A Turning Point in U.S.-Canadian Relations

Adam Bromke and Kim Richard Nossal

From Foreign Affairs, Fall 1987

Article preview: first 500 of 7,203 words total.

Summary:  A successfully concluded free trade pact will consolidate co-operation between the USA and Canada, and be of economic benefit to both. It will provide an effective example of liberalizing trade in a world riddled with protectionist tendencies. Failure on the contrary will inflame nationalist sentiments on both sides. The outcome of the trade negotiations may also influence co-operation in other fields such as acid rain, Arctic sovereignty and North American air defence.

Adam Bromke is a professor of political science at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario, and a columnist on international affairs for The Toronto Star. Kim Richard Nossal is an associate professor of political science at McMaster and author of The Politics of Canadian Foreign Policy.

U.S.-Canadian relations are at a turning point. Negotiations aimed at reaching a comprehensive trade accord between the two countries have entered a final phase. To be considered by Congress, a draft treaty must be ready by October. A successfully concluded pact will be an important step forward in consolidating cooperation between the two North American neighbors; moreover, in a world rampant with protectionist tendencies it will provide an effective example of liberalizing international trade. Conversely, failure to reach a mutually satisfactory agreement will not only be a distinct setback in bilateral relations between Ottawa and Washington, but will also encourage nationalist and protectionist trends. Whatever the outcome of the trade talks with the United States, it will have profound consequences for Canada, reaching to the very heart of the country?s politics.

For the United States, close economic ties with its largest trading partner are important; for Canada, with three-quarters of its trade going to the United States, they are essential. But the present negotiations also have a symbolic significance. The success or failure of the talks will affect the overall climate of relations between the two countries on such issues as acid rain, Arctic sovereignty and cooperation in North American air defense. Indeed, the outcome of the trade negotiations may influence the countries? readiness to cooperate on various global issues, both within NATO and in the broader realm of East-West relations. Last but not least, since the trade issue is likely to play a major role in the Canadian elections that are expected in 1988 or early 1989, the outcome of the negotiations may determine the pattern of Canadian-American relations for a number of years to come.

II

The massive electoral victory of the Progressive Conservative Party under Brian Mulroney on September 4, 1984, promised to bring an end to the increasingly unpleasant friction between Canada and the United States. Since 1980 a number of differences over both bilateral and global issues had marred relations between the two North American neighbors. Canadians were embittered by the continued disputes over both Atlantic and Pacific fisheries, and the lack of attention paid by the Administration of Ronald Reagan to controlling acid rain pollution of lakes and forests north of the border. Americans were irritated by what they viewed as the nationalist measures of the Liberal government of Pierre Elliott Trudeau: the establishment of the National Energy Program, designed to "Canadianize" the oil and gas industry through a retroactive nationalization of 25 percent of any oil discovery; and moves to strengthen the Foreign Investment Review Agency, which monitored and regulated foreign investment. As a result of American pressure both these initiatives were considerably diluted, but criticism from Washington continued, highlighting the basic differences in approach to the proper role of the state in the economy.

The United States was also disappointed by what it considered Canada?s unsatisfactory contributions to the defense of both North America and Western Europe. Even after the Liberal government substantially increased its defense outlays in the late ...

End of preview: first 500 of 7,203 words total.