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Transnational Relations and Interstate Conflicts: An Empirical Analysis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

Joseph S. Nye Jr.
Joseph S. Nye Jr.
Affiliation:
Professor of political science at Harvard University and a member of the Board of Editors of International Organization. The author is indebted to Carl Beigie, Robert Bowie, Annette Fox, Ted Greenwood, Barbara Haskel, Samuel Huntington, Robert Keohane, Sperry Lea, Kari Levitt, Peyton Lyon, Edward L. Miles, Wynne Plumptre, Roger Swanson, and John Yochelson for comments on an earlier draft of this article. He is also grateful to the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations for financial support of this research.
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Extract

Canadian-American relations have tended to bore statesmen and scholars who long to be where the action is. According to one scholar, “study of Canadian-American relations tells one almost nothing about the big problems facing the world,” while in a classic essay Arnold Wolfers used the unguarded border as an example of “indifference to power.” If we view world politics with “realist” assumptions that unified states are the only actors, force is the major source of power, and solving the military security dilemma is their overwhelming objective, then Canadian-American relations are indeed dull.

Type
Part IV. Integration, Institutions, and Bargaining
Information
International Organization , Volume 28 , Issue 4 , Autumn 1974 , pp. 961 - 996
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1974

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References

1 Baldwin, David “The Myths of the Special Relationship,” in Clark-son, Stephen, ed., An Independent Foreign Policy for Canada? (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968), p. 5;Google ScholarWolfers, Arnold, Discord and Collaboration (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1962), p. 97.Google Scholar

2 This assertion is developed in Keohane, Robert O. and Nye, Joseph S., “International Interdependence and Integration,” to be published in Greenstein, Fred and Polsby, Nelson, eds., The Handbook of Political Science (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1974).Google Scholar

3 I calculated this from all references that were not purely pro forma or goodwill statements in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Service.)

4 Canada's Defense Scheme #1 against the US was formally cancelled in 1931, but the political sense of security community predated the demise of the military contingency plan. Eayrs, James, In Defence of Canada, vol. 1 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1964), p. 77.Google Scholar

5 See, for example, Sommer, Theo, “The Community Is Working,” Foreign Affairs 51 (July 1973): 753.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Harry Eckstein, “Case Study and Theory in Political Science,” in Greenstein and Polsby, eds., The Handbook of Political Science.

7 Keohane, Robert O. and Nye, Joseph S., eds., Transnational Relations and World Politics (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1972). The theoretical work and hypotheses underlying the present article were developed in collaboration with Professor Keohane. In addition, I am indebted to Professor Keohane for part of the research on the prewar period and for comments on the article.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8 At the time this research began, 1947 was the most recent volume.

9 The total is 18,000, but among the 11,500 visits involving national defence are a number of visits for military training. Canada, Department of External Affairs, “Canadian Governmental Instruments for Conducting Relations with the United States,” 1969, Appendix B.

10 Indeed, the Departments of State and External Affairs often cooperate in helping each other to monitor the flows.

11 One US official, for example, described how he and a Canadian counterpart took the initiative in working out a new approach to a problem of Great Lakes pollution. By the hazards of timing of a summit meeting and the need for “friendly” items for the communiqu´, his venture reached presidential attention. It is hard to discover examples where conflictual issues need to be deliberately added to the agenda.

12 There are often Pareto optimal solutions to conflict that make both countries better off. This is the joint gain component of the solution. But the exact location on the curve of Pareto optimality is indeterminate. This is the question of distribution of gain on which I focus in this essay. In some cases, the joint gain may be in some ways more significant than the distribution of gain, but it is the latter that tests hypotheses about interstate bargaining in a situation of asymmetrical penetration by transnational actors.

13 One Canadian official argued that certain cases were not really conflicts because the American officials did not correctly perceive their own interests. Even if true, however, the problem of interstate conflict cannot be so easily defined away.

