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Getting It Just Right:

Strategic Culture, Cybernetics, and Canadas Goldilocks Grand Strategy

David S. McDonough

This is an Author's Original Manuscript of an article whose final and definitive form, the Version

of Record, has been published in Comparative Strategy 32, 3 (2013) [Copyright

Taylor and Francis], available online at:http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01495933.2013.805999#.Ue8ALdL2auI


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Canadas post-war strategic behavior combined two seemingly contradictory behavioral

tendencies. On one hand, Canada has proven to be a loyal American ally since the onset of the

Second World War, when security guarantees were verbally exchanged and an alliance cemented

with the 1940 Ogdensburg Agreement. This security alliance took an even more formal

institutional expression in the context of the North American Aerospace Defense Command

(NORAD) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). On the other hand, this loyalty

has been tempered by a degree of ambivalence with our superpower ally, reflecting the fact that

Canadian and American strategic preferences on key politico-military issues from missile

defense to the 2003 Iraq War occasionally diverge. In such cases, Canada reverts to an arms-

length approach towards the United States, often expressed with reference to multilateral or

internationalist principles that tend to resonate in Canadian society.

It is certainly easy to disparage this strategic ambiguity as being indecisive and

vacillating. Some in Canada will criticize bilateral relations as being overly intimate, irrespective

of any disagreements that may arise, while other will see far too much distance almost regardless

of how much cooperation actually exists.1 Yet such subjective assessments should not obscure

the fact that Canadas position rarely embodies either proximity or distance to an absolute

degree. Instead, officials have often been very adroit in balancing these competing inclinations,

in which close cooperation often masks a subtle element of ambivalence while explicit

distancing is offset with low-key cooperative measures designed to allay any American ire.

David Haglund has even labeled these competing inclinations the iron law in Canadian

politics, in which Canada must avoid drawing too close to the United States, while always

1 My thanks to Frank Harvey for bringing this point to my attention.


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ensuring that relations do not deteriorate to such a degree that Canadas prosperity and survival

might be placed in jeopardy by American wrath.2

This principle is best illustrated by how Canada has approached the question of strategic

defense.3

On one hand, while accepting air defense cooperation with the United States early in

the Cold War, officials in Ottawa also consistently sought to attach reservations and conditions

designed to safeguard Canadian sovereignty or at least offer a semblance of independence. This

can be seen in how Canada attached conditions on the construction and operation of early

warning radar lines on its territory, attempted to limit (unsuccessfully) American requests for

cross-border interceptions, and exchanged diplomatic notes that retroactively approved NORAD,

even as it created a nominal linkage with NATO that made this bi-national air defense

arrangement domestically palatable. On the other hand, while consistently refusing to officially

participate on ballistic missile defense (BMD), Canada was always careful to offset such explicit

distancing with an often overlooked degree of support by accepting NORAD early warning

use in Safeguards brief operational life, ensuring joint air defense cooperation was accelerated

when participation in the Strategic Defense Initiative was rejected, or eschewing an official role

in President George W. Bushs BMD deployments but then assigning an early warning role for

NORAD while substantially increasing national defense and domestic security funding. Such

2 David Haglund, The US-Canada relationship: How special is Americas oldest unbroken alliance? in

Americas Special Relationships:Foreign and Domestic Aspects of the Politics of Alliance, eds. John Dumbrell

and Axel R. Schfer (London: Routledge, 2009), 72.3 It is also visible in other areas, from how Canada approached NATO defence strategy during the Cold War to

Americas military interventions in Korea and Vietnam. See David S. McDonough, Canada, Grand Strategy, and

the Asia-Pacific: Past Lessons, Future Directions, Canadian Foreign Policy Journal (forthcoming). For a full

exposition of this grand strategy principle, see David S. McDonough, Ambivalent Ally: Culture, Cybernetics, and

the Evolution of Canadian Grand Strategy, (PhD diss., Dalhousie University, 2011).


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behavior demonstrated Canadas continued commitment to continental defense and security and

therefore helped make the requisite distancing action more palatable.4

By so successfully balancing proximity and distance, officials have proven adept at

following a strategic principle designed to safeguard Canadas national security and ensure that

sovereignty and independence are maintained. Rather than merely accepting it as an iron law, it

might be more appropriate to call this strategic principle the defining characteristic of a uniquely

Canadian grand strategy one that seeks to balance proximity and distance towards the United

States while avoiding the extremes of either inclination on a range of different strategic politico-

military issues. As such, Canada has essentially pursued what can be termed a goldilocks

grand strategy. Contrary to the claims of critics (and much like Goldilocks in the fairy tale),

Canada is neither too close nor too far from the US, but rather pursues policy responses that are

just right.

Undoubtedly, Canadas unique structural position within North America represents an

important underlying influence on its strategic behavior one that could perhaps shed light on

how successive Canadian governments and political leaders, rarely seen as being strategically

astute, have come to follow such a consistent grand strategy. As Patrick Lennox notes, with this

asymmetry in material capability, Canada is placed in a position of dependency on the United

States for its physical and economic security.5

The differences between these Two Siamese

Twins of North America could not be starker.6

America remains a continental-sized

superpower, with roughly ten times the number of people as Canada since the 1950s; an

4 See David S. McDonough, Canada, NORAD, and the Evolution of Strategic Defence, International Journal, 67,

3 (2012), forthcoming.5 Patrick Lennox,At Home and Abroad: The Canada-US Relationship and Canada's Place in the World

(Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2009), 5.6John Barlet Brebner,North Atlantic Triangle: The Interplay of Canada, the United States and Great

Britain (Toronto: Ryerson Press 1945, reprinted by McClelland and Stewart Limited, 1966), xxv


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economy roughly thirteen times the size of the Canadian economy; and most notably, military

spending at least thirty times higher.7

Yet material and otherwise realist conditions also retain an important degree of

indeterminacy. This can be partly attributed to the complex economic interdependence that exists

between Canada and the United States. After all, Canada represents the leading market for 38

American states, while 80 percent of Canadian exports and two-thirds of its imports flow across

the border.8

One should also not discount the high degree of convergent interests and values

within North America, at least since the slate cleaning period at the turn of the last century

resolved most of the outstanding issues between both countries.

9

Rather than representing a

threat to Canada, Americas presence has actually served to further alleviate Canadas own sense

of insecurity. R. J. Sutherland calls this an involuntary American guarantee, in which the

United States is bound to defend Canada from external aggression almost regardless of whether

or not Canadians wish to be defended.10

Of course, there were also concerns that the United States could in extremis move

towards the unilateralimplementation of its own security measures, with possibly negative

consequences on Canadian sovereignty. To avoid such unwanted help, Canada had to ensure it

did not become a strategic liability to the United States through military weakness or

7 Lennox,At Home and Abroad, 5, 7. On homeland security issues like intelligence, the difference becomes closer to

the 10:1 ratio one would expect from their respective populations. See David Haglund, North American

Cooperation in an Era of Homeland Security, Orbis 47, 4 (2003): 690.8 Fen Osler Hampson, Negotiating with Uncle Sam: Plus ca change, plus cest la meme choise, International

Journal65, 2 (2010): 306.9J. L. Granatstein and Norman Hillmer,For Better or for Worse: Canadian-American Relations: The

Promise and the Challenge (Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 1983), 40. Previously, the United States still

represented a significant military threat to British North America and later Canadian territory, as demonstrated by

invasions (1775-76, 1812-14), Anglo-American crises during the Civil War (1861-65), cross-border raids

by groups from both sides (1837, 1864, 1866), and US attempts at coercive diplomacy during the

Venezuelan crisis (1895-96) and Alaska Panhandle boundary dispute (1903).10 R.J. Sutherland, Canadas Long Term Strategic Situation, International Journal17, 3 (1962): 202.


