THE MODEL FOR BREXIT: CANADA.

A great restructuring of the international economic order is underway. At its core, the restructuring pits the two most powerful forces of the last 100 years — nationalism and globalism — in a struggle to find common ground. No attempt will be made to unravel this global clash of political and economic ideas in 900 words ( even if I could). But there is one local theatre that provides a useful case study of the basic elements behind the nationalism-versus-globalism divide.

The theatre is Britain, the context is Brexit and the role model is Canada. As Donald Trump’s White House threatens to blow up the globalist world trade establishment over steel and China, British Prime Minister Theresa May is leading the United Kingdom campaign to exit the European Union and create a new relationship with Europe. Enter Canada, playing a nationalist cameo role.

In recent comments, May has cited Canada’s relatively open trade relationship with the United States as a model for a new U.K. deal with Europe. “There are many examples of different arrangements for customs around the rest of the world,” she said. “And indeed we are looking at those, including, for example, the border between the U.S. and Canada.”

The very idea that Britain could become the Canada of Europe has exercised the haughty pontificates of Euro-ism at the Financial Times. Writing last week, columnist Martin Wolf weighed in with a dismal prognosis on where Britain will end up when the Brexit dust has settled: “It will become Canada. It will have a trade relationship with the EU similar to Canada’s. It will relate to the EU in a way not dissimilar to Canada’s relationship with the US. It will remain a middle- of- the- road democracy, like Canada, and not become, as David Davis, secretary of state for Brexit puts it, a ‘ Mad Max’ dystopia leading a regulatory race to the bottom. Finally, like Canada, it can seek a modestly positive global influence.”

Wolf goes on, in his muddled way, to subtly belittle Canada’s trade and economic status as second- rate options for Britain compared with remaining under the tight regulatory yoke of the EU. But Wolf takes his shots without looking at what Canada really represents, which is what Britain wants, or at least should want.

Under NAFTA, Canada has a trade agreement with the United States that allows Canada to retain its separate nationhood and clear control over key policies, including immigration, regulation, borders and scores of other areas. Under the EU Britain has given up many of its national powers.

In recent days Canada has received additional mentions in the Brexit negotiations, notably in direct sparring between May and Donald Tusk, president of the European Commission. In comments Wednesday, Tusk rejected May’s plan to leave the single market, leave the customs union and leave the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice. “Therefore,” said Tusk, “it should come as no surprise that the only remaining possible model is a free-trade agreement. I hope that it will be ambitious and advanced — and we will do our best, as we did with other partners, such as Canada recently.”

Nobody quite sees Canada’s trade deal with the EU as a model, and May had already rejected it. In a speech last Friday she said “a free- trade agreement similar to that which Canada has recently negotiated with the EU … would mean a significant reduction in our access to each other’s markets compared to that which we currently enjoy.” May also rejected the Norway model “where we would stay in the single market (but) would mean having to implement new EU legislation automatically and in its entirety.”

As May briskly put it: “We will not accept the rights of Canada and the obligations of Norway.” To which Tusk replied: “The EU cannot agree to grant the UK the rights of Norway with the obligations of Canada.”

The heart of the Brexit debate is a form of globalism versus a form of nationalism. Back in 1994, the Wall Street Journal reported on a paper by Australian economist Katherine West, who wrote that true globalism (her word) “requires British Government and business to be free and flexible enough to make the most of opportunities whenever and wherever they occur in the world of economy.” That would not be possible, said West, if Britain allows itself to be locked into the “constraining political and economic straitjacket” of Europe.

West was right. The EU economic structure became a kind of “bad globalism” in which the union submerged national rights and fostered a continent- wide high- cost economy under a single currency that, as Nobel economist Milton Friedman predicted, would likely fail to solve monetary and financial issues. That Britain never joined the euro currency union and now wants out of the regulatory union should be no surprise.

What are Britain’s options? Canada’s trade pact with the United States and Mexico is a useful model, despite its flaws. “It’s not free trade. It’s managed trade,” said Friedman. But NAFTA contained enough free trade to justify support since it preserved the national control that is vital to a democracy. What Friedman would say of Canada’s new trade deal with Europe — a 1,500- page monstrosity of managed trade — can only be speculated.

There is some talk that, post Brexit, Britain might join Canada as part of NAFTA. Given the current chaotic state of world trade policy and the uncertain future of NAFTA, that seems a long shot. But NAFTA serves as a desirable nationalist option for the U.K. compared with the globalist version offered by Europe.