Senator Yuen Pau Woo

Speech to the Canadian International Council – Vancouver Chapter

Good evening. When I last spoke to CIC just over two years ago, I made the case that the central problem in Canadian foreign policy was not how it responded to contemporary challenges in a particular geography or on a particular issue. It was also not about having a totem such as the feminist international policy or the promotion of human rights and democracy, important as these values are. The central challenge, rather, is about recognizing the shift in global power and adjusting to an increasingly multipolar world with strategic autonomy. At the time, I did not see any meaningful awareness on the part of our foreign policy establishment of these major trends. On the contrary, the basic premise of Canadian foreign policy was the maintenance of US primacy and a unipolar world.

By way of context, it is important to recognize that the emergence of a multipolar world is due to the much-maligned globalization, or more specifically the liberalization of trade and investment which has provided opportunities for developing countries to insert themselves into value chains and to export products and services directly or indirectly to industrialized economies. And it is also important to note that much of the western backlash against globalization is not simply an effort to minimize the excesses of unfettered trade and investment but is also an unspoken attempt to roll back the diffusion of power and influence outside of the West.

Hence, the now preferred approach to workforce adjustment due to trade disruption is not income support and retraining, but reshoring of industries and provision of state subsidies for businesses that would not otherwise be competitive. Instead of encouraging second and third sourcing of manufactured goods in developing countries that could use the additional investment, the US and its allies want to “shorten” supply chains, “reshore” manufacturing, and work with only “like-minded” trading partners. The backlash against globalization has made all this easier.

Well before Trump, Canada has been pursuing a foreign policy that tries to address important international issues without properly recognizing and accommodating the rise of emerging powers. And it is doing so by privileging above all its relationship with the United States. Our acquiescence to tough conditions in CUSMA, and the approach we took to protect our interests in the US Infrastructure, Inflation Reduction, and CHIPS bills (as well as Buy America policies in general) says a lot about how much Ottawa is resigning itself to a continentalist economic vision, at the expense of international trading partners. That is how I saw the world in early 2023.

My emphasis on multipolarity and strategic autonomy was not original back then, and it isn’t novel today. But I think it is fair to say that the reality of multipolarity is more evident now, especially under Trump 2.0, even if it is difficult to define multipolarity and what it means for the world. We are, in the words of Antonio Gramsci, in a “time of monsters,” when the old world is dying, and the new world is struggling to emerge – what he calls an “interregnum.” I am told a better translation of the original Italian is “morbid symptoms,” which works just as well for my purposes, but “monsters” is catchier.  

I would not have quoted Gramsci two years ago, to avoid any pedantic quibbling, but I am very comfortable doing so today, as I observe one foreign policy pundit after another intone “multipolarity” as an explanation for the actions of the Trump administration. However, the analysts who are only just coming around to the reality of multipolarity are at least 17 years late to the game. After all, we left the unipolar world as early as in 2008 with the Global Financial Crisis.

But, better late than never. And yet, while much of the Canadian foreign policy establishment is now accepting of a multipolar reality, most of the conversation about how Canada responds to this emerging new order is grounded in the old one. Yes, we recognize the damaging self-interested turn of the United States, but we continue to premise our foreign policy choices on American hegemony. We see the Russian threat to Europe and pledge our support for a beleaguered Ukraine but seem oblivious to a growing chasm in trans-Atlantic solidarity and the fundamental impotence of European states (never mind Canada) to bring about peace in Ukraine. We are rightly alarmed by threats to the world economy from protectionism and the evisceration of ODA but are looking to the G7 as a solution to global challenges that are not remotely within the power of that enfeebled organization to address. We talk about increasing defence spending to meet the demands of NATO even as the alliance is headed for a radical restructuring that will be centered on European strategic autonomy, to the exclusion of North America. And we respond to unfair treatment against us from the United States by proposing unfair actions against third countries such as Mexico and China. These are some of the “morbid symptoms” that have been unleashed during the interregnum, and the current debate on the future of Canadian policy is largely oblivious to them.

Take two recent op-eds by supposedly “realist” analysts from the MacDonald Laurier Institution:

One commentary in the National Post says “Navigating the fallout of Trump’s off-putting, if unserious, rhetoric will require Canada to not lose perspective. The United States is larger than any single four-year presidency, and its relationships with allies like Canada are founded on shared values and interests that transcend current political tensions. . . .  As the West navigates this period of uncertainty, all parties must work to maintain focus on actual threats rather than provocative rhetoric.” The real threat to Canada, according to the authors, is an offer from the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa to increase trade between the two countries. 

