A Barrier of Maple Leaves
Of the plethora of books published yearly in the United States astonishingly few deal with Canada and almost none with Canadian-American relations. This is one reason why our citizens will welcome John Sloan Dickey's forthright and readable book. Canadians should also find it rewarding.
Much has been made of the unfortified border between the U.S. and Canada. The United States fears no aggression, and present-day Americans would not dream of attacking their neighbor. Dickey reminds us that the Canadians do not feel so sure of this in the light of the two occasions in our early history when armed invasions were actually undertaken. With a 3,000-mile boundary and no hinterland except the Arctic north, Canada is helpless to defend herself militarily, even with a Maginot line.
The present threat to Canada by the United States is, however, not military but economic and financial and to some extent social. This book sets out in clear detail the enormity of the American influence on Canadian life and the gravity of the response of her citizens. Quotations from their leaders show deep concern; they, not Dickey, tell us about the threat of "Americanization" and the feelings leading to the present "new nationalism," almost universally subscribed to by English-speaking Canada and acquiesed in by French-speaking Canada.
It is no wonder that Canadians are increasingly fearful of being submerged. Over 70 per cent of Canadian imports, worth some $16 billion, come from the United States. Of Canadian investments the British have only 10 per cent, but the United States totals 80 per cent. The United States is the principal supplier of Canada's reading materials. Thus geography, history, and business reveal the inevitability of the present Canadian touchiness and distrust, the new nationalism, and the fierce longing for independence based on undefiled Canadian integrity.
Dickey describes the unfortunate American habit of taking Canada for granted. Excepting the French population, we speak the same language; we have innumerable similarities: architecture, advertisements, stores, food, newsstands, books and magazines, TV, sports, clothes, credit cards; 70 million travelers moving back and forth annually across the open border. So it is not easy for Americans to think of Canada as a foreign country and Canadians as foreigners. If we could only remember that it is and they are, relations would be greatly improved.
In outlining improved American responses to Canadian nationalism, however, Dickey wisely offers no quick, single solution. Some divergences cannot be reconciled. We must practise forbearance in social, business, and government circles. We should quietly suggest and tactfully create more frequent and systematic consultative processes.
Dickey phrases it like this: "Systematic consultation as a next step in a more rewarding process, like better public understanding, is no longer a nicety to be sought when other more pressing problems permit; in reality, it is today the only policy thrust sufficiently fundamental to reach and head off the endemic mischief that national excesses may otherwise introduce into the policies of both countries."
The President Emeritus of Dartmouth College has interested himself for a long time in Canadian-American affairs. As Senior Visiting Fellow of the Council on Foreign Affairs in 1971-72, he undertook the research that made possible this good book. Because it deals with a subject and situation of pressing and continuing importance, it deserves wide reading.
CANADA AND THE AMERICANPRESENCE. By John SloanDickey '29. New York University,1975. 202 pp. $12.50.
An authority on international affairs, Mr.Mallory has served on a number of internationalcommissions. He was, from 1927 to 1959, executivedirector of the Council of ForeignRelations and for 40 years editor of the Political Handbook and Atlas of the World.
