bout de papier, Vol. 5, No. 4 (1988) — Winter 1988 // Hiver 1988, pp. 6–8
On “Looking Back”
Editor,
Bruce Hutchison’s “Looking Back Over Sixty Years” speaks of Arthur Meighen’s Hamilton speech in 1925 “proposing a referendum before Canada entered any war.”
This is a Grit fairy-tale.
I have the text of the speech before me. It contains not one syllable about a referendum.
It says: “It would be best not only that Parliament should be called, but that the decision of the Government, which, of course, would have to be given promptly, should be submitted to the judgment of the people at a general election before troops should leave our shores.” Not a referendum, a “general election;” not “before Canada entered any war” but “before troops should leave our shores.”
Mr. Hutchison says also that until 1935 “the Conservative Party, except for its unchanging protectionism, was…devoted to the market.”
I have the advantage of having been brought up a John A. Macdonald Conservative, in the Conservative Party of Sir Robert Borden, Arthur Meighen, Sir James Whitney, Sir Adam Beck and Sir Rodmond Roblin. Devotion to the market did not build the C.P.R.; or inspire Borden to advocate, in the election of 1908, eventual nationalization of the telegraph and telephone systems; or Whitney and Beck to create the Ontario Hydro, or pass the Ontario Workmen’s Compensation Act (which was, for years, the model for the British Labour Party’s policy); or Roblin to set up the publicly owned Manitoba telephone system. Devotion to the market did not nationalize the Grand Trunk, the Grand Trunk Pacific and the Canadian Northern.
Devotion to the market was never a part of Conservative doctrine in the classic days of Canadian Conservatism. The mystique of “free enterprise” is an American importation, and a relatively recent one at that.
Eugene Forsey
Ethnics and Foreign Policy
Editor,
In his Guest Column entitled “Ethnics and Foreign Policy” (Vol. 5, No. 1), Peyton Lyon argues that ethnic lobby groups in Canada play a major role in shaping Canadian foreign policy, and that this is a cause for vigilance and concern. He best summarizes the tone and content of the column in his closing admonition that “ethnic groups should be heard and not heeded.. unless their demands are clearly consistent with Canada’s national interest.”
His basic thesis, while highly contentious, might be viewed as part of the academic foreign policy literature which examines the role of interest groups in the policy-making process. Though not well explored in the Canadian context, this is a general area of research both sophisticated and highly developed. Lyon’s argument, however, is neither. His essay is riven with a number of unexamined and problematic assumptions that are presented as statements of fact. At a minimum, these need to be highlighted as assumptions, open to examination and criticism.
By singling out ethnic interest groups from other kinds of interest groups, Lyon seems to be suggesting that lobbying by “ethnics” is somehow more significant (or, by the terms of his argument, more insidious than the lobbying of, for example, business or human rights organizations. His failure to acknowledge that ethnic lobbyists are far from the only lobbyists in Ottawa, and his failure to discuss the reasons for (and implications of) this exclusive focus on ethnicity, leaves one of the most basic premises of the article open to challenge. This is especially true given the past 15 years during which time economic concerns have tended to play an increasingly central role in the making and conduct of both domestic and foreign policy, stimulating a rapidly growing and active business and financial lobby. Ironically, it was Canadian foreign policy towards various issues in the Middle East which did much to stimulate these commercial, financial, and trade interest groups.
A second such example comes when Lyon states that “[next to survival, human rights are the ultimate value.” As a normative assertion, this may be defensible, yet it is far from self-evident to theoreticians and practitioners alike. The current debates over the definition, meaning, and practice of human rights both within Canada and abroad should give one pause. A greater problem arises, however, when he suggests that Canada could advance the cause of human rights in the Middle East through support for the creation of a Palestinian state. This linkage of individual human rights with the collective right of self-determination is one that is increasingly made in the theory of rights. But it represents a particular perspective within the theoretical literature, and at minimum Lyon owes it to his readers to highlight his adoption of that perspective. His failure to do so risks having passed off as a bland statement of fact a highly problematic and controversial argument. This is all the more important since he slips in the connection between peace and human rights via the Palestinian state issue. Given the political realities of the Arab and Islamic worlds, to equate human rights with peace, and to link that with the creation of a state for which there is more polemical agreement than there is practical support even within the Arab world, is ludicrous at best. While we certainly would not deny that human rights violations are a serious and widespread problem throughout that region, to recommend that Canada should pursue its human rights agenda through the creation of a Palestinian state surely misses the mark.