Or consider a recent piece in the Globe and Mail which starts out promisingly by advocating for what sounds like a “no illusions” foreign policy in response to US intransigence, only to conclude that we should double down on a US-led containment style Indo-Pacific Strategy by joining AUKUS. 

Are you kidding me? If AUKUS is not already doomed, it will surely be further morphed into an extractive concession for American defense contractors in Australia. The only question is how long it will take for the Aussies to come to their senses and whether the impulse to be the US Deputy Sheriff in the Pacific overwhelms the usually reliable common sense that we expect from Down Under. Australia is facing the same challenge of navigating an interregnum and they will, I hope, remember the lessons of an earlier interregnum, when the UK abruptly withdrew Imperial preferences from Canberra in the 1960s, leaving the country to quickly adjust by diversifying its trade towards other countries, notably Asia. At least they did not have to put up with a British Prime Minister fawning before a US President about how there is “no daylight” between the UK and the US on the President’s taunts about Canada as the 51^st state.

It should be clear to everyone by now that the idea of Canada as the 51^st state is more than the musings of a capricious and boorish leader. President Trump’s threats have so far been met by defiance and an outburst of Canadian nationalism. But don’t mistake the response so far as an assertion of Canadian autonomy. If you look carefully at our appeal to Washington to not impose tariffs, what you will see is the opposite. Ours is not a strategy to prepare for the emerging order, but a play to embrace more tightly the old one. 

Take the visit of provincial premiers to Washington in early March, at which a number of our provincial leaders pledged to help the United States counter China as a “common enemy.” We have differences with China that we need to work out bilaterally, but to volunteer for service as America’s henchman against the PRC is as self-defeating for our relationship with Washington as it is for our relationship with Beijing. 

The federal government is following the same playbook by offering to match U.S. tariffs on China to placate the United States. We did that some months earlier by slapping 100% tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles without a formal investigation into claims of dumping. There was no nuance to the action, which can only be interpreted as a pure play suck-up that did not look at protecting long-term Canadian interests. The response from Beijing was predictable, even if it was delayed. Last week Beijing slapped 100% tariffs on Canadian canola and pork, as well as duties on seafood and other products. The reaction from some Canadian analysts paints China as the aggressor in this tit-for-tat and goes as far as to suggest that the Chinese response is proof that we need to diversify away from the PRC. It is a twisted logic that essentially rewards the US for forcing Canada into a position where we hurt ourselves to win Washington’s favour. Thank goodness BC Premier David Eby had the good sense to say what should be obvious to everyone: Time to call truce on tensions between Canada and China.

Our blunt action against Chinese EVs and the threat to double down on tariffs against Chinese goods does not signal any understanding of the shift to a new world order, let alone our long-term interests. And it isn’t just China that we are willing to treat as a common enemy.  When the first rumblings of US tariffs on Canada emerged, there was talk in Ottawa of splitting off Mexico in our CUSMA re-negotiations with the United States. I don’t doubt that if we see it as potentially advantageous for us in the months ahead, we will not hesitate to do so again. And if other countries are enjoying a moment of schadenfreude over the travails of China and Mexico, I would warn them that under the current old order frame of thinking, Canada will do the same to any third country that the US chooses to target as a trade antagonist — in a nanosecond. The shame of course is not on them, but on us.

For all the bravado in our seemingly muscular response to US taunts and tariffs, our basic message to the Americans is that “we still love you and we will do what it takes to regain your love.” Indeed, the consistent message is that we should make our union even stronger by building a “Fortress North America,” where we can supply the energy, critical minerals, and other resources to help the United States consolidate its vision of a continental powerhouse led by Washington. Just don’t slap tariffs on us. Please, please stop slapping us. Doesn’t this sound like battered spouse syndrome? I think it does, and it is humiliating to watch.

Now, I am not so naïve to think that we can counter the tariff threat from the US without some sweet talk along the lines of “Fortress North America” but there should be no illusions about this kind of placation, which will take us down the road towards a form of the 51^st state, whether we like it or not. The reality is that reciprocal tariffs hurt Canada more than they hurt the United States and the longer this tit-for-tat war goes, the more open Canadians will be to a version of the North American fortress. 

Of course we won’t call it the 51^st state. But a customs union with common external tariffs is within the bounds of possibility. Perhaps even a currency arrangement which cedes control of monetary policy to the Federal Reserve. Very few people in Canada are talking about these scenarios now because we are still in the rage or “elbows up” phase of our blowup with the United States, but I am certain that if the US keeps up its campaign of economic coercion against Canada, there will be a serious debate in this country about moving in the direction of the 51^st state. We will see political and cultural divides in this country that make debates about Quebec independence seem like a squabble over pocket change. 

