‘Fourth option’ available for China policy
Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly unveiled the government’s long-awaited Indo-pacific strategy this week, but let’s not fool ourselves: this is principally a China policy. Or, rather, an away-from-china policy.
The Indo-pacific strategy is the modern equivalent of Mitchell Sharp’s “Third Option” in the early 1970s. Prime minister Pierre Trudeau wanted Canada to diversify its trade from the United States; Prime Minister Justin Trudeau aims for us to drift away from China. In my humble opinion, a “fourth option” should have been chosen: deeper, subtler engagement with China.
The strategy released on Sunday represents a 180-degree turn for the prime minister, who began his first mandate believing that his “sunny ways” could bring Beijing and Ottawa closer and repair the damage presumably inflicted by the Harper government.
Then Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou was arrested at the Vancouver airport on a U.S. extradition request, then the two Michaels were arrested in China and we went from “sunny ways” to “very dark days,” as noted by former Quebec premier and Huawei adviser Jean Charest during a webinar held this week by the Canada China Business Council.
Based on the observation that China has become “an increasingly disruptive global power,” the strategy seeks to diversify trade and other relations away from China to other countries in the region, in particular India, with which Canada hopes to conclude a comprehensive economic partnership agreement. As the document states, contrary to China, “Canada and India have a shared tradition of democracy and pluralism, a common commitment to a rulesbased international system and multilateralism.”
The idea that Canada should turn to India is based on the optimistic view that, “India is roughly where China was two decades ago. Its economy is in the midst of an economic surge, powered by an explosion of consumer spending, a rapidly expanding middle class and massive investments in infrastructure and digitization,” as a joint report from the Business Council of Canada and the Canada-india Business Council states.
But a deeper economic relationship with India also faces significant challenges, notably corruption, high tariffs and a lot of bureaucracy and religious tensions. For the moment, Canada’s exports to India (0.71 per cent of our total exports) are seven times smaller than what China buys from us. Obviously, we should work to increase our trade with India. But we should not count on that country to overtake China as our second-largest trading partner anytime soon.
The Indo-pacific strategy pledges that Canada will “continue to speak up” against human rights abuses in China and limit its engagement with China, for the purposes of “advancing Canada’s national interests while remaining true to our values.” In other words, we have opted for loudspeaker diplomacy, which is likely not the best way to advance our interests in China or to gain influence in Beijing.
Based on the new strategy, Defence Minister Anita Anand announced that Canada will deploy a third frigate in the Indo-pacific region, at the cost of $369 million over five years. What concrete results do we expect from this costly manoeuvre? The investments in trade initiatives ($245 million) are more promising; so are the $262 million allotted to forging stronger people-to-people ties in the region.
Recent polls suggest that the aggressive approach towards China is aligned with public opinion. According to a Nanos survey conducted last month, 84 per cent of Canadians feel China has a negative influence on world affairs and only eight per cent think that Ottawa should make closer ties with the country a priority.
However, the reality is that whether we like it or not, China is well on its way to becoming the largest economy in the world, and is also a military and technological superpower. We cannot ignore such a giant.
It is not a matter of whether to engage with the Chinese government and businesses, but a question of finding a new balance, with our eyes wide open as to the risks and the opportunities. How to we achieve this? The answer is not to be found in the 23-page Indo-pacific strategy.
The strategy does mention the need to “deepen our understanding of how China thinks, operates and plans, and how it exerts influence in the region and around the world.” Excellent! But how will this deeper knowledge be applied in the diplomacy and trade we conduct with the Middle Kingdom? Again, the strategy is thin on that score.
This is where the “fourth option” comes in: while being 100 per cent clear-eyed in our assessment of China’s goals and methods and steadfast in the defence of our values, we could engage more intelligently with the Chinese in order to foster Canada’s economic interests and restore a significant level of confidence between the leaders of both countries.
Issuing a press release revealing the content of a discussion between the Trudeau and Chinese President Xi Jinping may make good internal politics, but it is unwise from a diplomatic standpoint. The relationship between the two men and their respective countries has now reached a new low. No one benefits from such a situation.
How important is fully engaging with China? “It requires a special effort,” Charest asserts. “The government needs to rise above opinion polls, take the political heat and engage with China. That’s how important it is.”
WE WENT FROM ‘SUNNY WAYS’ TO ‘VERY DARK DAYS.’