Crafting a New Canadian Foreign Policy: Strategic Sovereignty for a “Leaderless World”

Abstract

Defining Canada's foreign policy has always been a conundrum for Canadian decision makers, torn between the desire to carve out a space of Canada's own, while recognizing the benefit and necessity of ties with the US. Today, this job has become much more difficult because America's global leadership role is changing in ways that are difficult to predict, but that will inevitably make it harder for Canada to navigate internationally. Canada has no choice but to develop greater strategic sovereignty. What Canada needs now, nineteen years after the last foreign policy review, is a national conversation about Canada's role in the world. The goal should be to encourage a sense of shared national purpose and craft a renewed foreign policy for an uncertain world. To do so, Canadian decision makers should ask five core questions: first, how should Canada's foreign policy prioritize Canadian values with ‘more pragmatism and less posturing'? Second, what balance should we seek between Canada's global role and its bilateral focus on the US? Third, how can we mitigate the risk to Canada of a more inward-looking, protectionist and unpredictable US? How should we adapt Canada's international engagement to take into account a less globally-engaged US? Finally, what specific Canadian interests, assets and vulnerabilities should our foreign policy prioritize? The article offers a framework for Canada to set about rebuilding its strategic sovereignty, launching a national conversation to rethink and rewrite its foreign policy narrative, redefine its international priorities and create a sense of common purpose around Canada’s role as a global actor.

Defining Canada's foreign policy has always been a conundrum for Canadian decision-makers, torn between the desire to carve out a space of Canada's own while recognizing the benefit and necessity of ties with the US. Our national narrative about Canada's place in the world has been heavily influenced by the overwhelming American presence and, at the same time, by our desire to differentiate ourselves from it. ¹

Today, the job has become more difficult, primarily because America's global leadership role is changing in ways that are difficult to predict. Canada needs to adapt its foreign policy to be ready for a changed world, but what that world will look like is far from clear. What Canada needs to do differently will depend on what we are trying to manage. If extreme forms of US isolationism and exceptionalism take root, then the US may turn away from its traditional global leadership role and, at the same time, use its power in an unrestrained or unilateral way. It is also likely that US global power will continue to weaken in the face of growing competition from other powerful states like China, as well as unsettled relations with India and, unless it is defeated in Ukraine, Russia. At the same time, the exercise of global leadership is becoming more difficult, as more states choose not to align themselves with either the US or its competitors. The role of the US in the global architecture that we have relied on since the end of the Second World War is fraying and transforming in ways that will inevitably make it harder for Canada to navigate internationally.

Other Western nations are grappling with the same challenge—one of the flaws of the post–Cold War structure is an over-reliance on one country. But two things distinguish Canada: first, and most importantly, our foreign policy is more entangled with the US's, so the adjustment will be more acute. Second, Canada does not have a history or an inclination to engage in regular national debates or articulations of its foreign policy. The last foreign policy review was nineteen years ago. It is past time for a rethink, because Canada's current approach to foreign policy and the government machinery that supports it are best suited to a world that no longer exists.

Many argue that the space for Canadian influence is now more constrained, with a five-fold growth in the number of states in the world since the Second World War and more large powers jockeying for position. While this is true, it does not mean that Canada cannot and should not set itself up to have a shaping role. The stark alternative is to focus inward and—depending on how the bilateral relationship with the US unfolds—assume a subordinate role within “Fortress North America” or a more vulnerable one as “Island Canada.” In a world where US leadership and reliability are unpredictable, and where there are new centers of power, weakening international institutions, and new interconnected threats that cannot be addressed without cooperative solutions, Canada has no choice but to avoid overdependence on the US in our foreign policy choices and to develop greater strategic sovereignty.

What Canada needs is a national conversation about its role in the world. The last foreign policy review was in 2005. The goal should be to engage all levels of government, the private sector, civil society, academia, and Canadians across the country to encourage a sense of shared national purpose around Canada's global identity and role. And as (and if) decision-makers choose to tackle the challenge of a new foreign policy for Canada, they should ask Canadians five core questions that are central to recrafting Canada's foreign policy.

First, how (much) should Canada's foreign policy prioritize Canadian values? Canada has focused more than other middle powers on the tension between interests and values in our foreign policy. This goes back to Lester Pearson's distinction between the realism with which we approach our relationship with the US and the idealism that we adopt in our multilateral and global engagement. Over the years, the domestic debate about the relative priority of a values-based foreign policy over an interest-driven one has evolved and been politicized in a way that often works against our broader interests. The current and previous governments have branded their foreign policies as “principled,” although the principles are described differently, with the current government using the words “progressive” or “feminist” and the previous government focusing on “not going along to get along.”

The difficulty lies not with the principles evoked—a foreign policy that prioritizes equality and rejects appeasement of dictators quite rightly responds to Canadian values. The problem is the binary, politicized Canadian debate around values and, too often, an approach that prioritizes rhetoric over implementation. Canada is not a major power so the approach to international engagement of “walk softly and carry a big stick” does not work for us. But nor does megaphone diplomacy—"walking loudly and carrying a small stick” or taking too long to deliver on commitments. Canada's foreign policy will and should always reflect Canadian values, but it is in Canada's interest to have more pragmatism and less posturing and not to be seen as the country that “lectures and leaves.” ²

Second, if America's global leadership role wavers, what impact will this have on the relative importance of Canada's global role versus its engagement with the US? Linked to the long-standing Canadian narrative around a foreign policy that prioritizes values over interests, the second thread running through our approach to foreign policy is a dividing line between the public policy choices that we see as necessary and those we see as optional. This walks back to our immense and long-standing reliance on the US as the anchor of our economy and continental security. In a way, historically, Canadian foreign policy has had only one true set of interests— the relationship with the US. While we see engagement with the US almost as domestic policy that is both existential and necessary, aside from the early post-WWII years, the rest of our foreign policy and defence engagement abroad has been seen largely as optional. If we are safe and prosperous in Fortress North America, then we can pay less attention to geopolitics.

