I think Canada's foreign policy is often affiliated with this notion of a "helpful fixer." We like to think that we are closely affiliated with an organization like the UN, which has been proven time and time again through our peace keeping missions. We put more solace in our identity as a strong economic country that thinks we are less partisan than we actually are, we think that we can be that "impartial" country that can help in peace keep missions and foreign aid (The perfect example of this was our role in the Suez, which effectively pissed of the British). The problem to me, is that we don't take a strong role in what is the best from Canada, we're more concerned with how we are perceived by the rest of the world.
I think the only reason that we went to Afghanistan was that our largest trading partner and the country we share a mutual defense treaty with was attacked. If it was anyone else, we would not have gone. The helpful fixer role is not benefitting Canada, which was clearly exposed in our security seat debacle of last month, which was further worsened by how Canada acted.
By no means am I anti-American, but I don't like how arrogant the American government is. They realize that they are in the drivers seat, and as a result they try to take us the the cleaners every chance they get, examples being their treatment of certain aspects of the NAFTA, or their handling of the mad cow outbreaks. You could even go back as far as Diefenbaker and Kennedy. The United States has a population that is 10x the size of ours and a substantially larger military, but our economies are equally dependent of each other. I feel that Canada should take a more assertive stand in securing it's economy and military, especially in the north, and stop trying to be the 'helpful fixer.' This ideology would work if the rest of the world did indeed actually perceive us as it, but they don't. In contemporary times we are perceived as a poster child first world nation, that is the 'little brother of the United States.'
It's time to stop trying to separate ourselves from the United States, while we let them step on us, as this just makes us look impotent. It's time to stop committing ourselves to extensive peacekeeping and foreign aid operations. I think that we are not being recognized as a world leader, so we should probably stop trying to be one in this certain areas. Our own country is suffering. Our own homeless rates have been increasing for years now, economic rates between rich in poor are continuing to be marganalized between rich and poor.
Hopefully that wasn't too much of a rant... I just felt this could be a good discussion!
Thoughts?
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