14 The eighteen conflicts were: 1920s—Great Lakes naval limitations, Great Lakes water diversion, Missisquoi Bay fishing, Roseau River drainage, Canadian peach embargo, US dairy embargo, St. Mary and Milk River diversion, US sinking of I'sm Alon liquor ship, border crossing privileges, Passamaquoddy Bay power; 1930s—Canadian discrimination against US tugboats, US seizure of Canadian ship, St. Clair River dredging, Canadian seizure of four US fishing boats, consular visits to criminals, Great Lakes cargo, income tax agreements, arms for Spanish Civil War. I am indebted to Alison Young for research assistance on these cases.

15 Some 30 present and former officials were asked to comment and correct the description and scoring of conflicts in tables 2, 3, and 4. Only one (Canadian) objected to the procedure of trying to score discrete conflicts (on the grounds that it misrepresented a continuous process).

16 Different bureaucracies in the same country may keep different scores. US Treasury officials tended to complain more frequently in the early 1970s that Canadians always came out ahead. As one State Department official observed, “In the 1960s the relations among financial officials were so close that we were often shut out of policy. Now, their relations are so poor that they complicate policy.”

17 Brown, David Leyton, “Governments of Developed Countries as Hosts to Multinational Enterprise” (PH.D. dissertation, Department of Government, Harvard University, 1973).Google Scholar

18 Raabe, F. Conrad, “Canada's Decision to Recognize the Communist Government of China, ” Association for Canadian Studies in the U.S. Newsletter 2 (Spring 1972): 12–20.Google Scholar Also, Mike: The Memoirs of the Right Honourable Lester B. Pearson, vol. 2 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1973), p. 195.

19 The procedure for constructing tables 2, 3, and 4 was as follows: A long list of interactions was constructed from all references to Canada in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States, presidential references in the Department of State Bulletin, and the Council of Foreign Relations clippings files (primarily New York Times, New York Herald Tribune, Financial Post [Toronto], Globe and Mail [Toronto]). Further references were added and interactions not involving significant conflict were removed from the list on the basis of secondary accounts. Particularly useful for 1950 to 1963 were the Canadian Institute of International Affairs volumes on Canada in World Affairs; and for the 1960s, the Canadian Annual Review. The list was then further refined through interviews with 30 current and former officials and observers. Certain issues (such as DEW Line, ABM, bunkering facilities, Laos) have been excluded as not involving sufficient incompatibility of objectives. Others (such as Cuban trade, Mercantile Bank) have been excluded as lacking direct presidential involvement.

20 Bachrach, Peter and Baratz, Morton, “Two Faces of Power,” American Political Science Review 56 (December 1962): 947–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

21 See Glazebrook, G. P. de T., A History of Canadian External Relations, vol. 2 (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1966),CrossRefGoogle Scholar chapters 17 and 18; Brebner, John B., North Atlantic Triangle (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968),Google Scholar chapter 15.

22 “Sharing a Continent: The Hard Issues,” in Dickey, John S., ed., The United States and Canada (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1964), p. 60.Google Scholar

23 Determining the first interstate request is often difficult for the recent period when the documents are not available; so I have used the source of the basic request underlying the conflict. This is sometimes not the same as the first request. For example, in cases where the US requested voluntary export controls but Canada requested better access to the American market, it is the US action that generates the issue but the basic request is Canadian.

24 This conforms with Huntington's argument in “Transnational Organizations in World Politics,” World Politics 25 (April 1973): 333–68.

25 Stewart, Walter, Trudeau in Power (New York: Outerbridge and Dienstfrey, 1971), p. 153.Google Scholar Also Thordarson, Bruce, Trudeau and Foreign Policy (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1972), p. 186.Google Scholar

26 In 1957, Diefenbaker charged that the Liberals would make Canada “a virtual 49th economic state.” Eayrs, James, Canada in World Affairs, 1955–57 (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1959), p. 125.Google Scholar In the 1958 election, an alleged refusal by Ford of Canada to sell trucks to China was widely publicized. Lloyd, Trevor, Canada in World Affairs, 1957–59. (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1968), p. 93.Google Scholar

27 See Saywell, John, ed., Canadian Annual Review for 1966 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1967), pp. 209, 298.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

28 See Foreign Relations of the United States, 1921 (henceforth, FRUS), vol. 1, p. 307. Also FRUS, 1923, vol. 1, pp. 494–98.

