MICHAEL BYERS
What is Canada For?
INTENT FOR A NATION
A relentlessly optimistic manifesto for Canada’s role in the world
DOUGLAS & MCINTYRE
Vancouver / Toronto
For Cameron and Fraser
CONTENTS
2 WARFIGHTERS OR PEACEKEEPERS? AFGHANISTAN, MISSION IMPOSSIBLE
3 MISSILE DEFENCE: DR. STRANGELOVE LIVES ON
4 NUCLEAR NIGHTMARES: GEORGE W. BUSH AND THE NPT
5 CANADA AND GLOBAL GOVERNANCE: ONE FOR ONE, OR ALL FOR ALL?
6 CLIMATE CHANGE: OUR GREATEST CHALLENGE
7 A TRUE NORTH STRONG AND FREE
8 CANADA-U.S. MILITARY RELATIONS: WHO TO SERVE?
9 DO WE NEED A CONTINENTAL ECONOMY?
— ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS —
MY THINKING ABOUT Canadian foreign policy has been influenced by many people, only a few of whom I can thank here.
I owe a profound debt to my parents, Brigitte and Bob Byers. Not least, they helped me understand that different Canadians connect with this country in quite different ways. My mother is an immigrant, born in Germany, and my father, of older Canadian stock, has some First Nations blood in his veins.
I am enormously grateful to Katharine, my wife and best friend. She too immigrated to Canada, just three years ago. Watching her learn about and adapt to this country has given me a better appreciation of its wonders and eccentricities.
A number of pro-Canadian activists have inspired me, even if we do not always agree. They include Maude Barlow, Duncan Cameron, Bruce Campbell, Murray Dobbin, Mel Hurtig, Seth Klein, David Langille, Peggy Mason, Jillian Skeet and Steve Staples.
My understanding of Canadian foreign policy has been enhanced through frank discussions with John Amagoalik, Dawn Black, Bill Blaikie, Stephen Clarkson, Andrew Cohen, Robert Greenhill, Paul Heinbecker, Rob Huebert, Wade Huntley, George Hynall, Paul Knox, Suzanne Lalonde, Jack Layton, Stephen Lewis, Margaret Macmillan, Alexa McDonough, Frank McKenna, Roy McLaren, Alex Neve, David Orchard, Louis Pauly, John Polanyi, Kent Roach, Colin Robertson, Douglas Ross, Stephen Toope, Wesley Wark, David Welch, Jennifer Welsh and many, many others— including numerous civil servants whose names I will not divulge.
I am also grateful to Gilbert Merkx for initiating the process that took me back home, by asking me, while I was a law professor at Duke, to also direct that university’s Center for Canadian Studies. Lloyd Axworthy—a political idol of mine for nearly three decades—helped things along by recruiting me to the University of British Columbia.
I owe a particular debt to Len Finlay of the University of Saskatchewan. Twenty years ago, Len taught me about the wonders of Shakespeare and thus inspired my love of the English language; last year—in an essay published in English Studies in Canada—he fortuitously provided the title for this book.
Finally, I am grateful to the many editors who have improved my writings on the topics covered here, including Natasha Hassan, Jerry Johnson, Bob Levin, Patrick Martin, Val Ross and Carl Wilson of the Globe and Mail, Jim Atkins of the Toronto Star, David Beers of the Tyee, Paul Laity and John Sturrock of the London Review of Books and especially Scott McIntyre and Scott Steedman of Douglas & McIntyre.
This book benefited from research assistance from Jennifer Breakspear and financial support from the Walter and Duncan Gordon and Pierre Elliott Trudeau foundations. As always, Kathy and Mike Edmunds provided the quiet retreat where most of the writing was done.
MB
VANCOUVER · January 31, 2007
— PREFACE —
AS A CHILD, I spent my summers on a farm near Stoughton, Saskatchewan. My awareness of international affairs dates from that time. For although southeastern Saskatchewan might seem a long way from anywhere, global politics were ever present. My grandparents’ livelihood depended on the price of wheat, and that price was determined by events abroad. I remember my grandfather, with only a Grade 8 education, discussing quotas and subsidies with acumen worthy of an international trade lawyer. At the same time, we saw the contrails of American B-52 bombers high overhead. The planes were flying north to the High Arctic, where they would circle on standby—just like in Dr. Strangelove—waiting for the order to fly into the Soviet Union to drop their nuclear bombs. Rural Saskatchewan was smack dab in the middle of the Cold War.
I have spent my life learning, reading, thinking and teaching about Canada’s place in the world: first as a high school student in both Ottawa and Lethbridge; then as an English literature and political studies major at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, and later as a law student at McGill in Montreal. For twelve years—from 1992 to 2004—I lived outside Canada. The first seven years were spent in Britain, studying and teaching international law at Cambridge and Oxford universities. The next five years were spent in Durham, North Carolina, as a professor of law and director of Canadian Studies at Duke University. It was then time to return to Canada to teach political science at the University of British Columbia (UBC).
It is a strange experience, returning to one’s country after an extended period abroad. Everything is familiar, yet so much has changed. Things you had once been attached to—Peter Gzowski and Morningside—exist no longer. Things you had forgotten—the almost spiritual role that hockey occupies in the Canadian psyche—suddenly reappear.
Returning from an extended absence can improve your understanding of where you come from, since you have seen how things are done differently elsewhere.