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otherwise, in what has aptly been termed a defense against help approach to security policy.11

Yet this should not obscure the fact that Canada still operates in an exceedingly benign security

environment a strategic backwater that lacks some of the potential for interstate violence

associated with what Christopher Twomey calls the crucible of conflict.12

As a result,

geopolitical factors limit the likely success of certain Canadian policies and provides

reactions or feedback that may prove decisive in the charting of future policy courses. But, as

Colin Gray further explains, such factors cannot influence, let alone determine, the direction

of Canadian defence and foreign policies.13

Any explanation of Canadas strategic behavior therefore needs to go beyond strictly

parsimonious structural-material models to incorporate domestic-level analysis. That being said,

the Canadian foreign policy literature has traditionally been weak at shedding light on second-

image factors, often preferring atheoretical or descriptive accounts over explicit explanations.14

One promising form of explanation is rooted in strategic culture, which has become an

increasingly popular mode of explanation for Canadian scholars eager to rectify the explanatory

deficit in the literature. However, much like the wider literature on strategic culture, even these

accounts still have difficulty going beyond descriptive understanding to causal explanation.

This article seeks to refine and bring greater clarity to the concept of strategic culture. To

do so, it introduces a model of behavior that combines strategic culture with cybernetic theory,

11 Donald Barry and Duane Bratt, Defense Against Help: Explaining Canada-US Security Relations, American

Review of Canadian Studies 38, 1 (2008), 64. The notion of defence against help was first outlined in Nils rvik,

Defence Against Help A Strategy for Small States? Survival15, 5 (1973): 228-231.12 Christopher Twomey, Lacunae in the Study of Culture in International Security, Contemporary

Security Policy 29, 2 (2008): 338-357. The term strategic backwater is from Joel Sokolsky and Joseph Jockel,

Continental defence: Like farmers whose lands have a common concession line, in Canadas NationalSecurity

in the Post-9/11 World: Strategy, Interests, and Threats, ed. David S. McDonough (Toronto: University of Toronto

Press, 2012), 120.13 Colin Gray, Canadian Defence Priorities: A Question of Relevance (Toronto: Clark, Irwin & Company, 1972),

15.14 Brian Bow, Paradigms and Paradoxes: Canadian Foreign Policy in Theory, Research and Practice, International

Journal65, 2 (2010): 371-380.


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with particular reference to the Canadian case. By including cybernetic theory alongside strategic

culture, this account will be able to provide a more accurate and sophisticated portrayal of

Canadian strategic culture, while also creating synergistic dialogue with a mid-range foreign

policy theory. In so doing, it helps resolve some of the theoretical shortcomings often associated

with strategic culture. Geo-strategic and structural factors cannot be ignored. But, at least in the

Canadian case, they do not actually determine the actual substance and direction of a countrys

behavior. Instead, one needs an explanation rooted in domestic-level analysis, but still capable of

showing how geopolitical factors act as an operational milieu for Canadian decision-makers.15

Strategic Culture and Cybernetic Theory

Strategic culture consists of a distinct subset of a commonly held socio-political culture.

It is rooted in the constructivist notion that state preferences and interests are largely generated

and shaped by its identity and should not be treated exogenously.16

Indeed, strategic culture gives

a sense of hierarchy and priority to those preferences/interests and can be distinguished from

other cultural traits by its focus on politico-military security matters. While indirectly shaped by

larger geopolitical-structural forces, it remains a domestic-ideational form of explanation, in

which the societys cultural inclinations are manifest through the beliefs and consequent actions

of policy-makers. While a national society-wide phenomenon, strategic culture is inextricably

linked to elites of its so-called strategic community. As Beatrice Heuser notes, policy-makers

15 Gray, Canadian Defence Priorities, 15.16 For more on the linkage between strategic culture and constructivism, see Jeffrey Lantis, Strategic Culture: From

Clausewitz to Constructivism, Strategic Insights 4, 10 (2005).


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carry within themselves all these [broad cultural] ideas, convictions, beliefs and points of

reference.17

The concept was first introduced by Jack Snyder to examine the Soviet Unions cultural

inclination for nuclear war-fighting, and achieved a new prominence with Colin Grays account

of Americas national style on strategic nuclear matters.18

According to Alastair Iain Johnston,

however, Gray offers such a broad aggregate of variables that it is potentially unfalsifiable and

even tautological, and leads to the sweepingly simple conclusion that there is one US strategic

culture that leads to one type of behavior.19

He also outlined two subsequent generations of

scholarship one offering a more critical perspective concerning the instrumentality of strategic

culture, and the other providing a narrower conception of both culture and the behavior to be

explained.20

Johnstons own work constitutes a methodologically rigorous addition to the third-

generation, in which culture is largely defined in ideational terms and used to explain grand

strategy.21

Yet strategic culture has never officially moved beyond this three-fold typological

division. And an unresolved ontological and epistemological debate emerged on the proper

17 Beatrice Heuser, Foreword, in Strategic Culture and Weapons of Mass Destruction: Culturally Based Insights

into Comparative National Security Policymaking, eds. Jeannie Johnson, Kerry Kartchner, and Jeffrey Larsen (New

York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), xi18 Jack Snyder, The Soviet Strategic Culture: Implications for Nuclear Options, R-2154-AF (Santa Monica, Calif.:

RAND Corporation, September 1977); Colin Gray, National Style in Strategy: The American Example,

International Security, 6, 2 (Autumn 1981): 21-47; Colin Gray, Nuclear Strategy and National Style (Lanham, MD:

University Press of America, 1986).19 Alastair Iain Johnston, Cultural Realism: Strategic Culture and Grand Strategy in Chinese History (Princeton:

Princeton University Press, 1995), 8, 12-14.20 Alastair Iain Johnston, Thinking about Strategic Culture, International Security, 19, 4 (Spring 1995), 32-64. For

a more recent review of strategic culture scholarship, see David S. McDonough, Grand Strategy, Culture, and

Strategic Choice: A Review,Journal of Military and Strategic Studies, 13, 4 (2011): 1-33.21 Johnstons theory was meant to rectify what he saw as some of the conceptual and methodological problems

associated with the third-generation of scholarship, such as its narrower and less historically-grounded definition of

culture and its use of intervening variables. It is therefore curious that Johnston is often considered the

quintessential third-generation work on strategic culture. See Lantis, Strategic Culture, 4. In fact, it might be

more accurate to describe him as a stand-alone example of a fourth-generation of scholarship, which never really

found much in the way of adherents.


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delineation of strategic culture. On one hand, Colin Gray provided a defense of the first-

generations strategic culture as context approach, in which culture is both a shaping context

for behaviour and itself as a constituent of that behaviour.22

On the other hand, Johnston was

quick to challenge Gray by arguing that any interpretive description entailed implicit

explanation, which required a methodology open to the possibility that culture did not matter.23

Yet few have chosen to adopt Johnstons methodologically rigorous approach to strategic

culture. Notably, Gray largely sidestepped the debate with more policy-relevant research into

strategic culture, while even Johnston soon turned his attention to issues of social and

institutional identity.

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Canadian scholars have begun to offer their own accounts of strategic culture. For

example, Stphane Roussel and Jean-Christophe Boucher offered a significantly different

perspective by exploring the possibility of a sub-state regional strategic culture in the form of

Quebec, while Justin Massie proffered the existence of multiple strategic cultures in Canada,

even if the adoption of one culture over another remains underexplored.25

Some of the more

theoretically ambitious have even sought to bridge the Gray-Johnston divide with the concept of

explicative understanding, which sees the gulf between interpretive understanding and

scientifically explaining reality as overdrawn.26

Even then, however, one cannot help but sense

22 Colin Gray, Strategic Culture as Context: The first generation of theory strikes back, Review of International

Studies, 25 (1999): 50.23 Alastair Iain Johnston, Strategic cultures revisited: reply to Colin Gray, Review of International Studies, 25

(1999): 519-523.24

On the former, see Colin Gray, Out of the Wilderness: Prime-time for Strategic Culture, (paper prepared for theDefense Threat Reduction Agencys Advanced Systems and Concepts Office, 31 October 2006). The later point is

raised in Twomey, Lacunae in the Study of Culture, 34825 Stphane Roussel and Jean-Christophe Boucher, The Myth of the Pacific Society: Quebecs Contemporary

Strategic Culture,American Review of Canadian Studies 38, 2 (2008): 165-187; and Justin Massie, Making sense

of Canadas irrational international security policy: A tale of three strategic cultures,International Journal64, 3

(2009): 625-645.26 Alan Bloomfield and Kim Richard Nossal, Towards anExplicativeUnderstandingof Strategic Culture: The

Cases of Australia and Canada, Contemporary Security Policy 28, 2 (2007): 286-307; and David Haglund, What

good is strategic culture?International Journal59, 3 (2004): 479-502.


