudeau. His goal was to make Canada less dependent on the United States by diversifying Canada's trade partners, introducing "economic nationalist" legislation, and retracting support for NATO. Under the broad banner of the "third option", Trudeau had hoped that the 1970s would be a decade of growing Canadian independence.
And, even though the end of the decade was marked by the diplomatic success of secreting American hostages out of Iran, the third option proved a failure.
In this episode, I’m going to review Pearson’s time in office, including Canada’s extended peacekeeping missions in Vietnam and Cyprus, the Prime Minister’s confrontation with President Lyndon Johnson, and finally Pierre Trudeau’s ascent and radical reformulation of Canadian foreign policy into what he called the Third Option.
This episode focuses on continental defence, the formation of NORAD, and the related decision Canada makes not to develop nuclear weapons. How can a middle power enter a military alliance with a superpower and still have a say? Can Canada develop enough hard power to stop the United States from infringing on its sovereignty? Should Dienfenbaker accept American nuclear weapons on Canadian soil? And how will Pearson answer these same questions when he becomes Prime Minister? Tune in to find out.
This episode is a continuation of my introduction of the "golden age" of Canadian foreign policy. I consider how Canada got in on the ground floor of the creation of the United Nations, fought in the Korean War, and helped in the creation of peacekeeping in response to the Suez Canal Crisis of 1956.
This first episode of the Canadian Foreign Policy Podcast is designed as an introduction to the subject of my course Canada and the World.
I begin by reflecting on the "Golden Age" of Canadian foreign policy which still looms large in the minds of scholars and diplomats. In the period right after World War II, Canada asserted its independence, came out of its isolationism and sought to influence the international order.
Could diplomats like Lester Pearson and Escott Reid really get the attention and respect of the Great Powers? How could a "middle power" navigate the early days of the Cold War and help avoid World War III? What role would it play in the new NATO collective security alliance?