Canada in the World: Canadian International Policy

Video Interview Charles-Philippe David Subscribe to eNewsletter and/or Email Alerts and Podcasts

Who was Raoul Dandurand	2:46	Windows Media l Quicktime
Canada’s Diplomatic Role	4:48	Windows Media l Quicktime
Diplomacy and non State actors	4:54	Windows Media l Quicktime
Challenges for Diplomacy	2:46	Windows Media l Quicktime

Who was Raoul Dandurand

My name is Charles-Philippe David. I currently hold the Raoul-Dandurand Chair in strategic and diplomatic studies here at the Université du Québec à Montréal. I am no doubt here and contributing to this interview partly because the Chair that I have held for 10 years now—it’s the 10th anniversary this year in 2006—bears the name of Raoul Dandurand. And if anyone embodies the values that the Department of Foreign Affairs promotes today and has promoted for so long, it’s Raoul Dandurand. Let me remind everyone that he was President of the League of Nations General Assembly in 1925. I have always told students and people who are unfamiliar with Raoul Dandurand that Mr. Dandurand was a kind of Pearson before Lester Pearson. And they would have gotten along very well, no doubt, both of them being Liberals. Mr. Dandurand was a long-time senator. He negotiated the Statute of Westminster giving independence to Canadian foreign policy in 1932. He founded Stanislas College in Montreal, a rather remarkable feat. So in the diplomatic and strategic arena, his contribution embodies Canadian values: peaceful resolution of conflicts, promotion of a vision of security that extended to human considerations (at that time, this was called concerns over the growing influence of minorities in European countries), arbitration, and the use of international institutions (at that time, courts of law such as the one in The Hague, or the League of Nations). So Dandurand’s vision was already very human and humanitarian.

And the other reason I’m here I think is because this Chair has been working very actively for 10 years now in a number of areas, but particularly in the area of peacekeeping missions. Also, last November an observatory on peacekeeping missions, of which I am a member, was created here at UQAM. There are about a dozen members of this observatory and we’ve already organized several conferences. We’ve hosted Louise Fréchette, we organized a seminar last March on the Responsibility to Protect. So you can already see topics that are of direct concern regarding the thrusts of Canadian policy.

Canada’s Diplomatic Role

Canada has always fulfilled an extremely important role in disarmament forums at the UN and more specifically in the technical institutions attached to the UN—one obviously thinks of the International Atomic Energy Agency. There are other examples where Canada has played a very active role, continues to play a very active role, and of course diplomacy has a very important place. And it’s noticeable when diplomacy does not work: the costs, the consequences of such a failure are always, in every case, very high. Think of Iraq in the early 1990s and throughout most of that decade: diplomacy did not really provide the expected outcomes, and ultimately the whole thing ended in an invasion—on a false pretence, no doubt—but nevertheless the problem of nuclear proliferation, though it was imaginary, was resolved by the use of force. And so we would have preferred diplomacy to have triumphed instead of this use of force.

I say this because there are other examples. Think of Iran and North Korea, where diplomacy, year after year, is still producing results, and we have high hopes that diplomacy can work. In the case of North Korea, this has been going on for at least 10, if not 12 years. Canada vigorously supports multilateral efforts in this area because we are, of course, an Atlantic force, but we are also a Pacific force, in both senses of the word, and our focus is therefore on issues such as North Korea. Think about Iran as well: we are supportive of, though not directly involved in, negotiations between European countries, the United States and Iran. We vigorously support the efforts being made there because, once again, we see diplomacy as the only way to truly resolve the basic problem of nuclear proliferation in the case of Iran.

And if diplomacy doesn’t work in the case of North Korea or Iran, then it’s the broader problem of nuclear proliferation that you touched on. How many countries at that moment could be tempted by a nuclear military venture if diplomacy did not work? It’s in Canada’s interest for diplomacy to work and it’s the best way in which Canada can affirm its interest, affirm its security doctrine, because it’s truly one of the biggest challenges of the 21st century. Because as I said, there is, in effect, nuclear proliferation by countries, but there’s also the problem of nuclear terrorism or terrorism that could acquire radiological, bacteriological or chemical weapons of mass destruction. In all those areas, only cooperation between countries can work. There are obviously initiatives that are more forceful or more military, such as the Counterproliferation Initiative that the Americans have implemented. Of course, there are intervention plans if it’s proven that a country or a group is illegally procuring such weapons; but we know quite well that in all cases prevention is much more desirable than intervention. And so, in a network that is increasingly interdependent, along the porous borders that are found throughout the world, if you want to foil the networks that pose problems in this area, only cooperation between diplomats, security, police forces, intelligence, can really produce results.

