“Doctrine” is a slippery word. There have been many so-called “doctrines” in the history of foreign policy-making. Most that have entered the history books as catchphrases were never called “doctrines” by their authors.
So we have the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 and the Brezhnev Doctrine of 1968. Neither was called a “doctrine” at the time — Monroe’s not until 1853 — but what they and several others had in common were that they were simple declaratives on single subjects. They still weren’t entirely safe to handle.
The Monroe Doctrine said that European powers were not welcome in the Western Hemisphere. The Brezhnev Doctrine said (once you strip away the Leninist cant) that the U.S.S.R. could forcibly reimpose Communist rule in a satellite state if it felt threatened.
Even at that level of simplicity, things got messy. In 1823, the U.S. had no ability to enforce anything of the sort, but (just eight years after the War of 1812 had ended) Great Britain had a shared interest in keeping the Spanish out of Latin America, and it did have the necessary force. The fact that the Monroe Doctrine applied in principle to Britain as much as anyone else was conveniently ignored for most of the period.
The Brezhnev Doctrine was created to justify — retroactively — the Soviet suppression of the Prague Spring in 1968. It was applied — retroactively — to the Hungarian Revolution in 1956. It crashed and burned spectacularly in Afghanistan in 1979. The Soviets didn’t even attempt to apply it in Poland in 1981.
The Harper Doctrine goes a great deal farther. It actually tries to set the conduct of Canadian foreign policy into a philosophical bezel. Lang defined it as composed of equal parts belief that the U.S. can no longer carry the burden of superpower status alone and needs Canada to “step up to the plate” globally, and belief that since the U.S. is in decline, Canada must diversify its trade, primarily into Asia. To which can now be added that it seeks to base Canadian foreign policy firmly in “principle,” Israel and Iran being the most obvious examples.
This isn’t the first time a Canadian government has had a guiding philosophy in foreign affairs. The Human Security Agenda of the Liberal governments of the late 1990s has been called the Axworthy Doctrine, after Lloyd Axworthy. With the notable exception of the war in Kosovo in 1999, the Axworthy Doctrine was all about “soft power.”
Its accomplishments tended to be in areas like the Ottawa Treaty against landmines, and the eventual emergence of the Responsibility to Protect doctrine of liberal interventionism.
The “soft power” phase of Canadian foreign policy tended to produce “soft” results; R2P foundered on the lack of any noticeable international political will to apply it. UN Resolution 1973 on Libya deliberately avoided reference to R2P because it wouldn’t have flown.
The Axworthy Doctrine had at least the faint virtue that it did no real damage to core national interests, although John Manley famously commented that “Canadians have the habit of taking strong stances on any number of international issues, but when it comes time to take action, Canadians take a washroom break.”
Oddly enough, the two “doctrines”, coming from totally different ideological starting points, end up in the same place, nicely inverting Teddy Roosevelt’s famous old chestnut into “speak loudly and carry a small stick.” But as the past few weeks suggest, the Harper Doctrine has a good deal more potential for damage at home.
There is no way you can square “principle” with “open for business.” If nothing else demonstrates that, the chaotically ambivalent stance on China certainly does, and as a by-blow it has managed to confuse the Indians and upset the Americans. (If the Chinese aren’t bemoaning the promised toughening of state-owned-enterprise investment rules, it’s likely because they figure the horse is already out of the stable.) What Washington thinks of the F-35 decision is likely unprintable. Official Washington may be less sensitive to any particular Canadian action than much of official Ottawa believes, but the effect becomes cumulative unless there is a strong relationship between leaders to smooth over the rough spots.
The moral of the story: if you’re a small-to-middle power, the less defined your foreign policy doctrine is, the better. And much the same might be said for greater powers.
Original Article
Source: canada.com
Author: Eric Morse
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