Our interest in international co-operation is absent from Harper's Manichean worldview.
Given the relish with which the Harper government has plunged into showy international policy stands such as boycotting the upcoming UN Conference on Disarmament, observers could be pardoned for thinking that Prime Minister Stephen Harper has long been yearning to put his stamp on Canada’s foreign affairs. In fact, however, he gave little thought to matters beyond Canada’s borders until recently.
In an interview this month in Maclean’s, the prime minister remarked that what has surprised him the most since taking office is the centrality of foreign affairs: “There’s hardly anything today of any significance that doesn’t have a huge international dimension to it.” From the economy to “security matters or pandemics,” he has discovered, “it’s all international.”
This might not have been such a revelation had the prime minister listened to his parliamentary colleagues under previous governments. When Bill Graham was minister of foreign affairs from 2002-2004, for instance, his speeches emphasized the fact that Canada’s challenges were enmeshed with conditions beyond our borders. Given that the global economic, environmental, health, and security risks we face are too large for any country to solve on its own, Graham explained, it is in Canada’s interest to ensure a strong international system that allows countries to tackle problems collectively despite their differences.
That argument in favour of collective diplomacy was so antithetical to the perspective of then-opposition-leader Stephen Harper that it may have been what blocked him from recognizing the global scope of Canada’s policy challenges. Even now, when the reality of those challenges is inescapable to him as prime minister, the solution of collective diplomacy and institution-building is anathema to his way of thinking about Canada’s national interests. He makes plain his distaste for the idea of Canada as a consensus-builder among friends and foes alike: “We take stands that we think reflect our own interests but our own interests in a way that reflects the interests of the wider community of nations, or particularly the wider interests of those nations with whom we share values and interests.”
Though not very lucid, this statement conveys a dichotomy between those countries that Canada makes common cause with, and those it does not. The distinguishing criterion, the prime minister explains, lies in the sharing of values such as freedom, democracy, human rights, and the rule of law. Countries that do not share such values are seen as potential threats. Accordingly, Canada advances its interests by making common cause with like-minded nations against those who endanger us. And it does so, above all, Harper believes, through the possession and exercise of military capabilities. The realities of a “dangerous world” – one in which the most obvious challenge is “Islamic extremist terrorism” – justify the build up of Canada’s military.
The bottom line, for this prime minister, is a worldview in which “the real defining moments for the country and for the world are those big conflicts where everything’s at stake and where you take a side and show you can contribute to the right side.” A readiness to join in such clashes of good and evil determines Canada’s fidelity to its own identity, and shapes the course of global progress.
The implications of this Harper worldview for Canada’s foreign policy can be summed up in the adage that if you have only a hammer, everything looks like a nail – or, conversely, that a hammer is the only tool you’ll turn to if all you see is nails. Despite his nods to globally shared challenges – and last week’s pretence of boycotting the UN conference in order to spur its reform – what Harper sees most when he looks at the world are evils that must be crushed with the hammer of military might.
Those Canadians who do not share such reductionist views of the great dangers to our national interests – those who believe that pandemics, climate change, and organized crime, for instance, are threats as great as, or greater than, Islamic extremist terrorism – should contest the prime minister’s vision of hammers and nails. They should resist the conflation of Canada’s identity, and the course of world history, with the exercise and outcomes of military force. They should insist on the need for different tools – those of diplomacy, peace building, and development – to foster global co-operation on threats that cannot be bombed out of existence.
During the second half of the 20th century, Canada had a distinguished international reputation for working with such tools to advance the collective interests of all the world’s nations. Amid the Harper government’s rejection of dialogue, and its glorification of all things military, that heritage – and the hopes for progress it offers – must not be forgotten.
Origin
Source: The Mark
In an interview this month in Maclean’s, the prime minister remarked that what has surprised him the most since taking office is the centrality of foreign affairs: “There’s hardly anything today of any significance that doesn’t have a huge international dimension to it.” From the economy to “security matters or pandemics,” he has discovered, “it’s all international.”
This might not have been such a revelation had the prime minister listened to his parliamentary colleagues under previous governments. When Bill Graham was minister of foreign affairs from 2002-2004, for instance, his speeches emphasized the fact that Canada’s challenges were enmeshed with conditions beyond our borders. Given that the global economic, environmental, health, and security risks we face are too large for any country to solve on its own, Graham explained, it is in Canada’s interest to ensure a strong international system that allows countries to tackle problems collectively despite their differences.
That argument in favour of collective diplomacy was so antithetical to the perspective of then-opposition-leader Stephen Harper that it may have been what blocked him from recognizing the global scope of Canada’s policy challenges. Even now, when the reality of those challenges is inescapable to him as prime minister, the solution of collective diplomacy and institution-building is anathema to his way of thinking about Canada’s national interests. He makes plain his distaste for the idea of Canada as a consensus-builder among friends and foes alike: “We take stands that we think reflect our own interests but our own interests in a way that reflects the interests of the wider community of nations, or particularly the wider interests of those nations with whom we share values and interests.”
Though not very lucid, this statement conveys a dichotomy between those countries that Canada makes common cause with, and those it does not. The distinguishing criterion, the prime minister explains, lies in the sharing of values such as freedom, democracy, human rights, and the rule of law. Countries that do not share such values are seen as potential threats. Accordingly, Canada advances its interests by making common cause with like-minded nations against those who endanger us. And it does so, above all, Harper believes, through the possession and exercise of military capabilities. The realities of a “dangerous world” – one in which the most obvious challenge is “Islamic extremist terrorism” – justify the build up of Canada’s military.
The bottom line, for this prime minister, is a worldview in which “the real defining moments for the country and for the world are those big conflicts where everything’s at stake and where you take a side and show you can contribute to the right side.” A readiness to join in such clashes of good and evil determines Canada’s fidelity to its own identity, and shapes the course of global progress.
The implications of this Harper worldview for Canada’s foreign policy can be summed up in the adage that if you have only a hammer, everything looks like a nail – or, conversely, that a hammer is the only tool you’ll turn to if all you see is nails. Despite his nods to globally shared challenges – and last week’s pretence of boycotting the UN conference in order to spur its reform – what Harper sees most when he looks at the world are evils that must be crushed with the hammer of military might.
Those Canadians who do not share such reductionist views of the great dangers to our national interests – those who believe that pandemics, climate change, and organized crime, for instance, are threats as great as, or greater than, Islamic extremist terrorism – should contest the prime minister’s vision of hammers and nails. They should resist the conflation of Canada’s identity, and the course of world history, with the exercise and outcomes of military force. They should insist on the need for different tools – those of diplomacy, peace building, and development – to foster global co-operation on threats that cannot be bombed out of existence.
During the second half of the 20th century, Canada had a distinguished international reputation for working with such tools to advance the collective interests of all the world’s nations. Amid the Harper government’s rejection of dialogue, and its glorification of all things military, that heritage – and the hopes for progress it offers – must not be forgotten.
Origin
Source: The Mark
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