To be clear, I am on the side that resists a closer economic union with the United States that reduces our strategic autonomy in the world. For those who share my view, the best we can hope for at this stage is that the storm will pass before North American integrationist forces in Canada gather overwhelming strength. Perhaps a sharp and prolonged downturn in financial markets will force President Trump to moderate his approach. Or perhaps a different America will emerge after two years, or four, following the mid-term and Presidential elections in 2026 and 2028 respectively — one that respects the right of Canada to have some strategic autonomy in the world even as our economy remains closely tied to the United States. But I am not optimistic. For Canada to pursue a degree of strategic autonomy in its international relations will require some amount of beneficence on the part of the United States, never mind respect. I am not sure America, under any administration, is much interested in beneficence. The reality is that the United States is a declining hegemon and one that increasingly recognizes its diminishing influence outside North America.  It is for that very reason that the United States will not also seek to diminish its influence within North America. On the contrary, the secular forces at play will compel it to do the opposite.

Many commentators have offered the old American dream of “manifest destiny” to explain Trump’s actions, and I don’t disagree with them. But whereas manifest destiny and the Monroe doctrine of the early 19^th century and its 20^th century variants were about territorial expansion and influence commensurate with rising American power, in the current context it is about territorial consolidation as a rearguard action against American decline. It is the old order fighting to remain relevant and Canada is seen by Washington as essential to maintaining the remnants of that old order.

The problem is that we seem quite content to defend the old order. In fact, there are many other examples of how Canada is reflexively turning to old order thinking, even as it sees very clearly the breakdown of that order and the dangers of remaining in it.

For example, there is now universal agreement on the need to diversify our trade and investment so that we are not so dependent on the United States. Much of the focus for trade diversification is on the Asia Pacific region, building on the CPTPP and other trade agreements that we have across East and Southeast Asia. All of that makes sense. What does not make sense is the idea that we should diversify to all of Asia, but not China, as some analysts and politicians are calling for. This is insanity. It is bad enough that our access to the world’s largest market has been impeded, perhaps for a very long time. Are we also going to deny ourselves access to the world’s second largest market? Set aside for a moment that Trump may talk tough but continue to encourage US firms to make money in China, as he did in his previous administration. How are we going to prepare for a new order by shunning the one country that will, for better or worse, be a major player in that changed environment?

I understand the various reasons for Canadian aversion to China, but the PRC is not, as some ministers and MPs have said, an “existential threat” to Canada in the way that the United States is today. The instinct to demonize China is deeply ingrained in the Canadian political class, and I see it on a regular basis in Ottawa. And I believe we have taken our cues in the way we see and treat China largely because of American prompting and pressure. The increase in research security screening at Canadian universities is a good example, as is the recently completed public inquiry on foreign interference. 

In her final report, Commissioner Hogue on the one hand accepts uncritically the intelligence agencies’ assessment of China as the most serious foreign interference threat to the country. On the other hand, she says the biggest threat to Canadian democracy is disinformation yet fails to identify the most consequential source of toxic and destabilizing information warfare facing Canada, which is coming from the United States. This is just another example of old order thinking, where we are willing to live with the Gramscian monsters we know, while exaggerating the threat of the monsters we don’t.

Here is another example: Recently, Canada announced secondary sanctions on some Chinese companies because of their indirect support for Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine. We took this move around the time Donald Trump was cozying up to Putin and just before the US voted with Russia on a resolution related to the third anniversary of the invasion of Ukraine. China, incidentally, abstained on that vote. By any assessment, the biggest threat to Ukraine’s territorial integrity today, after Russia, is the United States. Perhaps there will be return to the minerals deal in the days and weeks ahead, but any such deal will be extortionate on the part of the United States and ultimately beneficial for Russia. It will be a deal that Canada and the EU would have resolutely refused to contemplate before Trump, but we will of course go along with it. Are we considering sanctions on the United States and on American companies for aiding and abetting Russian strategic objectives? Of course not. And I am not advocating that we do, but can we at least have the honesty and self-respect to not pretend that we are acting in the interests of Ukraine when we are doing so only to the extent that it is backed by US power?

Hypocrisy in foreign policy is as old as foreign policy itself, so we should not be surprised that Canada’s positions on various global issues are rife with contradiction and double standards. There was a time when the dominance of the old order, anchored by the pre-eminence of the United States, could gloss over these contradictions, and the rest of the world could do little but mumble quietly about them. 

