Pivoting toward Asia: Comparing the Canadian and American Policy Shifts

ABSTRACT

Both Canada and the United States have “pivoted” toward Asia in their foreign policy over the past decade, although emphases in those pivots differed between the two countries. The former focuses on an economic pivot initially, the latter on a security one. What factors explain these shifts? What was the magnitude of policy change by both? Utilizing some important theoretical works by Charles Hermann, we discuss the factors that appear to have brought about this policy change toward Asia, outline the actions and activities that both countries have initiated toward Asia in the past decade to illustrate the type and magnitude of policy change that has occurred, and compare some areas of political, economic, and military similarities between Canada and the United States toward this region. Finally, we assess the likely future of these pivots to Asia in light of the change in political leadership within both nations.

KEYWORDS:

• Foreign policy change
• agents of change
• Asian pivot
• Canadian foreign policy
• American foreign policy

Acknowledgments

Thanks to the participants at the 2015 ACSUS Biennial Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada, for comments, the reviewers for this journal, and to Patrick James for his suggestion about the possible applicability of Charles Hermann’s framework for this analysis.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. See its Web site at http://www.canasean.com/

2. All trade data by country with Canada reported in the article were calculated from Statistics Canada’s Canadian International Merchandise Trade Database at http://www.statcan.gc.ca/eng/trade/data

3. The rebalancing elements already in place in Asia and the other commitments already made would also make a rapid movement away from the pivot difficult. See Work (2014), for example, for the range of military commitments already under way.

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Notes on contributors

James M. McCormick

James M. McCormick is Professor in the department of political science at Iowa State University. He is the author of American Foreign Policy and Process (6th ed., 2014) and editor of The Domestic Sources of American Foreign Policy (6th ed., 2012). He has written articles on American foreign policy, Canadian foreign policy, and Canadian studies.