Identités ethnoculturelles et politique étrangère : le cas de la politique française du Canada

2012 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-140
Author(s):  
Justin Massie

Résumé.Cet article propose, grâce à la notion de culture stratégique, une articulation du lien entre identité et politique étrangère. Il met plus particulièrement l'accent sur les effets des identités ethnoculturelles (anglophone et francophone) sur la politique de sécurité internationale du Canada, et soutient l'hypothèse qu'il en résulte une culture stratégique atlantiste et biculturelle, laquelle accorde une importance particulière à la France (de même qu'à la Grande-Bretagne et aux États-Unis). Il ressort de l'analyse historique de celle-ci que la centralité des identités ethnoculturelles canadiennes permet de mieux comprendre l'importance particulière dont jouit la France sur les limites normatives du multilatéralisme et de la légitimité de recourir à la force militaire par le Canada.Abstract.This article seeks to provide a constructivist account of Canadian foreign policy, linking identity and policy, through the concept of strategic culture. It focuses on Canada's dual ethnocultural identities (Anglophone and Francophone) and the bicultural and Atlanticist strategic culture that stems from it. It argues that this strategic culture helps explain France's significant importance (together with the United Kingdom and the United States) in defining the normative boundaries of Canada's multilateralism and legitimacy to use of military force abroad.

Author(s):  
Christopher S. Browning ◽  
Pertti Joenniemi ◽  
Brent J. Steele

The chapter reinterprets the United Kingdom-US special relationship through the lens of vicarious identification. It demonstrates how historical proclamations of the special relationship have responded to recurrent British anxieties related to its postwar, post-imperial, and now, following Brexit, its (impending) post-(EU)ropean decline. Vicarious identification with the United States is seen to offer the chance to reaffirm core narratives of self-identity central to British ontological security and which when successful enable the country to avoid serious reflection on its current situation. The chapter highlights the historical continuities of this move but also shows how vicarious identity promotion operates as a foreign policy strategy designed, not only to legitimize the special relationship, but also to entice the United States and its citizens to reciprocate in kind. Beyond exploring the temptations of vicarious identification as a form of foreign policy strategy, the chapter also explores its vulnerabilities, vulnerabilities crystallized during the course of the Trump presidency.


Author(s):  
Kurt Hübner ◽  
James Anderson

Historically, the land known as Canada during the 21st century was colonized by the Kingdoms of France and England and was also the site of an abortive and short-lived colonization attempt by Scandinavian settlers in the 10th and 11th centuries. The early French colony of New France boasted a population in the tens of thousands but was eventually annexed and colonized by the United Kingdom following the conclusion of the Seven Years’ War. As a result, the modern nation-states of the United Kingdom and France have the closest relationships with Canada, and it is through these conduits that much of the contemporary Canada–European Union (EU) relationship lies. Although Canada, being a colony of the United Kingdom, did not conduct its own diplomacy for the entirety of the 19th century and much of the 20th, it was able to establish informal ties through diplomatic attachés to British embassies and consular offices. Following the Statute of Westminster in 1931, Canada gained the ability to craft an independent foreign policy which it pursued wholeheartedly. After the Second World War, it joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) alongside the United States, the United Kingdom, and numerous other European nations. Its formal relationship with the EU and its predecessors began in 1959, when it and the burgeoning European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) signed an agreement on the peaceful uses of atomic energy. Since then, its cooperation has gained breadth and depth, expanding to myriad other policy areas including agriculture, foreign policy and defense, security, and trade. There have been points of tension between the two partners in the past, most notably around issues with the Quebec independence movement, governance of the Arctic, and governance of international fisheries and the oceans. However, over time the EU has grown to become perhaps Canada’s second most important partner worldwide, after the United States. This has culminated in the signing of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) and the Strategic Partnership Agreement (SPA), which are major milestones and cement Canada and the EU’s mutually increasing importance to each other.


2021 ◽  
Vol 73 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-105
Author(s):  
Ognjen Pribicevic

The relations with Russia rank among the most important and most complex issues in the US and UK foreign policy. The years after the Second World War have been marked by an exhausting arms race between the Western and Eastern bloc that ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall, the break-up of the Soviet Union and the victory of the United States and its Western allies. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the relations between the US and the United Kingdom on the one hand, and Russia, on the other, during the mandate of President Trump and after Brexit and point to possible directions that these relations may take in the aftermath of Biden?s victory in the 2020 US Presidential elections. The author proceeds from a hypothesis that the efforts of President Trump, who, contrary to his predecessors, felt that the relations with Russia should be based on interests rather than ideology, have failed. He has not been successful primarily due to the huge resistance mounted by the state structures, mainstream media and anti-Russian coalition forged by the Republican and Democratic parties. The relations between the UK and Russia remain cold after Brexit as well due to the severe problems between the two countries. The first part will deal with the strained relations between the United States and Russia following the West?s victory in the Cold War, the efforts of President Trump to improve these relations and his failure to do so. The second part of the paper will address the relationship between the United Kingdom and Russia, which is in many respects even more complicated than that between Russia and the US. After Brexit, the relations between the two countries continue to be plagued by the activities of the Russian agents in Great Britain, the crisis in Ukraine and different views on the war in Syria. In the third part, the concluding part of the paper, the author tried to answer the question of how the relations between the US and Russia will develop after Joseph Biden won the 2020 US Presidential elections. According to him, the new President will continue to pursue the traditional policy towards Russia agreed upon by both US parties. It can be expected that Biden will, despite the policy of sanctions pursued by his predecessors, Obama and Trump, engage more in supporting the opposition and civilian sector in Russia. Given the cold and strained relations between these two states, it may be assumed that Great Britain will readily follow a new, tougher course of action pursued by President Biden towards Russia and Putin. It is especially important for UK politics that Biden returns to the ideas of liberalism because, as we have seen on previous pages, in London, in addition to the actions of Russian agents on the UK territory, Putin is most resented precisely for his activities to overthrow the ruling liberal order. Despite the good ties between Prime Minister Johnson and the former US President who supported Brexit, Biden's victory will bring relief to the UK because of his commitment, as opposed to Trump, to bring back America to the world political stage, where London is likely to expect to find space for its new global role after leaving the EU. On the other hand, Moscow will probably continue with its past foreign policy strategy in anticipation of the moves to be taken by the new US President without high expectations regarding the future relations between the two countries. Russia has even fewer expectations when it comes to relations with the UK, given the gravity of the problems that burden the relations between the two countries


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