But the increasingly multipolar world means that countries around the new “poles” of power are both more conscious of the double standards of the west, and less tolerant of it. They may still feel compelled to bite their tongues in the presence of the American imperium (witness King Abdullah in the Oval Office), but not so much when it comes a lesser power such as Canada. I have met diplomats from the so-called “Global South” who are openly telling me that they no longer have patience for lectures on human rights and democracy from our foreign affairs officials, given our blatant double standard on the issues that matter to them.

Welcome to Palestine. You may be aware of the official figures on the death toll from Israel’s assault on Gaza — something in the order of 45,000, with upwards of 17,000 children killed. But you are likely not aware of a July 2024 paper in The Lancet which estimates that 186,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza alone since October 7th, either from direct military action or from starvation, malnutrition, disease, exposure, and lack of access to medical facilities. This much larger number of casualties is on account of Israel’s policy of restricting humanitarian aid such that essential medicines and food are not getting to civilians in Gaza. Last week, Israel reimposed its embargo on humanitarian aid entering Gaza and cut off electricity, which means the death toll will surely rise. 

In contrast, the civilian death toll in Ukraine is under 15,000. Let me be clear: one death in war is a death too many and we are right to express our support for Ukraine in its fight against Russian aggression. But where is the outrage in Canada and across the west against Israel’s ongoing genocide in Palestine? 

Here is what our government said in response to Israel’s most recent blockade on humanitarian aid to Gaza: “Canada is concerned by Israel’s decision to halt aid to Gaza. The parties to the conflict have an obligation to facilitate rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian relief for civilians.” The best we can do is to express “concern” and call on the “parties to the conflict” to act decently? 

To be fair, this is pretty much the response from our traditional western allies, so I can see how if we are cocooned in an Atlanticist “old order” such as the G7 and mostly talking to just the folks who inhabit that order, our statement might seem perfectly appropriate. But I can assure you that most people around the world see the actions of the west with respect to Gaza as deeply hypocritical, and fundamentally indefensible. I think many Canadians also see the double standard and hypocrisy, but our establishment institutions and leadership class are largely captured by old order thinking. Perhaps more to the point, they are in thrall to emotional, political, and financial pressure from entrenched interests of a western-led old order in which Canada is deeply embedded.

In fact, on every metric of war misery in Ukraine and Palestine, the Canadian response reeks of a double standard:

• The Russian invasion of Ukraine is ultimately a land grab, and one that is premised on political, cultural and linguistic domination of Russians over Ukrainians. We are right to reject this kind of ethnic cleansing, but how else would you describe the illegal occupation of Palestinian territories by Israel and the systematic erasure of Palestinians from Gaza and parts of the West Bank to fulfil Zionist ambitions? What has happened to Canada’s support for the international rule of law?
  
  
• We brag about being world leaders in new forms of autonomous sanctions on Russia because of its war crimes in Ukraine but will not even contemplate basic sanctions on the State of Israel or its leaders for indiscriminate bombing of civilian facilities and the use of starvation as a weapon. Worse, the government has given its blessing to a quasi-official definition of Anti-Semitism that defines calls for boycotts, divestment, and sanctions against Israel as Anti-Semitic. And one of Justin Trudeau’s last acts as Prime Minister is to declare himself as a “Zionist” because, he says, Zionism simply means the right of Jewish people to determine their own future. He conveniently ignores the version of Zionism that has given itself the right to determine the future of Palestinians who have lived on their lands for generations, even before the creation of Israel – a future that is looking increasingly desperate.
  
  
• Canada has accepted more than 1.1 million applications for emergency visas from Ukrainians seeking to escape the war and approved over 900,000 of those applicants. By contrast, we have only accepted 5000 applications from Gaza and approved 645 of them. The Gaza emergency visa program, by the way, is now closed. Are the lives of Europeans or those who conform to an image of being European more valuable than the lives of Palestinian Arabs?
  
  
• We make heroic efforts to identify companies that are providing parts and components that may be used for military purposes in Russia’s war on Ukraine, so that we can slap sanctions on those companies. But we turn a blind eye to Canadian companies providing parts for F-35 jets used by Israel to bomb civilians in Gaza on the grounds that those parts are protected under a defense pact between Canada and the United States.

So why the focus on Ukraine but not Gaza? Because, we are told, defending Ukraine is ultimately about fighting China. The EU’s High Representative on Foreign Affairs Kaja Kallas said recently that after defeating Russia, the EU can turn its attention to defeating China. Our officials have not made statements of such extraordinary naivete and provocation, but one of the basic arguments we fall back on regularly is that the Russia-Ukraine war is ultimately about China and Taiwan. This is not the time and place for a detailed discussion on cross-straits relations, but are we seriously saying that we will commit to fighting China in any conflict with Taiwan? Our actions and the way we frame our Indo-Pacific Strategy certainly suggests that to be the case. To what extent are we doing so in defense of an old order led by the United States? And would we take the same position if the United States is no longer as committed to defending Taiwan as it used to be? 

