Abstract
The Canadian experience in terms of change and the foreign policy community presents a paradoxical case study. The stylized image of Canadian governance has been one of cautious and hesitant adaptation. Yet, over the last three decades, the Canadian foreign ministry (the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and its predecessors, External Affairs and International Trade Canada and the Department of External Affairs) has gone through a series of reorganizations in a bid to reinvent itself. While clinging on to many of its older habits of behaviour with respect to international activity (most notably an acute concern with diplomatic skill and reputation),1 the Canadian pattern of internal reform has been one which features a marked focus on re-thinking and re-jigging. Indeed, the concern with trying to get its organizational structure right serves as the dominant leitmotiv for the Canadian foreign ministry.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
Andrew F. Cooper, Canadian Foreign Policy: Old Habits and New Directions (Scarborough, Ontario: Prentice Hall, 1987).
James N. Rosenau, Turbulence in World Politics: A Theory of Change and Continuity (Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1990).
On this theme, more generally, see Lauri Karvonen and Bengt Sundelius, Internationalization and Foreign Policy Management (Aldershot: Gower, 1987), p. 14.
John Holmes, The Shaping of Peace: Canada and the Search for World Order, vol. 2 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1979), p. 110.
Peter Dobell, The management of a foreign policy for Canadians, International Journal 26, Winter 1970–1, pp. 218–19.
J. L. Granatstein, The Ottawa Men: The Civil Service Mandarins, 1935–1967 (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1982).
On the wider intellectual climate see G. John Ikenberry, ‘A world economy restored: expert consensus and the Anglo-American postwar settlement’, International Organization 46: 1, Winter 1992, pp. 290–6
Bruce Thordarson, Trudeau and Foreign Policy: A Study in Decision-Making (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1972), p. 150.
Jeffrey Simpson, ‘PM lectures provinces as meeting bogs down,’ Globe and Mail, 15 February 1978, p. 1.
G. B. Doern and T. Conway, The Greening of Canada: Federal Institutions and Decisions (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994)
Robert Johnstone, testimony to the Standing Committee on External Affairs and National Defence, Minutes of Proceedings and Evidence, 30 January 1981, 30: 15.
Office of the Prime Minister, Release, 12 January 1982, quoted in Andrew F. Cooper, Richard Higgott, and Kim Richard Nossal, Relocating Middle Powers (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1993), p. 37.
On this policy conflict, see Michael Hart with Bill Dymond and Colin Robertson, Decision At Midnight: Inside The Canada-US Free-Trade Negotiations (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1994), pp. 89–91.
Brian Hocking, ‘Regional governments and international affairs: foreign policy problem or deviant behaviour?’ International Journal, 45: 3, Summer 1986, p. 503.
Kim Richard Nossal, ‘The PM and the SSEA in Canada’s foreign policy: dividing the territory, 1968–1993/ International Journal 50: 1, Winter 1994–5, p. 203.
Leslie A. Pal, ‘Competing paradigms in policy discourse: the case of international human rights,’ Policy Sciences 28: 2 May 1995, pp. 185–207.
Tom Keating, ‘The state, the public, and the making of Canadian foreign policy’ in Robert J. Jackson, Doreen Jackson, and Nicolas Baxter-Moore, Contemporary Canadian Politics: Readings and Notes (Scarborough: Prentice-Hall, 1987), pp. 363–4.
Cranford Pratt, ‘Dominant Class Theory and Canadian Foreign Policy: The Case of the Counter-Consensus,’ International Journal 31: 1, Winter 1983–4, pp. 93–125.
Denis Stairs, ‘Public opinion and external affairs: reflections on the domestication of Canadian foreign policy,’ International Journal, 33: 1, Winter 1977–8, pp. 144–5.
Andrew F. Cooper and Leslie A. Pal, ‘Human rights and security,’ in G. B. Doern, Leslie A. Pal and Brian W. Tomlin, eds, Border Crossings: The Internationalization of Canadian Public Policy (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 209–38.
Denis Stairs, ‘The public politics of the Canadian defence and foreign policy reviews,’ Canadian Foreign Policy III, 1 (Spring 1995), pp. 91–116.
Kim R. Nossal, ‘The Democratization of Canadian Foreign Policy,’ Canadian Foreign Policy 1, 3, Fall 1993, pp. 95–105.
Evan Potter, ‘A question of relevance: Canada’s foreign policy and foreign service in the 1990s,’ in Fen Osier Hampson and Christopher J. Maule, eds, Canada Among Nations, 1993–94, Global Jeopardy (Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1993), pp. 48–
Gilbert Winham, ‘The Impact of System Change on International Diplomacy’, Ottawa: Canadian Political Science Association, 1993.
Cranford Pratt, ‘Development assistance and Canadian foreign policy: where we are now,’ Canadian Foreign Policy 2: 3, Winter 1994–5, pp. 77–85.
G. Bruce Doern and Brian W. Tomlin, ‘Trade-Industry Policy,’ in Doern, Pal and Tomlin, Border Crossings, p. 175. On the earlier tensions between the foreign ministry and the then Department of Trade and Industry, see Ernie Keenes, ‘Rearranging the Deck Chairs: A Political Economy Approach to Foreign Management in Canada,’ Canadian Public Administration 35: 3, 1992, pp. 381–401.
Peter B. Evans, Harold K. Jacobson and Robert D. Putnam, International Bargaining and Domestic Politics (Berkeley, California; University of California Press, 1993).
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 1999 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Cooper, A.F. (1999). Canada Trying to Get it Right: the Foreign Ministry and Organizational Change. In: Hocking, B. (eds) Foreign Ministries. Studies in Diplomacy. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-27317-1_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-27317-1_4
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-0-333-69243-1
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-27317-1
eBook Packages: Palgrave Political & Intern. Studies CollectionPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)