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that this methodology tends to be more successful at descriptive understandingrather than

explicative explanation.

Strategic culture might have a distinguished lineage in the political culture literature.

Even so, political culture has since fallen out of favor with many scholars as a type of

explanation, in so far as such cultural factors tend to guide or predispose actors to certain kinds

of behavior rather than directly causes such action.27

A similar problem also plagues the concept

of strategic culture, which is evident in both Canadian accounts and the wider literature. For

instance, strategic culture has so far been less than convincing in garnering scientifically valid

explanatory inferences. Indeed, Christopher Twomey concludes that strategic culture lacks the

specificity required for use as causal factors, fails to explain the predominance of one culture

over another, and often makes an intellectual leap from belief to behavior with insufficient

attention on the domestic policy process itself.28

Other astute observers also comment that

strategic culture lacks a falsifiable middle range theory and still has substantial room for

refinement.29

Yet such theoretical qualms should be placed in their proper context not as a

reason to dismiss strategic culture, but rather as a raison dtre to better refine it. Scholars have

already begun to sharpen the concept by incorporating other theoretical approaches to the

analysis, most recently with Jeffrey Lantis and Andrew Charltons account of strategic cultural

change that includes geopolitical factors and discourse analysis.30

This article represents another

attempt to bring greater analytical precision to the concept, though by an altogether different

route.

27 This criticism is noted in David Elkins and Richard Simeon, A cause in search of its effects, or what does

political culture explain, Comparative Politics, 11 (1979), 127-145.28 Twomey, Lacunae in the Study of Culture, 338-357.29 Jeannie Johnson, Kerry Kartchner, and Jeffrey Larsen, Introduction, in Strategic Culture and Weapons of Mass

Destruction: Culturally Based Insights into Comparative National Security Policymaking, eds.

Jeannie Johnson, Kerry Kartchner, and Jeffrey Larsen (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), 5.30 Jeffrey Lantis and Andrew Charlton, Continuity or Change: The Strategic Culture of Australia, Comparative

Strategy 30, 4 (2011): 291-315.


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To rectify some of these theoretical shortcomings, I suggest two noteworthy changes to

the analytical concept of strategic culture. First, two competing strategic subcultures will be

identified in the Canadian case Continentalism, which posits that Canada should maintain a

close identification with the countrys role as an American ally in North America, and the

Independence subculture that recommends greater distancing from the United States. Rather than

relying on a descriptive typology, both subcultures will be further conceptualized along a single

continuum onto which a range of different strategic inclinations can be identified and plotted,

including unrealized inclinations that might be embedded in society but are rarely discussed as

realistic policy choices or evident in actual behavior. This would permit greater differentiation

between strategic culture and the behavior it is meant to explain, while better reflecting the

plethora of different national cultural themes that compete and interact throughout different

elements of society.31

In this case, the most important strategic issue by far is Canada-US

relations. As such, the continuum encompasses strategic inclinations that underpin the countrys

adaptive behavior and push it towards closer proximity or greater distance towards the United

States.

Second, I incorporate elements of John Steinbruners cybernetic theory or paradigm

into what can be called a cultural-cybernetic model of behavior. Cybernetics posits that

government behavior does not reflect analytical or rational outcome calculations, but is instead

reliant on a minimally articulated notion of purpose, objective, or value the central value

being simply survival as directly reflected in the internal state of the decision-making

mechanism, and whatever actions are performed are motivated by that basic value.32

This

process envisions a reasonably simple (albeit successful) decision mechanism with a particularly

31 Twomey, Lacunae in the Study of Culture, 350.32 John Steinbruner, The Cybernetic Theory of Decision: New Dimensions of Political Analysis (Princeton: Princeton

University Press, 1974), 64, 65.


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short-term frame of reference. The goal of this theoretical synthesis is to add greater specificity

to the concept of strategic culture, further attenuate culture from the behavior it is meant to

explain, and show how cultural beliefs and inclinations are standardized and regularized in the

policy-making process.

Cybernetics also recognizes that Canadian policy-makers must deal with what has been

termed the complexity problem. This involves the uncertainty condition, such as an environment

in which there is limited time and information for optimal decisions and uncertainty over

exactly how to pursue national interests,33

and the challenges of a disaggregated policy process,

in which separate, disagreeing actors must jointly determine the decision and jointly affect the

outcome.34

As a result, policy-makers largely coalesce in the implementation of standard

operating procedures (SOPs) and show extreme sensitivity to those environmental factors

termed critical or feedback variables that could threaten this value. If the feedback variables

begin to endanger the value, cybernetic decision-making would involve the application of

incremental changes within a given SOPs parameters, and if this is not sufficient, the

discarding of the [SOP] in use and taking up the next item in the response repertory.35

Cybernetic theory is largely neutral on the origins and content of the value in question

and the type of behavioral response that the government pursues. It is precisely on these areas

that strategic culture offers important insight. First, strategic culture can provide context and

additional content to the value that concerns policy-makers. As mentioned earlier, a strategic

culture continuum involves plotting ideas, attitudes, and attendant behavioral inclinations

towards strategic issues. This involves an implicit assessment of key national interests, which

33 Colin Dueck,Reluctant Crusader: Power, Culture, and Change in American Grand Strategy (Princeton; Oxford:

Princeton University Press, 2006), 37.34 Steinbruner, The Cybernetic Theory of Decision, 1835 Ibid., 75.


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provides an important element of context to the goal or value being pursued by a cybernetic

organization within the rubric of survival. As Robin Marra reminds us, Survival can and does

encompass many different dimensions, e.g., national survival, political survival, fiscal survival,

survival in a bureaucratic sense, and one can certainly add culturally-derived notions of survival

to this list.36

Second, a collective cybernetic decision process also requires that the separate activities

of the individuals involved in the process must be directly coordinated to some degree, whereby

the established routines[are] rendered consistent.37

To be sure, David Sylvan and Stephen

Majeski question how multiple actors from diverse bureaucratic departments and agencies can

communicate and agree upon beliefs and patterns of thought on some potentially novel situation.

However, strategic culture represents a broader intersubjective concept capable of both

informing the beliefs and behavioral inclinations in a polity and setting the basic parameters of

the strategic debate. By uniting disparate individuals within such a framework, strategic culture

facilitates the sort of implicit coordination required for successful adaptive responses while also

reducing the level of uncertainty of an otherwise complex environment. This point is reiterated

by Douglas Ross, who accepts that a cybernetic analysis of Canadian behavior involves the

examination of the fundamental clusters of attitudes concerning the nature of Canadian foreign

policy, the threats, problems, and challenges confronting it, and the dominant interests and

values that must be served in actually formulating and executing policy.38

Third, cybernetic theory entails a cognitive and organizational reliance on pre-

programmed SOPs that are implemented as responses to shifts in the feedback variables and

36 Robin Marra, A Cybernetic Model of the US Defense Expenditure Policymaking Process, International Studies

Quarterly 29, 4 (1985): 361.37 Steinbruner, The Cybernetic Theory of Decision, 77, 78.38 Douglas Ross,In the Interests of Peace: Canada and Vietnam 1954-1973 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press,

1984), 26.