Let’s be very clear. We are sailing frigates through the Taiwan straits only because we have the assurance of backing from the US Pacific Fleet. We are talking tough in the South China Sea only because the US is talking tough in the South China Sea. Our muscular defense posture in the Pacific Ocean is entirely premised on US power projection in that region. But is it in our interest? The interregnum is precisely the time for us to ask that question, but I fear that very few people in our foreign policy establishment are willing to do so.

Here’s another example:

I have been a member of the Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs since I joined the Senate. We recently completed a study on Africa, where the focus was on development assistance to and investment in the continent. We heard from many witnesses who told us how Canada could improve its development assistance to African countries, and there were some good ideas floated. But what was baffling was the extent of discussion on how increasing Canadian presence in Africa was an important way to counter China’s influence in the region. We are hearing the same talking points in the aftermath of the cuts to USAID, namely that the cessation of U.S. ODA to Africa is regrettable because it will create an opening for China to increase its influence in the region. This is the same message we see in Canada’s so-called Africa strategy which was launched last week. It casts China as a “strategic rival” in Africa and worries about how “China’s vast political and economic footprint in Africa will have long-lasting impacts and influence on the continent’s development and global supply chains.” 

Well, yes but could it be possible that the “long-lasting impacts” are positive for the countries of Africa? Shouldn’t the overwhelming reason for aid and investment in Africa be the needs of African countries? On this point, Beijing is right in saying that this framing of western engagement in the “Global South” is an exemplar of “Cold War thinking.” But it is worse than that because this is a perspective that assumes African countries are to be pitied for taking Chinese aid and that African leaders cannot possibly know what they are doing when they accept the largesse of Beijing. It wasn’t until we got to the end of our study, when we heard from a panel of African ambassadors who said that while their countries would welcome more Canadian aid and investment, they are quite happy to also accept the airports, ports, roads, bridges, and other infrastructure projects that China has to offer. They are not interested in being played off by the United States for its geopolitical objectives. I wish I could say the same for Canada.

Let me close with a reflection on a specific policy area where we can begin to exercise some strategic autonomy in the context of a more multipolar world. It is in our Indo Pacific Strategy, which as currently written and as currently perceived by Asian counterparts, is a lightweight version of American policy under Joe Biden. I have previously argued that there is no analytic value to the concept of the “Indo Pacific” except in giving cover to a soft containment strategy on China. If I had my way, I would abandon the Indo-Pacific nomenclature altogether.

But even if we stick with it, our IPS should be substantially revised to demonstrate our appreciation for new strategic poles in the region, and our willingness to work with all of them in the pursuit of Canadian interests, independent of the United States. It would put less emphasis on the maintenance of US primacy in the Pacific and more on cooperative security in the region. It would, for example, seek to build stronger ties with India because India is a rising power on many fronts, not because we want to enlist Delhi in the containment of China. It would respect ASEAN centrality in all aspects of our relationship with Southeast Asia and not just the ones that align with US priorities. It would also drop the double standards on how we lecture Southeast Asian countries on their human rights failings when we have logs in our eyes. And most importantly, it would engage China as the complex and indispensable power that it is in all the domains that matter to Canada without the gratuitous labelling of the PRC as a “disruptive power,” “strategic rival,” or worst of all, “existential threat.” 

I will end with an abridged version of the passage from which my speech title has drawn inspiration. It is from Antonio Gramsci’s Notebook 3 and was written between 1930-32 while he was in prison:

"The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum, a great variety of morbid symptoms appear. If the ruling class has lost its consensus, i.e., it is no longer ‘leading’ but only ‘dominant,’ exercising coercive force alone, this means that the great masses have become detached from their traditional ideologies, and no longer believe what they used to believe previously. The crisis creates precisely this situation of great masses who no longer consent to the existing order.

This means that the terrain is open to both new ideological constructions and regressive, reactionary movements. In this phase, one sees the emergence of charismatic figures, demagogues, and attempts to restore authority through coercion rather than consent. The struggle for a new hegemony begins, but in the meantime, a kind of social paralysis can occur, where the old system is incapable of renewing itself, yet the new system is not yet strong enough to take hold.

These moments are dangerous but also full of potential, as they force societies to confront the contradictions that have built up over time."

My friends, the moments we face today are dangerous but also full of potential, because they force us to confront the contradictions that have built up over time.

Thank you.