29 Kottman, Richard, “Volstead Violated: Prohibition as a Factor in Canadian-American Relations,” The Canadian Historical Review 43 (June 1962): 106–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

30 Issue areas are defined in terms of dominant objectives of the US government. Political refers to objectives of autonomy, sovereignty, and relations with third countries. Economic refers to material welfare. In one case (magazine tax) the American government's objectives were more economic while the Canadian's were more political.

31 Interview with former State Department official, 1973; see also James Eayrs, Canada in World Affairs, 1955–57, pp. 112–27.

32 Lyon, Peyton, Canada in World Affairs, 1961–63 (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1968), pp. 42–45;Google Scholar also Newman, Peter C., Renegade in Power (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1963), pp. 336–39.Google Scholar

33 In the pulpwood case, Secretary of State Hughes threatened “retaliation of a far-reaching nature” (FRUS, 1923, vol. 1, p. 496). For the Canadian concern about impending US tariff changes in the liquor smuggling case, see Richard Kottman. In the Trail Smelter case, the US “stressed the relationship between a trade agreement and the pollution settlement”; see Dinwoodie, D. H., “The Politics of International Pollution Control: The Trail Smelter Case,” International Journal 27 (Spring 1972): 232.CrossRefGoogle Scholar It is interesting that US companies fearing similar suits helped the Canadian company during the 1937 hearings, but this transnational alliance was at the implementation, not the political process, stage.

34 Secretary of the Treasury Morgenthau told Canadian officials that the Treasury Department was handling the case, not the State Department, but Under Secretary of State William Phillips told Department of External Affairs officials that the State Department was trying to kill the tax and Canada should hold off its appeal to Roosevelt until the right moment. FRUS 1936, vol. 1, p. 801.

35 Smith, Denis, Gentle Patriot: A Political Biography of Walter Gordon (Edmonton: Hurtig, 1973), p. 232.Google Scholar Also A. F. W. Plumptre and Pauline Jewett in Stephen Clarkson, ed., An Independent Foreign Policy for Canada?, pp. 47, 52. Newman, Peter C., The Distemper of Our Times (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1968), p. 225,Google Scholar cites a 1961 US linkage to defense contracts, but this was difficult to confirm in interviews.

36 Kwavnick, David, Organized Labour and Pressure Politics (Montreal: McGill Queens University Press, 1972),Google Scholar chapter 6. Also, Crispo, John, The Role of International Unionism in Canada (Washington: National Planning Association, 1967), p. 47.Google Scholar

37 Peyton Lyon; Peter C. Newman, Renegade in Power.

38 See Wagner, James R., “Partnership: American Foreign Policy toward Canada, 1953–1957” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Denver, 1966).Google Scholar

39 Ibid., pp. 157–58.

40 On Boeing's lobbying, see McLin, Jon B., Canada's Changing Defense Policy, 1957–63 (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1957), p. 91ff.;Google Scholar on the International Woodworkers, see Crispo, p. 33. Also based on interviews.

41 Eayrs, Canada in World Affairs, pp. 153–60; Wagner, chapter 7.

42 Eayrs, p. 128.

43 On replacing Venezuelan oil, see Lloyd, p. 86. During the auto negotiations the Canadians hinted at the possibility of a highly protected market like that of Mexico. As one participant put it in an interview, “we could occasionally point to our sombrero under the table.”

44 I am grateful to Peyton Lyon and Garth Stevenson of Carleton University and John Trent of the University of Ottawa for helping me to select the cases in table 14.

45 The pronuclear group in the Progressive Conservative party was reinforced by official and unofficial visits and communications with NATO and NORAD officials (from interviews in Ottawa).

46 Lloyd says that the international oil companies provided “mild support,” p. 86. Lobbying by northern US refiners was more important (from interviews in Washington).

