Canada-US relations: Not botched, but not enough

Barack Obama won the United States presidential race and Canadian papers are full of op-ed wisdom on how this will affect Canada.

Earlier this year, two prominent Canadians—Derek Burney, a former ambassador to the US, and Fen Osler Hampson, a well-known academic—wrote in the high-prestige American journal, Foreign Affairs, on “How Obama Lost Canada: Botching Relations with the United States’ Biggest Trade Partner.” They underlined “the United States’ mistreatment of Canada” and pointed in particular to the Keystone XL pipeline debacle. They claimed US-Canada relations are at “their lowest point in decades.”

In our view, the relationship seems to be in pretty good shape, certainly much better than in the 1970s—before the Canada-US Free Trade Agreement—when Canada, the US, and Mexico were heading off on inward-looking, protectionist trajectories. Washington’s relations with Ottawa and Mexico City have rarely been worse than in those troubled years.

The Canada-US Free Trade Agreement and NAFTA created the largest trading community in the world. NAFTA let Mexico play in the developed league, and assured investors that the steps the country had taken to build deeply integrated continental production and distribution systems could be expanded without fear of government intervention.

Despite border bickering, occasional relapses into protectionism, and the events of 9/11, our partnership has flourished, with benefits for all three nations.

The problem is not that Canada-US relations have been botched, but that we have not gone far enough. We need to be thinking now about very large, very urgent matters that face us, that are continental in scope and could benefit from—and may require—continental responses.

We must prepare for climate change, which will lead to rising ocean levels, new agricultural patterns, and shifts in water demand and supply—all without regard for the 49th parallel.

With new energy resources rapidly coming on stream, we should begin now to work out a North American energy mix that best balances cost, efficiency, security, and sustainability.

And with aging infrastructure in desperate need of renewal and investment, we have to begin now to build a continental system of rails, roads, wires, and pipelines to support North American competitiveness in the 21st century.

These involve multibillion-dollar investments that we will live with for decades. Get it right now and we position ourselves well for the future. Get it wrong and we saddle coming decades with the weight of sunk costs and lost opportunity.

The article in its entirety is available on the Embassy Magazine website at: http://www.embassynews.ca/opinion/2012/11/12/canada-us-relations-not-botched-but-not-enough/42811.