I tell students that probably the greatest achievement in the area of security was the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which came into effect in 1970. It is one of the UN’s greatest achievements and consequently, since the UN is nothing but the sum of its member countries, it is one of Canada’s greatest achievements because we contributed to it, we ensured that the treaty could be signed. And it is the best example (indeed, I tell students this) of legislation, of global-scale regulations that are still relatively successful. Because instead of having 25 nuclear powers like President Kennedy announced in 1961, we don’t even have 10 declared or undeclared nuclear powers worldwide. So there is a certain amount of success at that level, and Canada contributed to it.

Diplomacy and non State actors

The place now filled by security privatization, militias, non-state or intrastate armed groups, even international groups that are based in several countries (one obviously thinks of the mafia because it is a textbook example, but there are also drug traffickers, groups that participate in money laundering, the nuclear networks I alluded to in another response), all these players pose considerable problems for nations. Countries were in particular accustomed to negotiating between themselves and practising a style of diplomacy between themselves. And now, they also have to practise forms of persuasion, of constraint, you understand—in essence, of diplomacy—that is both preventive but also coercive, to help states implement security that corresponds to our interests, even though these states do not have the means to implement this security. You mentioned Lebanon, for example. Normally, under a UN resolution, the Hezbollah militia should have been disarmed, and that has not been done. Lebanon doesn’t even have the capacity as a state to ensure the full security of its own territory other than by doing business with and including Hezbollah (and other militias). So it becomes complicated. Nations must be helped to remain, or else to become, strong, especially in the area of security because it is the core of the country’s primary responsibility. But increasingly we know that failing states, states that are sick, states that are perhaps on the road to recovery, are the most serious problem facing us since the end of the Cold War. It is the weak states, the failed states, the poorly governed states, the states that are unable to ensure their security that pose problems. It is not necessarily the strong states. I think that in the 21st century, the very health of the state will be a colossal challenge for the international community. So if there’s one country that has experience and that understands this kind of problem, it’s once again Canada, because of both its domestic and foreign policy. We are well aware that states must be supported, encouraged in their capacity to ensure security, in their capacity to resolve conflicts by innovative methods that are perhaps patterned on models that we know so well, such as federalism, such as a solid rule of law that is quite separate from civil society. And those are the formulas—peacebuilding, human security, promotion of human rights—that are needed to build and reconstruct states. And in the area of security, those methods are going to be more than necessary; otherwise you’re right, the situations we have experienced in the recent past—I’m thinking of Somalia, for example, of central Africa, of the Balkans, and of current situations such as the one we mentioned in Lebanon, but also other situations such as in Sri Lanka, in Colombia, in Afghanistan—risk considerable escalation in the years to come, and that would be the main security problem that would be facing us.

So, I’ll come full circle by saying, as with the proliferation issues, military intervention or coercive means are not enough. Diplomacy must be able to find a way, through public diplomacy, through programs supported by aid to these countries, through the promotion of a state of law. A state of law must exist well before democracy, for example. Think of Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Sri Lanka, Colombia, to ensure that these countries are in full control of their territory and their citizens and that, at that point, there is little danger, little risk of proliferation by intrastate or interstate armed groups that set up bases in these countries—think of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, for example—and take advantage of porous borders to broadly threaten the security of those states, and consequently threaten our own security. We don’t need to show why after September 11.
 

Work to be done by Diplomacy

I think that countries have invested heavily in a good number of existing institutions. I spoke of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, but there are also many groups, such as exporters of nuclear technologies, committees, groups of countries that specifically monitor such things as the trafficking of fissile material. There are also laws, national initiatives. I alluded to the American Counterproliferation Initiative that allows the American navy to, for example, intercept ships on the high seas that are suspected of transporting and forwarding illegal nuclear material, as well as chemical weapons, even perhaps bacteriological weapons. The main purpose of all these initiatives is to combat the risk of countries becoming proliferators. But we recently discovered, three years ago, by shining the light on the network of the father of Pakistan’s atomic bomb, Abdul Khan, that it is unlikely that countries have everything it takes today to thwart the very determined will of a network such as that of Abdul Khan to obtain on the black market—or even taking advantage of porous borders and the reluctance of industrialized countries to acknowledge them, developed countries that harness nuclear energy—to obtain weapons, to use these civilian means to compile military arsenals, when this network extends worldwide. So what I would say about it is this: diplomacy has an enormous amount of work to do because we must now seek help not from just countries, but also from international organizations, from regional organizations, to considerably strengthen, by all manner of ways, the coordination and exchange of intelligence between countries. That, I would say, is really another major challenge that is awaiting us because we have seen in the past few years that such coordination has been largely inadequate, allowing Pakistan, for example, to openly procure a nuclear weapon in plain view of all countries, including Canada, but it still took us by surprise when the atomic bomb was finally tested in 1999. So that proves we must redouble our efforts to enhance this coordination.

Last Updated:2006-10-16

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