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From Golden Straitjacket to Kevlar Vest: Canada's Transformation to a Security State

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 November 2007

Patrick Lennox
Patrick Lennox
Affiliation:
Dalhousie University
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Abstract

Abstract. This article seeks to document and explain the form and pace of Canada's transformation to a security state. The manifestations of this transformation are seen in the major constitutional, bureaucratic, defensive, and border infrastructural changes that have taken place since 9/11 in an effort to give the Canadian state increased powers to protect its citizens from terrorism. The approach taken in explanation of these changes combines on an ontological level an appreciation for both material and ideational causal forces. This power-plus-ideas approach recognizes the material hierarchy in power capabilities between Canada and the United States as well as the ideational influence of the new transnational security paradigm as the significant causal forces behind the transformation of the Canadian state. It is argued that the material hierarchy in the relationship between Canada and the United States is the ultimate or underlying cause of the form of these changes, but that the ideational pull of the new transnational security paradigm must be factored into to the account of the rapid pace of such change.

Résumé. Cet article cherche à documenter et expliquer le rythme et la forme des changements par lesquels s'est opérée la transformation du Canada en État sécuritaire. Les manifestations principales de cette transformation se sont concrétisées depuis le 11 septembre 2001 en réponse au terrorisme, afin de donner à l'État canadien les moyens de protéger ses citoyens. Les changements d'infrastructure observés touchent le domaine constitutionnel, la bureaucratie, la défense et les frontières. L'approche ontologique privilégiée dans le cadre de cet article reconnaît les forces matérielles et idéationnelles dans son explication causale. Une approche réconciliant la puissance et les idées prend en compte la hiérarchie des capacités matérielles qui caractérise la relation du Canada avec les États-Unis, ainsi que le pouvoir émergeant du paradigme sur la sécurité transnationale au niveau des idées. Ces deux aspects se retrouvent au centre du questionnement sur la transformation de l'État canadien. L'auteur avance que la hiérarchie matérielle entre le Canada et les États-Unis représente la cause ultime ou sous-jacente de la forme du changement, mais que la vigueur idéationnelle du nouveau paradigme de la sécurité transnationale demeure un facteur important dans l'évaluation du rythme de la transformation.

Type
Research Article
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 40 , Issue 4 , December 2007 , pp. 1017 - 1038
Copyright
© 2007 Cambridge University Press

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