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ensure the continued maintenance or achievement of the value. This provides a simple way to

operationalize and test cultural inclinations, which otherwise would be too ill-defined to be of

much use as an explanation. As such, it seems prudent to expand upon Ross notion of Standing

Operational Doctrines (SODs). SODs refer to tendency groupings or SOP policy

aggregates39

in other words, implicit strategic doctrines that are derived from societal norms

and used as heuristics or cognitive shortcuts to help ensure a relatively consistent and

coordinated policy output.

Moreover, SODs can be conceptualized as the dominant patterns of strategic

behavior,

40

a concept that has caused so much consternation amongst positivist students of

strategic culture. It should be noted thatpatterns of behavior should not be confused with

behavioritself that would violate the social scientific requirement that independent and

dependent variables be separated in order for a hypothesized causal relationship to exist and

tautology avoided. The emphasis should instead be placed on the notion of patterns, in

reference to how one has previously acted (e.g., the pattern) having an effect on current behavior.

The concept of doctrine, by referring to an ideational-heuristic roadmap explicitly meant to

guide action, nicely encapsulates this pattern effect.

Policy-making remains a fragmented process involving shifting (and sometimes

competing) coalitions of actors with differing policy preferences. In a cybernetic policy process,

SODs provide the culturally-derived heuristic framework through which preferences of

coalitions of actors within the policy process itself, rather than fully integrated, are loosely and

implicitly coordinated this is done by structuring and affecting the particular balance amongst

these coalitions, which ultimately changes the policy outputs that emerge out of this process in

39 Ibid.40 Nossal and Bloomfield, Towards anExplicative Understanding, 288.


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accordance to a given SOD. As such, shifts between SODs would entail changes in the relative

balance between coalitions, and would do so in accordance with a cybernetic pattern. For

example, when confronted by significant environmental pressure (e.g., changes in the feedback

variable), decision-makers discard the current strategic doctrine for the SOD next in the response

repertoire, and the political fortunes of the coalitions change as a result.

A cybernetic approach is clearly amenable for use in conjunction with ideational and

cultural theories. At its core, cybernetic theory posits that human beings lack the analytical

capacities to scan over a wide range of alternatives and make fine grain optimization decisions.

As Sylvan and Majeski go on to note, this opens the door to psychological and satisficing

processes capable of leading policy makers to focus on, or at least strongly prefer, certain types

of policy instruments over others.41

For the purposes of this study, policy-makers use heuristic

shortcuts that lead them to focus on a higher-order priority (e.g., the value) and to rely upon

SODs to achieve that objective. This results in long-standing patterns of behavior and a

consistent and strategically-informed Canadian grand strategy.

A cybernetic organization implements SODs to achieve a minimally-articulated notion of

survival. In the Canadian case, the central values for policy-makers are to maintainsecurity

against domestic and international threats and sense ofsovereignty, whether defined internal as

the states authority within its borders and external in reference to the states capacity for

independent action abroad.42

Canada is only able to safeguard its territorial and economic

security in close cooperation with the United States, though such a partnership can ultimately

detract from the countrys internal sovereignty and external independence. The reverse is also

41 David Sylvan and Stephen Majeski, US Foreign Policy in Perspective: Clients, Enemies and Empire (London;

New York: Routledge, 2009), 10.42 Eric Lerhe, Canada-US Military Interoperability: At What Cost Sovereignty? (PhD, Dalhousie University,

2012), 18-19.


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true: Canadian effort to safeguard its political interest in sovereignty in North America by

maximizing distance could prove equally problematic. Ottawa could find itself facing possible

security threats alone or dealing with US unilateral security measures capable of curtailing its

capacity to act independently abroad. Clearly, security and sovereignty are closely connected to

one another, with the pursuit of one possibly resulting in the failure to achieve the other, in what

amounts to a situation of trade-off complexity.43

This dilemma was on display at the onset of the Second World War, when Canada

cemented a security alliance with the Americans but also had to deal with their wartime presence

in its sparsely populated northern territory.

44

This presence was only a temporary aberration, but

it certainly contributed to the Canadian aversion to the presence of American forces in Canada

and extreme sensitivity to the potential derogation of Canadian sovereignty.45

As such, the

successful pursuit of both values is dependent on ensuring that Canada is neither too close to the

Americas, nor too distant. Indeed, since movement in either direction could endanger both

values, decision-makers seek to maintain security-sovereignty values within a limited range

along the continental-independence continuum.

Any given SOD is rooted in past behavior and remains in the doctrinal repertoire of an

organization so long as its operational record remains or appears to remain failure-free.46

In

a complex and fragmented organization, SODs create some basic unity amongst the competing

coalitions of actors involved in a countrys foreign, defense, and security policies. This

conceptual distinction between a strategic culture continuum and culturally-derived SODs also

43 For more on trade-off complexity, see Steinbruner, The Cybernetic Theory of Decision, 16-17.44 For example, the US Army had deployed a veritable Army of Occupation to work on defence projects in the Far

North, which led to a presence of 43,000 military and civilian on Canadian territory. Shelagh Grant, Sovereignty or

Security? Government Policy in the Canadian North, 1936-1950 (Vancouver: University of BritishColumbia Press,

1988), Chp. 5.45 R. J. Sutherland, The Strategic Significance of the Canadian Arctic, in The Arctic Frontier, ed. R. St. J.

Macdonald (Toronto: University of Toronto Press 1966), 261.46 Ross,In the Interests of Peace, 31.


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helps disentangle some of the potentially problematic elements of strategic culture, which can

result in forms of explanation that verge on tautology. Yet it also keeps intact the inclusion of

behavior within the definitional confines of strategic culture, which aside from being in

accordance to standard linguistic usage of culture also makes the concept so conceptually

interesting.47

Canadas two strategic subcultures, the continental-independence continuum, and

attendant SODs will be further explicated in the remaining two sections.

Canadian Strategic Culture: Beliefs, Attitudes, and Inclinations

Canadas two strategic subcultures not only have distinct interpretations of geopolitical

reality, but also sharply different answers to how Canada can and should relate to the United

States. On one hand, Continentalism reflects the positive attitude that historically developed in

Canada towards the United States. This subculture is a product of the twentieth century, and

harkens back to the interwar doctrine of the two spheres that distinguished the morally

righteous New World from a debased Old one.48

This state of peaceful coexistence has

developed the normative affinity, mutual identification, and shared threat perception that mark a

security community,49

to the extent that it verges on being a transnational collective identity.

As David Haglund notes, the Canadian reaction to the 9/11 attacks displayed all the hallmarks

of in-group solidarity at a moment of crisis.50

This is clearly related to that curious Canadian

tendency to have an expansive and flexible definition of what needs to be defended beyond the

countrys immediate territory, whether in the form of an Anglosphere, North Atlantic

47 Gray, Strategic Culture as Context, 69.48 David Haglund, Are we the isolationists? North American isolationism in a comparative context,International

Journal58, 1 (2002-2003): 11.49 See Stphane Roussel, The North American Democratic Peace: Absence of War and Security Institution Building

in Canada-US relations, 1867-1958 (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queens University Press,2004); and Justin

Massie, Canadas (In)dependence in the North American Security Community: The Asymmetrical Norm of

Common Fate,American Review of Canadian Studies 37, 4 (2007): 493-516.50 Haglund, The US-Canada relationship, 68.


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community, or North America.51

However, there is no doubt that Canadas collective

identification or we-ness with the Americans remainssui generis. Both share a liberal

democratic approach to domestic governance, an Anglo-Saxon heritage based on a common

ancestry, a dense network of cultural, economic, and family ties, and a shared sense of belonging

that has at the very least facilitated a very strong in-group dynamic within North America.52

This subculture entails a relatively benign, even familial attitude towards the United

States. Canada might have little choice other than to accept its geopolitical destiny in North

America, but Continentalism also recognizes the fortunate happenstance and indeed privilege of

being situated next to a friendly superpower. As then Minister of External Affairs Louis St.