This approach might have made eminent sense throughout some of our history. In today's world, where new threat vectors like climate change, pandemics, and violations of cyber law are global in nature and require collective responses, where the US is a less predictable and reliable guarantor of Canada's security, where America First policies and threats of tariffs could threaten our economy, it is no longer tenable. The direct costs of climate disasters, the Covid pandemic, or the Russian war in Ukraine to Canada's economy and security are undeniable. “Fortress North America” will no longer afford us the security or economic dividends it once did. As geographic distance is collapsing, Canada needs to start seeing international engagement not as optional but necessary, and in Canada's existential interest.

Third, how can we mitigate the direct risk to Canada of a more inward-looking, protectionist, and unpredictable US? Canada's proximity to the US has had a determinative effect on how diplomacy is done, both at the bilateral and international levels. In terms of the bilateral relationship with the US, although we have used roughly the same hub-and-spoke approach as other major players, with Washington at the center of diplomatic efforts, there is a major difference. Canada has developed a much more “interlaced” form of diplomacy that includes a layered system of cross-border province-to-state, city-to-city, and private-sector to private-sector diplomacy. When a vital Canadian interest is at stake, as it was most recently with threatened tariffs on steel, this entire system of “donut diplomacy” kicks into gear. Our “Team Canada” approach to influencing US decision-making is an asset that will, in an uncertain future, continue to give Canada an edge over many other competitors.

Canadian decision-makers can think about using this kind of concerted strategy in the US for issues that matter to us beyond bilateral trade. On geopolitical issues, Canada has rarely chosen to activate the full array of its bilateral networks with the US, preferring to leave these to the multilateral level or as one item on a long agenda at leaders’ bilateral meetings. This is a missed opportunity to use our bilateral diplomatic tactics and weight to try to keep the US engaged on broader geopolitical issues of core interest to us.

Fourth, how should we adapt Canada's international engagement to take into account a less globally engaged US? American leadership and influence in multilateral bodies has started to shift in the past few years, owing to several different push-and-pull factors. The last two American presidents have been less “multilateralist” than their predecessors were, albeit with markedly different approaches. Former president Donald Trump repudiated alliances like NATO and withdrew the US from treaties like the Kyoto Protocol, and President Joe Biden has focused less on global bodies like the UN or World Health Organization in favour of purpose-built fora like the Democracy Summit or the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework. ³

US leadership has also been incrementally crowded out by competitors, notably China. Acutely aware that the UN is an ecosystem and that what you say in one forum will echo in other negotiations, China uses this to rewrite the rules, taking advantage of the West's lack of coherence. And many more states are occupying a “middle space” at the UN, “forum-shopping” for the right alliances, depending on the issue and their interests and not automatically aligning with traditional “Western” or other negotiating blocs. In sum, where the US used to act as a multilateralist in a unipolar world, it is now acting more often as a unilateralist in a multipolar (or messier) world.

If this trend continues, it will have a profound impact on Canadian foreign policy. For middle powers such as Canada, bodies like NATO, the UN, or the G7 act as force multipliers, enhancing leverage. Going forward, Canada should focus on multilateral fora to keep the US engaged internationally, build cross-regional, issues-based alliances to temper extremes of state behaviour, and work to (re)build support for gaps in international norms that matter to Canada, for instance in areas such as cyber attacks or disinformation. In particular, Canada should target its multilateral diplomacy to build greater resilience in bodies where US leadership is central, and plan consciously to use those fora to contain the US when needed. For example the G7 could be used to try to blunt more extreme US positions when needed, similar to the approach used when Russia was in the G8.

Last, but certainly not least, what specific Canadian interests, assets, and vulnerabilities should our foreign policy prioritize? A change in US leadership will inevitably affect Canada's vulnerabilities, assets, and interests. Canada must be ready to navigate a world where the gap is growing between what it needs and what the US wants or is willing to do. It must adapt to a world where the American security guarantee is less reliable; a world where America is hostile to free trade while Canada remains a trading nation; where America is skeptical of alliances, while Canada relies on alliances and partnerships; and where American democracy is destabilizing and polarizing, while Canada relies on resilient democracy as a core Canadian value. There are also international norms that matter to Canada that will be weakened if there is a US leadership vacuum, such as nuclear non-proliferation, or that will be ignored if the US takes “America First” policies to the extreme, with international trade principles on tariffs, for example. Canada needs to use a national conversation on foreign policy as an opportunity to take a structured, strategic approach to deliberately define our international comparative advantage and vulnerabilities.

It is an undeniable fact that the US global role is shifting, and thus it would be folly for Canada not to set about reclaiming our strategic sovereignty. Canada needs a national conversation to rethink and rewrite its foreign policy narrative, redefine our international priorities, and create a sense of common purpose around our country's role as a global actor.