THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA: A LESS EXCLUSIVE RELATIONSHIP
On March 7, 2013, well-known Québec political columnist John Parisella met with students of the Glendon School of Public and International Affairs. He came at the invitation of the School’s Graduate Programme Director, Michael Barutciski, to give his view on the re-election of President Barack Obama and the challenges to Canadian-American relations created by this re-election.
Parisella was Québec’s Delegate General in New York from 2009 to 2012; before that, he served as an adviser to Robert Bourassa (1985-1993) during Bourassa’s premiership. He reminded Glendon students in his lecture that American presidential politics is always practised in a specific context. Prior to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, for instance, no one had served as President of the United States for more than eight years, i.e., two terms. After Roosevelt’s death, a constitutional amendment limiting the presidency to two terms was passed. Following World War II, the U.S. became the most powerful nation on earth but the Cold War began as the Soviet Union emerged. The years from 1945 to 1980 were a time of social liberalism for Americans.
In this context, Nixon and Eisenhower, who were both Republicans, were centrist conservatives. From the 1980s until the election of Obama, the U.S. experienced a period of conservatism. Although a Democrat, Clinton was a centrist, and Obama is even more so. The U.S. was a bipartisan country where the two major congressional parties were able to work together. However, a growing political polarization took root in that country in the 1980s and 1990s. The Republicans veered further to the right, and so-called “right-wing” Democrats became Republicans.
OBAMA COMES TO POWER
Obama’s coming to power in 2008 was a refreshing moment for Americans, giving them their first black President in the White House and toppling numerous barriers. Obama is also the first American President since Eisenhower to have won more than 50% of the votes (in both 2008 and 2012).
During his first term, observers thought that Obama would transform the country rather than be just a transactional President. But Parisella believes that history will see Obama as a President who did profoundly transform his country. Obama did, of course, have to manage the economic depression but 40 million Americans will have access to healthcare by 2014. “ObamaCare” will be equally transformational over the next 20 years. Moreover, it has been decades since the U.S. has had so little reliance on foreign oil. Under Obama, the U.S. took down Bin Laden. The U.S. has also decimated Al Qaeda, which pulled out of Iraq (still in combat mode) and has reduced Al Qaeda troops in Afghanistan; these troops are now preparing to leave that country. There was also the fall of Gaddafi and Libya, which came about in large part through air strikes rather than a military operation on the ground; and a number of dictators have disappeared. Parisella thinks that all of this amounts to a new way of conducting foreign policy, one that Americans prefer over having “boots on the ground.”
The Obama Administration has promised to double exports by 2015, a pledge that will have an impact on Canada. Energy self-sufficiency (thanks to shale gas and oil) means that the U.S. will have energy security and autonomy beyond anything the Americans ever thought possible. This development has ramifications for the Keystone Pipeline project, which may or may not be accepted.
OBAMA’S SECOND TERM
According to Parisella, Obama’s re-election in 2012 was a huge victory. The President once again had a growing new coalition. Over a million more young Americans than in 2008 voted with urban voters, single mothers and members of minorities, and more than 73% of Hispanic Americans voted.
That said, where is the U.S. headed now? Parisella thinks the country will be no less polarized than it has been because Republicans have not changed their discourse. But there have been changes in a number of areas: the economic situation (although still fragile); the difficult fiscal situation; the Newton tragedy; the immigration file, where something has to be done; Iran and the Middle East, which remain a powder keg; and Syria, which has lost its way. Obama will not want to be the President who let Iran equip itself with nuclear weapons. Furthermore, two women have been appointed to the Supreme Court and will change the dynamic of that body.
AND FOR CANADA…
According to Parisella, America has changed and is changing under Obama but the extent of these changes will not be felt for five to 10 years. America is changing and Canada is undergoing extensive change. It is obvious that, on the economic front, the U.S. is looking for new markets. Parisella feels that the Canadian economy will suffer unless we follow suit. Our free trade with the U.S. has remained quite stable for 10 years. Some of the reasons given for this are the strength of the U.S. dollar, the dramatic events of September 11 or the tightened border between our two countries. Although there is a grain of truth in these claims, another explanation is that all of us are looking for new markets. Emerging markets such as India and China are ripe for the future and are going to overtake the U.S. in five years.
Canada cannot remain indifferent when it comes to the economic marketplace because the Americans are not indifferent. The fact that the U.S. is moving towards energy self-sufficiency is also big news for Canada. Will Keystone be a go or not? That said, there is a possibility that this pipeline will not be built, making the alternative for oilsands crude unclear. Northern Gateway will be more complicated than the Keystone Pipeline. If Canada cannot sell its energy or direct it to our markets, Alberta will cease to be as rich as it currently is. And if this happens, the rest of the country will also suffer. So, we are facing great challenges, including the challenge of sending oilsands crude to Québec via pipelines rather than buying it from some other source.
Whether we like it or not, the growing American energy self-sufficiency has significant implications for our common relationship. Our prosperity and economic progress greatly depend on our proximity to the U.S. It is untrue to claim that the American economy does not affect us. Parisella predicts that if sequestration leads the Americans into recession again, Canada, too, will go into recession. It is true that the last recession (2007-2008) did not hit us so hard as it did the Americans. But Parisella says that we got through it because ours is a natural resource-based economy – resources that people need and that we can export. This means that what happens in the U.S. impacts us directly and also has an impact within our internal Canadian debate.
Parisella considers that what happened on September 11, 2001, is probably the most important event in recent world history – as important as the 1962 Cuban missile crisis showdown. That crisis marked U.S.-Soviet relations for at least 25 years during the Cold War. At that time, we came very close to nuclear war and, from that point on, it became clear that no one wanted to go that far. The events of September 11, together with the technological revolution, mean that we will not be able to find the same solutions.
Here is what Parisella has to say: “I sometimes listen to the politicians in my province and have the impression I’m hearing the debates of the 1970s all over again. But we’ve moved on. If America changes, Canada changes, Québec changes. This means that, as a political class and a civil society, we’re going to have to have debates and look at new ways of doing things.”
In conclusion, Parisella said he does not believe Obama is thrusting us into a new era of liberalism or that we are seeing the beginning of the end of conservatism under him. And he added: “I think that, basically, he is pointing us in a direction that will eventually be defined by someone. I don’t believe that ideological definitions from the past are valid for the future. I think that the left-right continuum is becoming increasingly less relevant, especially if you make comparisons starting with the Cold War era or with the 1970s or 80s.”
In Parisella’s view, the U.S. and Canada will remain the world’s largest trading partners, but this relationship will no longer be as exclusive as it once was. Parisella delivered a brilliant lecture, one that was greatly appreciated by the students and faculty in attendance.
By Michel Héroux
