Canada-U.S. Relations
For at least the past half century, Canada’s relationship with the United States has been our most important one, and there is no sign this will change any time soon. Over three quarters of our exports go to the United States, accounting for a third of our gross national product. Millions of jobs across the country depend on our trade relationship with the United States.
But our relationship, as the contributors to this series note, is about far more than economics. Our two countries work closely in Afghanistan as part of NATO and the fight against al-Qaeda. Our long record of cooperation on environmental issues was renewed last month when Prime Minister Harper and President Obama unveiled new joint vehicle emissions standards.
Yet we also face important challenges. Our thickening border, for example, has restricted the flow of people and goods between our two worlds, harming both our economies. And, in an American capital consumed by urgent domestic and international crises, it is always difficult for Canada to make its voice heard.
Our contributors, who bring to bear experience from both the diplomatic and academic worlds, help us understand how Canada can make its way onto Washington’s agenda and reinforce why our relationship with the United States is as important as ever.
Enter North America
by Jeremy Kinsman
Former Canadian Ambassador to Russia, Italy, and the EU.
- First Posted: Apr 22 2010 01:47 AM
- Updated: about 1 month ago
Washington would welcome an effort by Ottawa to forge a new agenda for the emerging Canada-U.S.-Mexico community.
In a changing world that is witnessing the end of America's global dominance, what is North America's future?
What, in fact, does North America mean, besides its obvious geographic location?
Is it really a common home for the citizens of our three countries - Canada, the U.S. and Mexico?
How can that be, you might ask, when the largest has bulked up its border defences to such an extent and seems to like playing footsie with economic protectionism?
North America is clearly at a strategic crossroad and the question we ought to be asking is how do we move forward together.
At a recent conference on North America's future at Berkeley, experts from the University of California and the University of British Columbia presented a host of material showing there are fewer differences between Canadians and Americans than are commonly believed.
As usual, the data shows Canadians are more apt to favour government services because they are seen to have worked.
Americans, on the other hand, have a stronger commitment to religion, especially evangelical, as part of their collective identity.
But there are no big cleavages that could block closer integration on vital issues such as the environment, energy or a common security.
So, what stands in the way of our moving forward?
The brooders
The Berkeley conference was not lacking for eminent Canadian (and American) do-ers.
The participants included former ministers Joe Clark, Ann McLellan, Pierre-Marc Johnson, and David Emerson as well as a bi-national group of savvy scholars and former ambassadors such as Canadian Allan Gotlieb and the American Thomas Pickering.
For his part, Gotlieb, who championed Brian Mulroney's free-trade deal during his period in Washington in the 1980s, despaired that the combined effects of 9/11 and the U.S. financial meltdown has turned America inward and defensive.
The recent, so-called thickening of the Canada-U.S. border, he said, has smothered the gains of the 1988 free trade agreement and its 1994 North American (NAFTA) successor.
What's more, he went on, Canada has lost strategic significance for Washington, despite the importance of our energy exports. All in all, "we don't see where we are going."
Preoccupied America
There was little comfort from this assessment from the American "realists" on the panel.
They argued that the Obama administration, preoccupied as it is with its election promises, along with a dysfunctional Congress, cannot at present be expected to expend political capital on "non-U.S." priorities.
Still, there was noticeable pushback against this kind of laconic surrender.
David Emerson, Stephen Harper's former trade minister, argued compellingly that strengthening globally efficient North American supply chains, in a re-energized NAFTA, would be a vital element in restoring the competitive position of all three North American economies.
Comments