Laurent noted in his 1947 Gray Lecture, Canada and the United States were like farmers whose

lands have a common concession line, who were able to settle from day to day, questions that

arise between us without dignifying the process by the word policy.53

To be sure, this

subculture implicitly warns that a refusal to be closely aligned to the United States on certain key

issues could result in potential consequences, from economic retaliation to a reduced Canadian

voice on bilateral matters. St. Laurent would go on to admonish his audience on the need for

constant watchfulness and imaginative attention on this relationship. Yet this warning was

normatively framed as a matter of Canadas obligation to accept our responsibility as a North

American nation.54

Continentalism propagates the belief that Canadas foremost concern should be the

United States. Other interests exist and undoubtedly will be pursued, but preference should

51 Kim Richard NossalDefending the Realm: Canadian Strategic Culture Revisited,International Journal59, 3(2004): 503-520.52 David Haglund, And the Beat Goes On: Identity and Canadian Foreign Policy, in Canada Among Nations

2008: 100 Years of Canadian Foreign Policy, eds. Robert Bothwell and Jean Daudelin (Montreal: McGill-Queens

University Press, 2009), 356.53 The Rt. Hon. Louis S. St. Laurent, The Foundations of Canadian Policy in World Affairs, Duncan and John

Gray Memorial Lecture, 13 January 1947.54 Ibid.


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always be given to relations with our superpower patron. This is partly the result of a generally

pessimistic view of Canadas ability, in the absence of American cooperation, to unilaterally

safeguard its territory, play a significant role on the international stage, or achieve its political

and economic interests alone. The subculture also has a relatively optimistic view of Canadas

position in North America. Political control over Canadian territory might be modestly curtailed,

but the potential benefits arising from closer Canada-US alignment, such as having greater say

on issues that might affect the country, are seen to easily outweigh such inconveniences.55

In

sum, it essentially agrees with the notion, once said by head of the American Section of the

Permanent Joint Board of Defense Fiorello LaGuadia, that it is far better to trust to the honour

of the United States, than to the mercy of the enemy.56

Not surprisingly, the strategic inclinations encapsulated within this subculture are

primarily directed at facilitating more expansive cooperation and integration with the United

States. Perhaps the most robust expression of this integrationist impulse can be found in the

discussions over the idea of a grand bargain, in which Canada would trade significant defense

integration and border security harmonization in return for secure access to American markets.

Notably, such arguments have so far failed to gain much traction.57

However, proposals for

limited sectoral integration have proven to be much more resilient, whether in the form of

missile defense, maritime integration, or a limited continental security perimeter. Yet Canada has

historically preferred loose bilateral arrangements, with even the bi-national NORAD anomaly

still largely limited to narrow issue-areas (e.g., air defense, early warning and attack assessment,

55 Massie, Canadas (In)dependence, 493-51656 Quoted in Galen Roger Perras,Franklin Roosevelt and the Origins of the Canadian-American Security Alliance,

1933-1945: Necessary But Not Necessary Enough (Westport: Praeger, 1998), 81.57 These arguments seem to overstate the American interest in such a comprehensive perimeter. See Joel Sokolsky

and Philippe Lagass, Suspenders and a Belt: Perimeter and Border Security in Canada-US Relations, Canadian

Foreign Policy 12, 3 (2005-06): 15-29.


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and maritime warning).58

Indeed, Canada has often found itself keen to balance existing bilateral

ties with other multilateral arrangements, which Continentalism is not necessarily adverse to

provided that close strategic relations with the Americans are maintained.

On the other hand, theIndependence subculture is representative of Canadas relative

isolation within North America. The overwhelming American presence, magnified by the rapid

growth of economic linkages in the post-war period, has no doubt fostered a certain amount of

concern and even distrust towards our ally. This has its origins in the often turbulent early history

between Canada and the United States, when fears of manifest destiny whether conceived as

military encroachment or an inevitable union dominated Canadian strategic concerns. Even

today, the thought that the Canadian mouse could be easily crushed by the American

elephant has continued to linger. This subculture does not deny the existence of todays close

cultural affinity or economic ties between both countries, but offers an alternative interpretation.

Simply put, a transnational collective identity can generate suspicion that is counter-hegemonic

or unabashedly nationalist in character. In some sense, this reaction shows that collective

identities can be held hostage to what Sigmund Freud has termed the narcissism of minor

differences.59

Even the growth of economic ties can be viewed as further evidence of American

economic encroachment. At the very least, it makes Canada more vulnerable to economic

58James Fergusson,Beneath the Radar: Change and Transformation in the Canada-US North American

Defence Relationship (Calgary: Canadian Defence and Foreign Affairs Institute, 2009), 5. For more on the

anomalous nature of NORAD in Canada-US relations, see Sokolsky and Jockel, Continental defence, 114-137.59 Haglund, And the Beat Goes On, 356


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retaliation and linkage politics.60

At its most extreme, it raises questions on whether the country

gained independence from Great Britain only to become a satellite of the United States.61

The Independence subculture does not necessarily entail hostility, as the neighborliness in

Canada-US relations helps counterbalance any lingering sense of historic grievance. But it does

involve a very strong awareness of the power imbalance that marks the Canada-US relationship.

As such, the subcultures general attitude is that of suspicion that closer alignment would only

give the United States additional leverage and means of pressure. It also believes that the best

way to avoid such consequences is to keep the United States at a distance. As such, the tighter

embrace prescribed by the Continentalism would only be self-defeating. Canada should not

necessarily discard its relationship with the Washington altogether, but it would only be one

among a diverse array of interests, some of which could take precedence. Canadas ability to

take an independent stand apart from our superpower patron, to pursue its own interests

irrespective how it might affect its relationship with the Americans, and to tell our ally when

their breath is bad,62

to use John Holmes memorable phrase; all are founded on a generally

optimistic view of Canadas material capability to undertake independent action.

True, the Independentist subculture shares with Continentalism the belief that security is

abundant within North America. It is, however, more skeptical on the role of the Canada-US

alliance in underpinning this situation, even as it is much more optimistic that security is

prevalent (if not exactly plentiful) outside of North America. In any event, it retains a high

60 For more on hard and soft forms of retaliation, see Brian Bow, The Politics of Linkage: Power, Independence and

Ideas in Canada-US Relations (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2009) and Rethinking

Retaliation in Canada-US Relations, inAn Independence Foreign Policy for Canada? Challenges and Choices

for the Future, eds. Brian Bow and Patrick Lennox (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009), 63-82.61 Kenneth McNaught, From Colony to Satellite, inAn Independent Foreign Policy for Canada? ed. Stephen

Clarkson(Toronto; Montreal: McClelland and Stewart [for the University League for Social Reform], 1968), 173-

183.62 John Holmes,Life with Uncle: The Canadian-American Relationship (Toronto; Buffalo: University of Toronto

Press, 1981), 137


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degree of confidence in Canadas ability to navigate whatever security challenges might arise,

and to do so without relying on the United States. At the same time, despite this general

optimism, this subculture retains a very strong realist caution in its assessment of Canadas

relationship with America, and is considerably less sanguine on the possible consequences that

close alignment might have on Canadian sovereignty, policy autonomy, and independence.

The strategic inclinations embedded within this subculture are geared towards

maximizing the distance between Canada and the United States. It entails at least an element of

what can be best described as isolationism or non-alignment, in so far as this subculture is

inclined to minimize international commitments that could possibly infringe on Canadian

independence. On that level, it certainly harkens back to the interwar period, when Canada

keenly avoided substantial commitments to the League of Nations.63

More recently, it is more

often equated with Thomas Hockins notion of voluntarism, which refers to Canadas patient

effort to supplement, even transform, balance-of-power politics by its commitment to

multilateralism.64

The argument for a multilateral counterweight is perhaps most clearly made

with reference to NATO. As a Minister of National Defence reportedly quipped, with fifteen

people in the bed you are less likely to get raped!65

A more idealist argument focuses on the

United Nations as an organization that embodies the opinion of the international community and

is less beholden to the United States.