A third assumption appears when he states that Canada’s current pro-Israeli “tilt” “diminishes our ability to promote specifically Canadian objectives, such as trade.” Assumed here is that potential trading partners in the Arab world punish Canada for its foreign policy through the withholding of trade. To make such an assertion stick would require an extensive review of the historical patterns of Canadian trade with the region, to demonstrate lost opportunities and foregone potential because of policy orientations. While there is no room in this response to review these trade data, (and one of us already has addressed part of this problem elsewhere; see International Perspectives) suffice it to suggest that the massive growth of Canadian trade (in both exports and imports) with nearly every state in the region during the 1970s and early 1980s calls into question the validity of Lyon’s assertion. It cannot be passed off as a simple statement of fact. It is worth noting, however, that most studies indicate that the trading world is populated by pragmatists, and that an attractive trading opportunity usually takes precedence over politics. Neither the trading patterns of countries sympathetic to the Palestinian position nor the record of the Arab boycott give support to Lyon’s assertions. And surely the Jerusalem embassy experience provides evidence that, in those cases where economic interests are seen to be at jeopardy, the Canadian economic elites can quite successfully take care of themselves.
Another example is Lyon’s assertion that “the political strength of the Jewish- Canadian Community and the resolve of the politicians to cater to it,” and “not external pressure,” is the source of Canada’s pro- Israel bias. It is unfortunate that Lyon seems to have ignored research which has addressed this very question. There is no doubt that on a number of Middle East issues the government of the day has considered carefully the views of the organized Canadian Jewish community. It also is true that this community maintains an active lobbying organization staffed by a combination of professionals and constituent volunteers – a seemingly reasonable thing to do within a democratic pluralist system. It also is true that on some issues this lobby has failed to achieve its goals, either due to counter-lobbies being more effective or due to the judgement of responsible officials that Canada’s interests would be served better by a different policy. In other words, sometimes there is a symmetry of perspectives and a complementarity of interests; other times not. In either case, it is the government and its professional advisors who ultimately are responsible for policy. Sometimes that policy is affected by domestic forces while other times the international community – whether the United States, the United Nations, the EEC, the Commonwealth, la Francophonie, etc. — comes into play. Surely Lyon wouldn’t suggest that the Government, composed of the elected and the appointed, are pulled and pushed this way and that merely at the whim of a single lobby which has to compete with so many other factors and forces? While there is no denying that a number of key Israel-related issues will trigger the active response of much of the leadership of the Canadian Jewish community, it the government saw good reason to change long-held positions, and the new policy received significant support from important actors whether domestic or external, it would do so.
A final example is found in Lyon’s suggestion that “a consensus is growing” among scholars and diplomats “that Canada’s pro-Israel tilt is contrary to the national interest, and [that] the tilt is largely attributed to the lobbying of one of our smaller ethnic groups.” Lyon has presented evidence of a consensus of one — namely himself. In the absence of further indications of this “consensus,” the assertion appears more as an effort to create a bandwagon effect in support of Lyon’s views than as a statement of fact. Although it is likely that there are people — even scholars — who might agree with him, we expect that many of these might wish to place some qualifiers on the general assertion, never mind those who evidently do not fit into his “growing consensus” and who would take issue with his all-inclusive statement.
Furthermore, Lyon appears to exaggerate the extent of Canada’s “tilt.” Canada maintains extensive trade and diplomatic relations with the Arab world. Much to the displeasure of many ardent Canadian supporters of Israel, Canada continues to refuse to acknowledge Israel’s claims in the post-1967 territories, and criticizes Israeli activities in those territories. The Canadian embassy remains in Tel Aviv. While Canada does refuse to recognize the Palestine Liberation Organization as the sole legitimate representative of Palestinian Arabs, it continues to accord the Palestinian Arabs the status of a national community in search of a homeland, and continues to call for a just resolution of the Palestinian issue at the expense of Israel’s post-1967 borders. And finally, Canada consistently has called on the parties to that particular Middle East conflict to negotiate the legal and territorial definition of that Palestinian homeland rather than impose an externally derived and possibly divisive resolution. This pro-Israel “tilt” of Canadian policy may not be all that Lyon makes it out to be.
In short, Peyton Lyon’s presentation is far more problematic and unsubstantiated than it might first appear. His tendency to try to skate over potential difficulties and challenges by presenting his views as established fact cannot pass unchallenged. Properly substantiated, Lyon might well succeed in contributing to our understanding of the role and impact of interest group lobbying in the foreign policy-making process. “Ethnics and Foreign Policy,” however, is far wide of the mark.
