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Creating Canada's Peacekeeping Past illuminates how Canada's participation in United Nations' peacekeeping efforts from 1956 to 1997 was used as a symbol of national identity - in Quebec and the rest of the country. Delving into four decades of documentaries, newspaper coverage, textbooks, political rhetoric, and more, Colin McCullough outlines the continuity and change in the production and reception of messages about peacekeeping. Engaging in debates about Canada's international standing, as well as its broader national character, this book is an ingeniously conceived addition to the history of the changing Canadian identity.
In 1960 the Republic of Congo teetered near collapse as its first government struggled to cope with civil unrest and mutinous armed forces. When the UN established a peacekeeping operation to deal with the crisis, the Canadian government faced a difficult decision. Should it support the intervention? By offering one of the first detailed accounts of Canadian involvement in a UN peacekeeping mission, Kevin Spooner reveals that Canada’s involvement was not a certainty: the Diefenbaker government had immediate and ongoing reservations about the mission, reservations that challenge cherished notions of Canada’s commitment to the UN and its status as a peacekeeper.
Barely two weeks later, sixteen-year-old Shidane Abukar Arone is tortured to death. Dozens of Canadian soldiers look on or know of the torture.
In 1957, Lester Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize for creating the United Nations Emergency Force during the Suez crisis. The award launched Canada's enthusiasm and reputation for peacekeeping. Pearson's Peacekeepers explores the reality behind the rhetoric by offering a detailed account of the UNEF's decade-long effort to keep peace along the Egyptian-Israeli border. While the operation was a tremendous achievement, the UNEF also encountered formidable challenges and problems. This nuanced account of Canada's participation in the UNEF challenges perceived notions of Canadian identity and history and will help Canadians to accurately evaluate international peacekeeping efforts today.
Grant Dawson's analysis of political, diplomatic, and military decision making avoids a narrow focus on the shocking offences of a few Canadian soldiers, deftly investigating the broader context of the deployment in Somalia. He shows how media pressure, government optimism about the United Nations, and the Canadian traditions of multilateralism and peacekeeping all helped to determine the level, length, and tenor of the country's operations. His findings will undoubtedly play a seminal role in informing scholarly debate about this important period in Canadian diplomacy and military engagement.
As the twentieth century ended, Canada was completing its sixth term on the United Nations Security Council, more terms than all but three other non-permanent members. A decade later, Ottawa’s attempt to return to the council was dramatically rejected by its global peers, leaving Canadians – and international observers – shocked and disappointed. This book tells the story of that defeat and what it means for future campaigns, describing and analyzing Canada’s attempts since 1946, both successful and unsuccessful, to gain a seat as a non-permanent member. It also reveals that while the Canadian commitment to the United Nations itself has always been strong, Ottawa’s attitude towards the Security Council, and to service upon it, has been much less consistent. Impeccably researched and clearly written, Canada on the United Nations Security Council is the definitive history of the Canadian experience on the world’s most powerful stage.
Peacekeeping. Despite efforts to relegate it to the past, what was once a central pillar in Canada’s national identity has been making a comeback in recent years. Creating Canada’s Peacekeeping Past illuminates how participation in the United Nations’ peacekeeping efforts from 1956 to 1997 became central to national self-identification in both English and French Canada. Delving into four decades’ worth of political rhetoric, newspaper coverage, textbooks, and more, Colin McCullough outlines continuity and change in the production and reception of messages about peacekeeping. He demonstrates that those who produced messages about peacekeeping often overlooked the particularities of individual missions, preferring to link their cultural products to political discourses about national identity. Engaging in debates about Canada’s international standing, as well as its broader national character, this book is a welcome addition to the history of Canada’s changing national identity.
The deployment of a large number of soldiers, police officers and civilian personnel inevitably has various effects on the host society and economy, not all of which are in keeping with the peacekeeping mandate and intent or are easily discernible prior to the intervention. This book is one of the first attempts to improve our understanding of unintended consequences of peacekeeping operations, by bringing together field experiences and academic analysis. The aim of the book is not to discredit peace operations but rather to improve the way in which such operations are planned and managed.
This book focuses on the broad implications of the transformation of Canada from a peacekeeping to a war-making nation during the Conservative Party's recent decade in power. Funds were poured into the Canadian Forces, and a newly militarized nation found itself entrenched in conflicts around the globe. For decades, Canada had played a leading role in UN peacekeeping, and when the Cold War ended, the prospect of international harmony was infectious. Yet in short order hostilities erupted in the failed states of Rwanda, Somalia, and the Balkans; terrorism - including 9/11 - raised its head; and Iraq and Afghanistan became war zones. In the face of these immense challenges, the UN was dismissed by its opponents as irrelevant. Structured around an anti-war perspective, The Lamb and the Tiger critically examines the ageless genetic and more recent cultural (civilizational) explanations of war, concluding with a close look at the impact of war and right-wing politics on women and Indigenous peoples. The Lamb and the Tiger encourages Canadians to think about what kind of military and what kind of country they really want.
An accessible and empirically rich introduction to Canada’s engagements in the world since confederation, this book charts a unique path by locating Canada’s colonial foundations at the heart of the analysis. Canada in the World begins by arguing that the colonial relations with Indigenous peoples represent the first example of foreign policy, and demonstrates how these relations became a foundational and existential element of the new state. Colonialism—the project to establish settler capitalism in North America and the ideological assumption that Europeans were more advanced and thus deserved to conquer the Indigenous people—says Shipley, lives at the very heart of Canada. Through...