63

This isolationist sentiment is perhaps most commonly associated with Mackenzie Kings chief foreign policyadvisor of the pre-war period O. D. Skelton. This might appear a curious placement, given that Skelton was a strong

supporter of relations with the United States. However, Skeltons views also took place during the interwar period,

when isolationism was largely directed at Great Britain and can be described as anti-imperial (and perhaps anti-

British) in nature. For more on Skeltons views, see Norman Hillmer, O. D. Skelton and the North American

Mind,International Journal60, 1 (2004-2005): 93-110.64 Thomas Hockin, The Foreign Policy Review of Decision Making in Canada, in Lewis Hertzman, John Warcock

and Thomas Hockin,Alliances and Illusions: Canada and the NATO-NORAD Question (Edmonton: M. G. Hurtig

Ltd., 1969), 95, 99.65 Quoted in Sutherland, Canadas Long Term Strategic Situation, 207.


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That being said, proponents of this argument rarely specify the process by which

multilateralism can actually offset American preponderance. NATO never did develop into the

sort of broader political and economic community that could institutionally constrain the

United States.66

And the United Nations remains an even more problematic avenue for Canada to

achieve independence from the Americans. It remains to be seen whether such a change would

actually entail an increase in independence or an illusionary facade behind which Canada could

further reduce its commitments. Indeed, these inclinations have often been expressed in terms of

rhetoric rather than substantive commitments an illusion of independence that would shatter

if Canada ever did break more forcefully with the direction of American foreign policy.

67

In

that sense, the Independentist subculture is inclined towards dishonest multilateralism, which

ignores the deficiencies of such measures, often relies on them to avoid significant international

contributions altogether, and exhibits the uninspiring purpose of seeing how low Canadian

expenditures on international affairs can be kept without forfeiting Canadas position in

international forums.68

This Continental-Independence divide within Canadian strategic culture bears more than

a passing resemblance to the Canadian foreign policy debate between quiet diplomacy and the

independent approach that emerged several decades ago.69

Quiet diplomacy, centrally concerned

with leveraging Canadas special relationship with the United States, reflects elements within

66 Instead, Canada had to settle for largely rhetorical commitment in the form of Article 2 of the North Atlantic

Treaty. See David Haglund, The NATO of its dreams? Canada and the co-operative security alliance,International Journal52, 3 (1997): 464-482.67 Patrick Lennox, The Illusion of Independence, inAn Independent Foreign Policy for Canada? Challenges and

Choices for the Future, eds. Brian Bow and Patrick Lennox (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009), 45.68 Kim Richard Nossal, Pinchpenny diplomacy: The decline of good international citizenship in Canadian foreign

policy,InternationalJournal54, 1 (1998-99): 104. For more on dishonest multilateralism, see Frank Harvey,

Dispelling the Myth of Multilateral Security after 11 September and the Implications for Canada, in Canada

Among Nations2003: Coping with the American Colossus, eds. David Carment, Fen Osler Hampson, and Norman

Hillmer (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 2003), 200-218.69 See Clarkson, An Independent Foreign Policy for Canada?


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Continentalism.70

The independent approach, suspicious of quiet diplomacy and keen to loosen

ties with the Americans, can also be compared to the Independentist subculture.71

This debate

has done much to illustrate a fundamental feature that underpins Canadas approach to dealing

with the United States.72

Yet it would also be a mistake to assume this conceptualization of

strategic culture can be equated or reduced to this earlier work. The identification of cultural

tendencies within a broader cybernetic framework promises greater analytical substance that can

go beyond prescriptive advocacy. Meanwhile, quiet diplomacy and independence themselves

represent a dichotomy that compressed and simplified a much more subtly varied landscape of

ideas.

73

In contrast, this article avoids this problem by plotting the predispositions and

inclinations along a continuum, which can illustrate the full range of policy responses at play and

debated in the Canadian polity.

Standing Operational Doctrines in the Canadian Policy Process

Canadas two subcultures display a significant amount of variation based on the relative

intensity of these attitudes and beliefs. For example, the Continentalist attitude can range from

mild affection to a level of attachment in which Canadian and American interests are virtually

indistinguishable. The Independentist subculture, in turn, can range from cautious detachment to

a degree of suspicion that can only be described as anti-American. In their more modest

70 Peter Lyon, Quiet Diplomacy Revisited, inAn Independent Foreign Policy for Canada? ed. Stephen Clarkson

(Toronto; Montreal: McClelland and Stewart [for the University League for Social Reform], 1968), 29-41.71 See Stephen Clarkson, The Choice to be Made inAn Independent Foreign Policy for Canada? ed. Stephen

Clarkson (Toronto; Montreal: McClelland and Stewart [for the University League for Social Reform], 1968).Elements of the independence approach are also reflected in the views of Jamie Minifie and John Warcock.72 It has also been reiterated in the writings of others. See Allan Gotlieb, Romanticism and Realism in Canadian

Foreign Policy, Benefactors Lecture 2004 (Ottawa: C.D. Howe Institute, 2004); Massie, Canadas

(In)dependence, 493-516; Erika Simpson,NATO and the Bomb: Canadian Defenders Confront Critics (Montreal

and Kingston: McGill-Queens University Press, 2001); and Michael Tucker, Canada and arms control:

perspectives and trends,International Journal36, 3 (1981): 635-656.73 Brian Bow and Patrick Lennox, Introduction: The Question of Independence, Then and Now, in An Independent

Foreign Policy for Canada? Challenges and Choices for the Future, eds. Brian Bow and Patrick Lennox (Toronto:

University of Toronto Press, 2009), 4.


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formulations, the differences between the two subcultures are more in degree than in kind,

though in extremis can reflect different and indeed polar ways of relating to the United States.

Beliefs are certainly closely related to attitudes, in so far as the intensity of the general attitude of

attachment or disenchantment would likely be strongly correlated to the relative strength of the

belief e.g., the relative importance of relations with our ally, the belief in the feasibility and

benefits of pursuing a more non-aligned approach, etc. Yet the relationship between these two

factors retains some amount of attenuation. For example, beliefs can involve strategic

calculations that complement certain attitudes towards the United States, but cannot be broken

down or simplified as reflecting such attitudes.

For the sake of analytical simplicity, however, beliefs and attitudes will be collapsed into

an overarching conceptual category. Both factors are clearly related to one another, albeit not

perfectly, while the most important elements of both attitudinal predisposition towards the US

and relative importance of Canada-US relations can together be distinguished across the two

subcultures according to their relative intensity. To achieve a modicum of parsimony, the

intensity of this predisposition can be gauged based on the degree to which relations with the US

are prioritized. This belief seems to best encapsulate the strategic cultural element in how

Canada relates to the United States, while reflecting core national interests that are more closely

related to behavioral inclinations than attitude alone.

Strategic culture is not simply reflective of the attitude and beliefs that underpin a

countrys conception of interests; it is also equally about those strategic inclinations that lead

directly towards certain types of strategic behavior. While inextricably tied to Canadas general

predisposition towards the United States, behavioral inclinations actually prescribe actual types

of action for the country to follow, while proscribing others. By providing ideational guidance of


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a countrys actions, these ideational factors represent more concrete and self-contained

constructs that can be differentiated more in kind than degree. As such, rather than simplifying

them based on their degree of intensity, these inclinations can be identified and plotted along a

Continental-Independence continuum (see Figure 1).

Figure 1 Canadas Strategic Culture: Continental-Independence Continuum

Some of these inclinations, generally located in the middle goldilocks zone of the

spectrum, are clearly on display in the countrys strategic policy debate and its goldilocks grand

strategy. Others, however, are at best unrealized inclinations that can either be logically-derived

or identified in the countrys foreign policy debate. One example is total non-alignment, which

would entail Canadas withdrawal from its key alliance commitments to NORAD and NATO.