David B. Dewitt Associate Professor of Political Science &
Associate Director, Centre for International and Strategic Studies York University, Toronto Grant Littke Ph.D. Student, Department of Political
Science & Research Assistant, Centre for International and Strategic Studies York University, Toronto
Peyton Lyon Responds
Editor,
I was invited to write a column. Messrs. Dewitt and Littke attribute dark motives to my failure to write a book! But does any reader of this journal really need to be told that ethnic groups are not the only minorities who lobby in Ottawa? Or that lobbying itself is acceptable in our political culture?
Legitimacy matters far less to me than effectiveness. When any group is successfully pressing for action I deem harmful to the national interest, I want my fellow citizens to be aware of its strength, aims and methods. Lobbies representing tiny minorities tend to lose potency when placed in the spotlight.
In 1975, over 300 senior Ottawa decision-makers ranked “interest groups” fourteenth as an input in our foreign policy. By contrast, in a 1987 study confined to officials who had exercised responsibility for Middle East policy, Canada’s Jewish community (1.4% of the population) was ranked as the primary source of this policy ahead even of the Prime Minister. (Professor Dewitt, as Chairman of the Executive of the “Canadian Professors for Peace in the Middle East”, “, the academic front for the pro-Israel lobby, should feel flattered!)
A substantial majority of the DEA officials we questioned held that Canada’s policy had been tilted towards Israel, a tribute to the strength of the organized Jewish community and the weakness of opposing groups. My two critics state that the lobby does not always win. True, and Canada’s posture has gained some balance in recent years. What cannot be measured, however, are the changes not made, and the initiatives not taken, because officials, aware of the subservience of their political masters to the lobbies, do not even propose them. One of Trudeau’s DEA ministers told us that all his officials were “Arabists,” but then complained that they had all been “passive.’ Trudeau had pressed for greater balance, he said, but the lobby, with strong support in caucus and cabinet, had generally prevailed.
I’m challenged to define the national interest — impossible. Trade: it matters little for this discussion how much it was, or is. Rather the question is: how much more it would be if Canada were not regarded as a camp follower of the United States and Israel? Almost all the DEA officials questioned told us that selling in the Middle East would be easier if our tilt towards Israel were not so apparent.
It may, as suggested, be just a normative bias on my part that I see “survival” as a more important aim of foreign policy than “rights,” but at least one must agree that peace and war are inherently on the inter-state agenda, while conditions within states are not. Fortunately conditions in the USSR are now such that we can press for rights without serious risk to détente. In the Middle East, moreover, establishing the rights of the Palestinian people is a precondition for an enduring peace.
I’d have more respect for my logic-chopping critics if they could show half the understanding for the Palestinians that they display for their heavy-handed military occupiers. Naturally the Palestinians long for self-determination, now the right of virtually every other nation. Certainly there is a distinction between “collective” and “individual” rights. The Palestinians are denied both.
Israel could have negotiated a settlement many years ago, one that would assure its security. Why hasn’t Canada pressed Israel harder to do so? Since American subsidies are vital to Israel, why are we not more active in Washington on this issue? As active as we are on Southern Africa, or once were on the Middle East itself? The principal reason, it appears, is that it would be opposed by the pro-Israeli lobby.
North American Jewry has earned an enormous debt of Israeli gratitude. If it would press Israel to negotiate seriously, it would serve Israel as well as their own two countries. Instead the Canada-Israeli Committee applauds most Israeli actions, and criticizes none.
Peyton V. Lyon
Moose Calls
Editor,
On July 2 we received from a person in Nelson, New Zealand, the following letter:
“Dear Sir,
Our office is faced with a small dilemma. No one is at all familiar with the noise that a moose makes. Could you please forward details to the above address. Thanking you in anticipation.
Yours faithfully,
Our Public Affairs Officer, Mrs. Dulce Johnston, sent the following in reply:
“The Noise that Moose Makes What an interesting request!
But first let me tell you the story of three tourists who visited Canada. They were all so keen on bringing home photographs of animals in Canada. So the tour guide brought them to the northern part of British Columbia. Soon after they had set up camp, a herd of moose came slowly by. The Singaporean immediately aimed his camera, while the Swiss held his breath in amazement as he reached for his gear. Ah, but the Scottish tourist stood open-mouthed, and after a few moments silence, gasped and then exclaimed ’if that is a moose, I do not wish to see a rat!’
Now going back to your request — we have a number on our staff who tried to imitate the sound of a moose. If you are passing through Wellington do come in and we’d be happy to oblige.”
A. Douglas Small Canadian High Commissioner New Zealand
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Originally published in bout de papier, Vol. 5, No. 4 (1988) — Winter 1988 // Hiver 1988, pp. 6–8. Read the rest of this issue →
