Canada’s Post-Pandemic Foreign Policy: Three Big Questions

Published by OpenCanada.org.

The revival of Open Canada as a platform for discussing Canada’s foreign policy comes at an important moment. Our country has long benefited from a relatively benign international environment, with few external threats to our security and health, special access to our southern neighbour’s enormous economy and a system of international rules and institutions that underpinned a largely stable and open international order. These conditions can no longer be taken for granted.

Although the immediate priority for our political leaders is to navigate the COVID-19 pandemic and its associated economic crisis, the longer-term prosperity, well-being and security of Canadians will also depend on how well the country adapts to a changing world. That process cannot wait. Now is the time to think through Canada’s post-pandemic foreign policy.

Good strategizing often starts with pointed questions about important things. Below, I set out three such questions. They highlight just a few of the challenges that Canada will face in the years to come.

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