Another example is the notion that Canada should set aside its sovereignty concerns to join what

amounts to a Fortress North America. True, some more modest elements may go beyond simple

debate to percolate into Canadian policies; for example, the degree of integration undoubtedly

evident in the bi-national cooperation and military interoperability between both countries, or the

CONTINENTALISM INDEPENDENTIST

DistanceProximity

Strong Predisposition to being an American ally

Weak Predisposition to being an American ally

NATOcommunity -

rhetorical

Bilateraldefence

cooperation

Legend

Strategicintegration

Fortress America

Sectoral integration missile defence,

maritime/land

UNprioritization

NATOcommunity

actual

prioritization

Multiateralmilitary

alliance e.g., NATO

Binationalintegration

NORAD

Totalnon-

alignment

Defence inter-

operability


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hints of non-alignment in Canadas participation in the United Nations. As a whole, however,

these more extreme inclinations have never been featured as feasible options in the Canadian

policy process.

Canadas strategic culture is broader than its grand strategy, encompassing as it does a

wider spectrum of attitudes, beliefs, and inclinations on strategic issues than is actually expressed

in its defense and security policies. Elements of both subcultures are certainly meant to help

solve Canadas fundamental dilemma of achieving security and maintaining sovereignty.

Canadian goldilocks grand strategy reflects those inclinations in the continuums mid-range. It

does not stray too far in either direction of the spectrum, and is therefore representative of either

shifts between subcultures or alternatively the incorporation of elements of both cultural

inclinations. Whatever the interpretation used, it is clear that a key part of the story is explaining

why certain inclinations are reflected in behavior and others remain hypothetical.

Yet strategic culture alone remains too conceptually broad to account for and make

predictions about Canadas strategic choices. As noted by Colin Dueck, strategic culture at the

national level tends to act as a constraint, and a filter, rather than a determinant cause of grand

strategy in and of itself.74

To add greater specificity to the analysis and show how strategic

culture leads to behavior, cybernetic theory offers some definite advantages. Fortunately, by re-

conceptualizing strategic culture as a continuum, cultural factors become amenable to be

processed and operationalized within a cybernetic process. As noted earlier, Canadas traditional

interest in security and sovereignty can be conceptualized as the central values being maintained

and balanced in the cybernetic process. This approach also has an important and highly

beneficial consequence it nicely avoids the risk of either being drawn into financially

74 Dueck,Reluctant Crusader, 36.


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exorbitant American projects or bearing the cost of Canadian defense and sovereignty missions

alone.

The ideal balance for the values is situated in the goldilocks zone of this Continental-

Independence continuum. On one hand, Canadas willingness to be closely aligned to the United

States may prove detrimental to Canadian sovereignty if taken to its extreme. Strategic or even

sectoral integration inevitably raises the specter of American infringement on Canadas territorial

control and sovereign autonomy, while perhaps tarnishing the Canadian claim of an independent

role abroad. But security may itself become endangered if such a close association helps to

generate and magnify external threats or results in an involuntary Canadian commitment to

American policies, the latter point surely helping to explain Ottawas long-standing insistence on

maintaining command over military deployments.75

On the other hand, an attempt to achieve

some semblance of non-alignment, either alone or through the prioritization of NATO or the UN,

would prove equally harmful. Canada has long relied upon its close defense relations with the

United States to provide more security than it was capable of achieving alone. Indeed, any effort

to maximize distance from the Americans could leave Canada vulnerable to external threat and

force it to work twice as hard to satisfy its allys security concerns. Canadian officials would do

well to remember the benefits of having a friendly agreement in advance with the United

States, lest they be forced to take unilateral action capable of threatening Canadian sovereignty

and even its economic security.76

With its highly favorable burden-sharing arrangements,

75 For a good account, see David Bercuson and J. L. Granatstein, From Paardeberg to Panjwai: Canadian National

Interests in Expeditionary Operations, in Canadas National Security in the Post-9/11 World: Strategy, Interests,

and Threats, ed. David S. McDonough (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012), 193-208.76 The term friendly agreement in advance was reportedly used by President Roosevelt in talks with Great Britain

concerning American access to bases in British imperial West Indian territories. While noting that it was the US

preference to have such an agreement, there was also an implicit threat that the US would if deemed necessary

take the territories in any event. See Perras, Franklin Roosevelt, 76.


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Canadas partnership with the United States has also surely alleviated the financial and material

cost of maintaining sovereignty over this large and sparsely populated territory.

Importantly, a cybernetic process keeps these security-sovereignty values in a state of

balance that minimizes potential trade-offs between them, and does so through a process marked

by minimal or bounded rationality. Behavior is minimally-purposeful, heavily incremental, and

based on routines that with their degree of concreteness and coherency can be conceptualized

as SODs designed to keep these values within their tolerance range. While reflecting ideal types,

Canadas actual strategic behavior and security policies follow the basic dictums expressed by

two SODs. It is through this process that strategic cultural inclinations in the middle of the

spectrum become realized, while others at the margin do not.

Continental soft-bandwagoning, which serves as the default SOD in the Canadian policy

repertoire, is primarily meant to ensure the continued existence of a close relationship with the

United States. Originating in the security bargain struck at Kingston and Ogdensburg, it is

extremely receptive to close bilateral cooperation and represents an example of a

bandwagoning with the Americans. It also places relatively greater weight on national security

requirements over political interest in ensuring sovereignty. Indeed, bilateral cooperation is not

only seen as being normatively valued, in so far as it fulfils that internal need to be a good

neighbor to our ally, but also represents a necessary requirement to achieve security and

sovereignty. This does not mean, absent such cooperation, Canadian security would be

immediately endangered or its sovereignty revoked. Nevertheless, it does mean that both values

would be more difficult and costly to achieve alone and more at risk of being occasionally

trammeled by our American ally.


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Multilateral alliances and institutions are not necessarily arrangements to be avoided,

especially given Americas own post-war penchant for multilateral institution-building. But the

UN and even NATO are largely seen to supplement and reinforce the Canada-US alliance.

Indeed, any move to prioritize these institutions at the expense of this continental relationship

would be difficult and unwise. With the strategic decline of Great Britain, Canada lost what was

arguably its only true counterweight to American continental preponderance. While policy-

makers may flirt with the idea that multilateral organizations could serve as a substitute, nothing

more serious is likely to result. However, continental soft-bandwagoning is not necessarily

dismissive of the challenges posed by extreme proximity. Stronger cooperation must be

tempered with some degree of prudence, lest the Canadian mouse find itself accidentally tied to

the elephants foot. In that sense, while associated with bandwagoning behavior, this SOD can be

considered soft or moderately distant in nature. Bilateral cooperation might be embraced, but

not necessarily at the expense of the sort of security and sovereign protection that such

cooperation is meant to guarantee. Some forms of cooperation are clearly within the acceptable

range, while others are considered beyond the purview of the Canada-US alliance, at least as it is

presently conceived.

The central criterion for accepting some forms of cooperation and rejecting others is a

relatively simple one. Cybernetic theory posits a process in which only a few critical

environmental variables are monitored and assessed according to their ability to push the value

beyond its tolerance point. In the Canadian case, the environmental factor that can unbalance and

create trade-offs between the security-sovereignty values centers primarily on American strategic

preferences, as reflected in those initiatives, projects, or trends that often emanate from

Washington. Canada often avoids taking the initiative on such matters, often preferring to instead


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follow its larger and more senior partner. While the United States rarely offers an open

invitation, there is equally very little doubt when it wants a partner to join to participate in,

endorse, or simply acquiesce to a politico-security initiative.

Four criteria can be identified to judge whether the critical or feedback variable would

endanger security and sovereignty. First, Canadas participation, endorsement, or acquiescence

must be valued, if not absolutely required. Otherwise, there would be little incentive for or

pressure on Canada and even less in the way of environmental stress. Second, the United States

must consider an initiative to be a strategic priority. This primarily stems from the understanding

that Canada has greater freedom of action when Washington has minimal interest in an initiative.

