Canadian Foreign Policy in the NEWS:
Tuesday, October 17th, 2017: Just as it looked like Bombardier was down, slapped with nearly 300% tariffs on its C-Series jets sold to Delta, it appears to have maneuvered a way out of this mess (see news story here), offering to sell the C-Series program (and move the manufacturing of those planes) to an Airbus factory in the U.S. Now a whole bunch of questions arise about how all the various actors and stakeholders involved will respond. Will the U.S. administration be satiated by the move to U.S. production? It seems so... but this move is unlikely to placate Boeing, since their original concerns about an 'unlevel playing field' in the aerospace sector still applies. What about Canada's threat to cancel the purchase of Boeing's fighter jets? And what about Bombardier's workers in Quebec who were supposed to build those planes - what fate awaits them? To be discussed!
Tuesday, October 10th, 2017: "I think this is probably the most uncertain moment in international relations since the end of the Second World War." These are the words of Canada's Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland, speaking at an event in Washington today. Read the news story here. A question to consider for class: To what extent do these statements mark genuine concern for the way things are headed in the world, and to what extent is it part of GAC's communications strategy - aiming to use a dark historical narrative to suggest what could happen if multilateralism and globalization do not continue as before?
Tuesday, October 3rd (2017): Should Canada "amend" or "suspend" the Safe Third Country agreement with the U.S? That is a key question being debated as news comes out today that there is a backlog of 40,000 cases waiting to be heard at the Immigration and Refugee Board. This news story reports that only a few hundred cases have been heard this year from asylum seekers who crossed illegally into Canada this year, and only half of those claims were accepted. This would make for a very current research paper folks!Monday, September 25th (2017): The third of seven planned NAFTA negotiations are taking place in town today. But according to insiders, progress is starting to lag and it's not clear negotiations will be completed by the end of this year as all parties have agreed. One of the big questions is whether the famed Chapter 11's 'investor state dispute mechanisms' will find their way into the next version of NAFTA, or be tweaked or altogether removed. What do you think? Read more here...
Monday, September 11th (2017)The largest hurricane in history has just swept through the Caribbean and Florida, and some 9,000 Canadians were in the hurricane's path (with about 350 of them requesting help from the Government of Canada to evacuate). The U.S government has already used military planes to evacuate 1200 of its citizens... but Canada has only today commissioned private aircraft to evacuate citizens, prompting opposition parties to question whether the government has responded quickly and adequately enough. What do you think? When and how should governments respond when its citizens get stranded by nature elsewhere in the world?
FORMER COURSE PAGES (Archived):
- POL 3176 - International Political Economy (Winter 2017)
- POL 4178 - Political Economy of Development (Fall 2016)
- POL 3146 - Canadian Foreign Policy (Fall 2015 and Winter 2016)
- POL 4320 - Seminar in Canadian Politics (Winter 2015)
- GEOG 4200 - Seminar in People, Resources and Environment (Fall 2014)
- GEOG 2200 - Global Connections (Summer 2014)
- GEOG 2200 - Global Connections (Summer 2013)
- ENST 1001 - Envisioning Earth's Environments (2012/13)
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