After threatening Canada and Mexico with illegal tariffs, and Canada with annexation, United States President Donald Trump has agreed to hold off on imposing tariffs on Canada for at least 30 days. This determination got here after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke with Trump and dedicated to strengthening border safety.
Whereas this non permanent reprieve gives some respiration room, the long-run query of how Canada ought to deal with Trump and the American descent into authoritarianism stays.
Early responses appear to have coalesced round two insurance policies: for Canada to trade less with the U.S. and more with other countries and to strengthen the internal Canadian economy.
Decreasing Canada’s dependence on the U.S. economic system is important in our present second, as I’ve previously argued. However it’s going to impose vital prices on Canadians and require a elementary readjustment in how we take into consideration our economic system and society.
The Third Choice, revived
(CP PHOTO)
This present disaster isn’t going down in a historic vacuum. Greater than 50 years in the past, comparable issues about Canada’s dependence on the U.S. led to a coverage dialogue centred on what turned referred to as the “Third Option.”
In 1972, then-Secretary of State for Exterior Affairs Mitchell Sharp wrote a paper referred to as “Canada-US Relations: Options for the Future.” On the time, worldwide politics had been in a second of transition, and the U.S. was recalibrating its understanding of its nationwide curiosity.
Sharp proposed reconsidering the Canada-U.S. relationship. He noticed that whereas Canadians acknowledged the advantages of ties with the U.S., they had been more and more cautious of the route of the connection and in help of measures to “guarantee larger Canadian independence.”
Echoing at the moment’s issues, Sharp argued that the central query for Canada was whether or not its interdependence with the U.S. would “impose an unmanageable pressure on the idea of a separate Canadian id, if not on the weather of Canadian independence.”
The choices that Sharp proposed are the identical ones on provide at the moment:
- The First Choice: Preserve Canada’s present relationship with the U.S. with minimal coverage changes
- The Second Choice: Transfer towards nearer integration with the U.S.
- The Third Choice: Pursue a long-term technique to strengthen the Canadian economic system and scale back vulnerability
From three choices to at least one
Sharp’s evaluation is evident on the prices and advantages of free commerce. When it comes to advantages, financial prosperity could be simpler to achieve. In reality, this proved decisive in 1988, when Canada embraced the Second Choice — nearer integration by way of the 1988 Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement.
However, as Sharp warned presciently, a free-trade settlement could be a “well-nigh irreversible choice for Canada” as a result of it might tie the nation so carefully to the U.S., elevating the price of disentanglement.
In the meantime, the U.S. would all the time be free to redefine the connection for any purpose. This is what happened in 2001 when the U.S. prioritized safety over prosperity in response to the 9/11 assaults. It’s what’s occurring now.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP, Scott Applewhite
As in 2001, deeper integration stays a tempting response to the U.S. However the dangers from integration are even larger now, on condition that Trump is dismantling U.S. democracy at home and trying to bully its neighbours in unprecedented methods.
Learn extra:
How constitutional guardrails have always contained presidential ambitions
Already, Canada is struggling to recruit American allies to combat in opposition to the tariffs as a result of U.S. companies and politicians are afraid to stand up to Trump. Selecting to extra deeply combine would solely worsen Canada’s place, making it part of the U.S. economic system whereas dropping much more political affect.
And that’s with out addressing the morality of collaborating with a rustic that’s presently organising a concentration camp for migrants in Guantanamo Bay.
Autocratic governments, as Trump’s administration is demonstrating together with his ultimatums in opposition to Canada and Mexico, are bullies who will all the time push the benefit. Taking their calls for at face worth is a surefire strategy to give up Canadian autonomy one piece at a time. So, the First Choice — sustaining the established order — can also be off the desk.
Which leaves the Third Choice.
The mortal peril going through Canada
The Third Choice has develop into extra interesting throughout the political spectrum primarily as a result of the U.S. is forcing Canada’s hand. The uncertainty Trump has injected into the connection, even within the presence of a commerce settlement, has made it extra expensive for companies to interact in cross-border commerce.
If Trump’s tariff risk stays, and his assault on the rule of legislation continues, the U.S. market will develop into much more unattractive, not least due to the poisonous uncertainty Trump has injected into the connection.
However his actions additionally underscore the brand new, excessive hazard Canada now faces.
(AP Photograph/Evan Vucci)
As Sharp acknowledged in 1972, shared social values had been the bedrock of profitable Canada-U.S. relations. He understood that, for the Third Choice to work, the connection wanted to be “harmonious.” At the same time as he thought-about methods to scale back Canada’s dependence, he by no means doubted Canada and the U.S. had been “broadly suitable societies.”
That shared basis — “primarily based on a broad array of shared pursuits, perceptions and targets” — made it doable for Canada to chart its personal path whereas sustaining a productive relationship with the U.S.
At present, that assumption not holds. The U.S., underneath Trump, is performing as an expansionist imperial energy with little regard for international law.
That is the needle Canadian politicians have to string. By geography alone, Canada should proceed to have a relationship with the U.S. However the absence of shared values makes it extremely troublesome to have any type of wholesome, productive relationship.
The price of democracy
As Sharp acknowledged, there’s a value to following the Third Choice. It’ll require a “deliberate, complete and long-term technique” on a scale not seen because the Sixties — which means larger taxes, extra authorities intervention and a stage of worldwide engagement Canada hasn’t undertaken in fairly some time.
This should all be carried out in a panorama the place Canada and the U.S. not share values — a shift even ardent Canadian nationalists acknowledged was essential for Canadian independence — whereas pursuing insurance policies that don’t antagonize the U.S.
For the Third Choice to be viable at the moment, Canadians should embrace an impartial Canadian id primarily based on respect for democracy, pluralism, the rule of legislation and human rights. It doubtless requires consensus that U.S. authoritarianism is wholly unacceptable to Canada.
Canada is being pushed towards the Third Choice because the least worst strategy. However, as was true in Sharp’s time, the Third Choice come at a price. Independence and democracy don’t come free of charge.