If low in priority, there would be few consequences to rejecting American overtures and little

stress on Canadian security-sovereignty values. Third, the initiative must be underpinned by a

particular American threat perception significantly different from that in Canada, in degree as

well as in kind. A divergence of threat perception, as when the US has a higher sense of threat,

makes it more difficult for Canada to justify close cooperation and increases disagreement on

appropriate policy measures. Fourth, any strategic initiative must itself have characteristics

difficult for Ottawa to easily accept, based on a gauge of its relative controversy among

international or domestic audiences. This judgment can be based directly on the initiative itself

or be the result of the American administration promoting or implementing it. For example, poor

relations with Ottawa makes it difficult to have the mutual understanding necessary for smooth

bilateral cooperation, while an unpopular administration only increases the cost of cooperation

for a government interested in subsequent re-election.

If all four criteria are present, Canada would confront environmental pressures that could

potentially disrupt the balance between security and sovereignty. As a result, Canada would face


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definite incentives and pressure to be even more closely aligned with the Americans. In such

circumstances, while continental soft-bandwagoning could potentially increasing security, this

SOD would also threaten Canadian political interest in sovereignty and independence, and

therefore serve as an ill-suited policy response. Instead, officials turn to the alternative SOD in

its policy repertoire defensive weak-multilateralism to facilitate further distancing from the

United States and re-balance the values back within their tolerance range.

That being said, the actual differences between the two SODs should not be exaggerated.

Cybernetic theory envisions largely incremental and conservative policy changes capable of

compensating for the critical feedback variable and bringing the values back into balance. As

such, defensive weak-multilateralism is neither dismissive of the other doctrines penchant for

bilateral cooperation with the Americans, nor necessarily naive concerning the potential benefits

provided by international institutions. Yet it does entail greater sensitivity on threats to

sovereignty, greater inclination to being openly critical of the United States, and greater

normative affinity towards multilateralism and institution-building not only to seek refuge from

its great power patrons and avoid international commitments, but also to fulfill that idealist

vision of being a good international citizen.77

By situating Canada-US cooperation within a

larger multilateral framework, Canada would gain a useful semblance of independence and an

opportunity to assert its own distinct identity and status as a middle power. These two goals are

certainly related. As Adam Chapnick reminds us, the functional principle was often invoked as

idealistic rhetoric to provide the appearance of Canadian independence and to justify the

pursuit of Canadian global interests.78

Importantly, the United States has shown itself equally

77 See Nossal, Pinchpenny diplomacy, 88-105.78Adam Chapnick, Principle for Profit: The Functional Principle and the Development of Canadian Foreign Policy,

1943-47,Journal of Canadian Studies 37, 2 (2002): 78, 69.


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willing to absorb a great deal of rhetoric about divergences because it sees the Canadian

government as being able to go only so far in its disengagement.79

This also touches upon an important element of this SOD. On one hand, it offers a

distinctively Canadian commitment to middlepowermanship, in which dependence upon the

United States is lessened and multilateral policies with a defensive bent are advanced. There

might even be attempts at influencing or constraining some of the bellicosity in Americas

strategic behavior, in what has been termed the diplomacy of constraint.80

On the other hand, it

also entails a superficial or weak commitment to such idealist goals. True, Canada must

inculcate greater distance from the US in order to rebalance security and sovereignty, and

minimize any trade-off between them. However, a more radical departure would only further

disrupt these values and risk a more serious breach to the relationship. It would also violate a

core tenet of cybernetic theory minimal changes in policy responses that are only sufficient to

compensate for feedback variables and preserve the value(s). Instead, defensive weak-

multilateralism pursues a more modest approach, in which any distancing from the United States

is largely rhetorical and the pretence of independence is balanced by continued, less visible

forms of cooperation a two-track approach that may be contradictory and ambiguous but has

also proven remarkably resilient and even successful.81

The modest changes within and between these two SODs provides much of the scope to

Canadas goldilocks grand strategy and accounts for the continuity and consistency evident in its

79

Roger Swanson, Deterrence, Dtente, and Canada?Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science 32, 2(1976): 11180 See Denis Stairs, The Diplomacy of Constraint: Canada, the Korean War, and the United States (Toronto:

University of Toronto Press, 1974) and Ross,In the Interests of Peace. However, as later noted by Ross, this

diplomacy has admittedly yielded no visible record of success in either Korea or Vietnam. See his Canadas

international security strategy: Beyond reason but not hope?International Journal65, 2 (2010): 351 (emphasis in

original).81 The two-track approach refers to how Canada sought to balance support for American nuclear strategy with

simultaneous advocacy for arms control and strategic stability. See Philippe Lagass, Canada, strategic

defence and strategic stability: A retrospective and look ahead,International Journal63, 4 (2008): 917-937.


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strategic behavior. To be sure, a state may face a significant environmental threat to this value.

For example, in the event of another catastrophic terrorist attack on the United States, Canada

may be forced to make more fundamental compromises in how it deals with American homeland

insecurity, including perhaps a more extreme and untested SOD,. As Steinbruner acknowledges,

a cybernetic decision maker might well take strong, aggressive, radical action under certain

kinds of environmental provocation.82

However, even after 9/11, it remains to be seen whether

Canadas has fundamentally departed from its balanced strategic approach towards the United

States the absence of dramatic policy changes in the last decade hints that the answer is

negative.

Conclusion

The purpose of this article has been to offer a more refined account of Canadian strategic

culture. By combining strategic cultural analysis with cybernetic theory, it is better able to rectify

some of the theoretical and methodological shortcomings of cultural analysis, while keeping the

broad conceptual content many proponents of strategic culture have sought to retain. It is this

cybernetic process, by which certain SODs are selected and others are not, that provides a direct

counter to Alastair Iain Johnstons criticism that a holistic definition of strategic culture cannot

explain why particular tendencies or modes of strategic behavior are prominent in particular

times.83

Importantly, it does so without the overly strict methodological and conceptual

limitations recommended by Johnston, which few scholars have been willing to embrace in their

own research.

82 Steinbruner, The Cybernetic Theory of Decision, 65.83 See Johnston, Cultural Realism, 13.


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The cultural-cybernetic model outlined here provides a potentially novel explanation to

make sense of Canadas goldilocks approach to grand strategy. More extreme strategic-

doctrinal shifts towards proximity or distance are largely avoided, while modest SODs that tend

to balance such competing inclinations are selected according to a consistent cybernetic pattern

and result in policy choices marked by greater continuity than discontinuity. As such, there is

reason to believe that elements of both subcultures Continentalism and Independence are at

play in the Canadian context and guide strategic choices in this country. But these subcultures

also include a wide array differing inclinations, not all of which are readily apparent in the

countrys behavior. Indeed, when plotted along a Continental-Independence continuum, it

becomes clear only those tendencies in the narrow goldilocks zone coalescing in the form of

the two dominant SODs are realized in Canadas grand strategy.

This article has largely been focused on re-conceptualizing strategic culture and

explicating a cultural-cybernetic model. It has given some thought on the role that cultural and

cybernetic factors might have in underpinning Canadian strategic behavior, but it has largely

eschewed a direct test of this explanation on the Canadian case if only for reasons of space.

Clearly, these factors might carry explanatory potential in understanding not only the ebb and

flow of Canadas grand strategy, but that of other countries as well. But further research needs to

be done to confirm the utility of this explanation. On one hand, to provide further evidentiary

support for the cultural-cybernetic model, we need to fully probe the cultural and cybernetic

determinants of Canadas grand strategy. Ideally, it would not only include cases of Canadas

strategic behavior, but also a structured comparison with other possible explanations, such as

Patrick Lennoxs structural specialization theory.84

On the other hand, it is equally logical to

expand the theoretical inquiry to include not only smaller powers like Canada but also great

84 Lennox,At Home and Abroad.


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powers. By expanding the case selection, the cultural-cybernetic explanation can be tested

against states that come close to being crucial cases, in so far as it is amongst these great powers

that one normally expects to see strategic cultural inclinations and grand strategy.