47 Carl Beigie, “The Automotive Agreement of 1965: A Case Study in Canadian-American Economic Affairs,” in Preston, Richard A., ed., The Influence of the United States on Canadian Development (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1972), p. 118.Google Scholar A Canadian minister went over the head of GM Canada to negotiate directly with General Motors officials in New York. It is said that without the separate side agreements Canada would not have signed the intergovernmental agreement (from interviews in Ottawa). See also testimony in US Congress, Senate, Committee on Finance, United States-Canadian Automobile Agreement, Hearings Before the Committee on Finance on H.R. 9042, 89th Cong., 1st sess., September 1965, pp. 153–56.

48 Bilder, Richard B., “The Canadian Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act: New Stresses on the Law of the Sea,” Michigan Law Review 69 (November 1970): 4.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

49 In addition, transnational organizations played a very minor role in the political process. Seagrams gave a party for congressional employees. Phillips told Hume Wrong that such an effort to influence legislation was “not a pleasant thought,” and Wrong replied that he was “frankly horrified” (FRUS 1936, vol. 1, p. 819).

50 For Roosevelt's accusation and warning, see Kottman, R. N., “The Diplomatic Relations of the United States and Canada, 1927–1941” (Ph.D. dissertation, Vanderbilt University, 1958), pp. 364–66.Google Scholar There were also direct transgovernmental contacts between a New York congressman and Ontario Premier Hepburn in 1937. Willoughby, William R., The Saint Lawrence Seaway (Madison, Wis.: University of Wisconsin Press, 1961),Google Scholar chapter 12.

51 In an indirect sense, transnational organizations may have been more important in the prewar period than the cases indicate. I noted that the US was able to achieve its objectives in several instances through linking issues to the greater Canadian concern with access to the US market. President Hoover seemed quite unconcerned with the possibility of Canadian retaliation on tariffs. Part of the explanation may have been that American-based transnational corporations easily jumped Canadian tariff walls by direct investment. See Scheinberg, Stephen, “Invitation to Empire: Tariffs and American Economic Expansion in Canada,” Business History Review 47 (Summer 1973): 233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

52 See Higgins's, Larratt argument in Lumsden, Ian, ed., Close the 49th Parallel (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1970);Google Scholar but compare with Krutilla, John V., The Columbia River Treaty (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1967),Google Scholar chapter 10. On nuclear weapons, see McLin.

53 See Foulkes, General, “The Complications of Continental Defence,” in Livingston, Merchant, ed., Neighbors Taken for Granted (New York: Praeger, 1966), p. 101,Google Scholar where he states: “In the assessment of the threat Canada is dependent upon the United States for virtually all principal intelligence estimates.”

54 It is interesting to note that in the sequel to the magazine tax case, major Canadian magazine publishers formed an alliance with Time and Reader's Digest to compete for advertising against the television media. See Rotstein, Abraham and Lax, Gary, eds., Independence—the Canadian Challenge (Toronto: Committee for an Independent Canada, 1972), p. 218.Google Scholar

55 See the discussion in the “Introduction” to this volume.

56 See Canadian-American Committee, The New Environment for Canadian-American Relations (Washington, D.C.: Canadian-American Committee, 1972).

57 Ball, George, The Discipine of Power (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1968), p. 113.Google Scholar

58 The analogous figure for the European Common Market in 1966 was 43 percent; European Free Trade Association, 25 percent; Latin American Free Trade Association, 10 percent.

59 See Nye, Joseph S., Peace in Parts: Integration and Conflict in Regional Organizations (Boston: Little, Brown & Co., 1971),Google Scholar chapters 2 and 3.

60 See the article by John Sigler and Dennis Goresky in this volume.

61 See Litvak, Isaiah A., Maule, Christopher, Robinson, R., Dual Loyalty: Canadian-U.S. Business Arrangements (Toronto: McGraw-Hill, 1971),Google Scholar chapter 1.

62 This has not been for lack of opportunity. For example, a Canadian regional subsidy to a Michelin tire factory was treated as an export subsidy by the US which imposed countervailing duties. A decade earlier one might have seen an integrative response to this situation of policy interdependence.