Vulnerable America, capable Canada: Convergent leadership for an interconnected world

Abstract

The conventional wisdom that America is the sole superpower has been challenged by 9/11 as well as the 2008 global financial crisis and recession. As a result, Canada no longer relies on adjusting in advance to the US or seeking diplomatic capital by supporting it abroad. Rather, it provides global leadership in cases such as the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). Increasingly, Canada accommodates a vulnerable America by trying to reconstruct global order to give reducing and rising powers their proper place. This article examines the systemic foundations for this shift in foreign policy and Stephen Harper government's changing foreign policy doctrine, distribution of core international resources and its key decisions in development at the G8 Muskoka Summit in 2010, in the economy in the newer G20 summit at Toronto in 2010, and in security in Libya in 2011.

Keywords:

• Canada-US relations
• hard-power
• soft-power
• defence
• security
• UN
• NATO

Acknowledgements

I gratefully acknowledge the research assistance of Zaria Shaw, Julia Kulik, and Sara Amini.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

John Kirton

John Kirton is director of the G8 Research Group, co-director of the G20 Research Group and an associate professor of Canadian foreign policy and global governance at the University of Toronto.