The 2020 Network

The 2020 Network


Open to Debate: Does Canada have a foreign policy?

October 10, 2023

Foreign policy might not win elections, but it shapes domestic politics – and the world. Recent months have seen external affairs intersect with internal affairs, hitting the headlines and shaping the country’s agenda. Foreign electoral interference has been top of mind for quite some time. India’s alleged assassination of a Canadian on Canadian soil grabbed even more attention. Then, during an address from Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the House of Commons welcomed and celebrated a Second World War veteran who fought for a Nazi SS division in Ukraine.


Unmoored, unmade, underspecified, underfunded. There’s lots of ways to describe this country’s approach to managing relations with the rest of the world. In this episode, we drill down even deeper to ask a discouraging, yet essential, question: Does Canada have a foreign policy?


On this episode of Open to Debate, David Moscrop talks with Graeme Thompson, Senior Analyst, Global Macro‑Geopolitics, Eurasia Group.