Notes for a Presentation by
V. Peter Harder
Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs
7^th Annual Diplomatic Forum
30 September, 2004

Regina, Saskatchewan

Radisson Plaza Hotel, Regency Ballroom, Convention Level

Globalization and the Modern MFA:
Implications for Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada

I'm very pleased to be taking part in the Diplomatic Forum again this year. I think it's very important for all of us to have the opportunity to convene outside Ottawa and, each year, experience a different part of this country. I would like to thank Robert and all for organizing the Forum again this year, and for the kind invitation.

Some of the more cynical observers of Canada's role in the world will tell you that Saskatchewan's landscape is the perfect metaphor for Canadian foreign policy: vast, flat, and breezy .... with plenty of silos. But those are the cynics. And they'd be wrong.

I prefer to think of Regina as the perfect setting because we meet at a time when Jennifer Welsh, who hails from this city, is receiving high acclaim for her new book, At Home in the World: Canada's Global Vision for the 21^st Century. She writes in her introduction about her early international travel experiences, tramping around Europe, and sending postcards home to her family, here in Saskatchewan.

At the time, I am sure, the Grand Bazaar in Turkey and the pyramids at Giza must have seemed a long way from Regina. But as it turned out, they weren't -- not really. Saskatchewan is in many ways as global as those grand stops on the sightseeing tours; and becoming more so, year by year, as globalization ties us closer together. This is perhaps Dr. Welsh's most important point: that Canada and Canadians are already very much "at home in the world," and that officials in Ottawa's foreign policy circles must catch up to that reality..She writes that Canadian sovereignty "is not a symbol or a badge that we wear. It is something that must be exercised every day by those who project Canada's values and pursue Canada's interests in the wider world."

Just who are these people? These people who "project" and "pursue"? In the last century -- Canada's century, according to Wilfrid Laurier - it was our diplomats who took on these tasks with vigour, and produced results. They were innovators, problem-solvers, honest brokers.

They still are. The Department of Foreign Affairs and its career professionals boast an impressive record of recent achievements: international leadership for a global ban on anti-personnel landmines; the creation of the International Criminal Court; an instrumental role in adapting NATO for the post-Cold war era; working within the G8 to forge new partnerships for Africa's development, and to guard against the spread of weapons and materials of mass destruction.

But we all recognize that diplomacy is no longer the exclusive domain of foreign ministries or even governments. International relations today are played out on multiple levels and conducted by a variety of actors - multinational institutions, cities, media, business, civil society networks, and individuals.

Thankfully, the new diplomacy has not made diplomats obsolete -- but it has made their jobs more difficult, more demanding, and filled their daily appointment calendars with names of new and important interlocutors, from all walks of life.

With this multiplicity of actors, the nature of international influence has become more complex. As have the issues. Diplomats are obliged to deal with an array of subjects that rely on an appreciation for, and understanding of, what was once the domain of highly-specialized experts. You can list the topics as easily as I can: climate change, GMOs, bio-diversity, cyber-crime, infectious disease, innovation, education ... the list goes on.

So the role of Foreign Ministries around the world is changing, precisely because the context in which they operate has shifted so profoundly. Globalization -- now the defining phenomenon of the international system -- has brought to the fore this myriad of actors and horizontal issues, for which the classic MFA model, and traditional modes of a diplomacy, are no longer sufficient.

With Globalization comes risk to manage but opportunities to exploit. With that comes difficult choices that government has to make and resources are limited. All this must force different ways of sharing with partners if we expect to maximize our influence for better in the world. In Canada we have a Cabinet Committee on Global Affairs. A new committee to pull together coherent approaches.

As this 21^st century unfolds, I am under no illusion: in order for Canada to continue to maintain the kind of international influence we have traditionally held, to pursue our interests effectively, and to serve Canadians appropriately, the Department that was once the sole guardian of these functions, must adapt.

The ongoing International Policy Review will set out a new vision for Canada, framed by a number of strategic choices. These choices will help determine how we will work to build a more secure world, expand economic opportunity, democratization, and social development, while at the same time working with others to protect the global commons. Naturally, these strategic choices will have implications for the priorities of, and the allocation of resources within, the Department of Foreign Affairs - both in Canada and abroad.

We are thinking through the operations of the Department. I want the Department optimized to deliver on the outcomes and recommendations of the Review. And I want to ensure that whole-of-government coherence is at the centre of our mandate -- aligning our core activities as a Foreign Ministry with the important, legitimate and expanding international roles of other government departments.

I do want to give you a general sense of the directions we are moving in, and the basic precepts that guide my thinking about how the Department must change.

First, I am convinced that Canada's 21^st century diplomacy must deal in the currency of ideas.

You will no doubt have seen the series of articles in the latest issue of Foreign Policy titled "The World's Most Dangerous Ideas." Among them, religious intolerance, anti-Americanism, and the concept of a "war on evil." All inherently dangerous, perhaps; but particularly dangerous in the era of globalization, because they can be so easily disseminated, and ascribed to with about as much reflection and contemplation as it takes to click a mouse. We need to counterbalance these with bold and catalytic ideas -- carefully devised, well scrutinized and broadly consulted within the international community -- but bold nonetheless.

Historically, Canada has been the generator of some ground-breaking notions: Peacekeeping. The Landmines Ban. The Responsibility to Protect. This is because at the heart of our foreign service, and of any good foreign service, are knowledgeable, experienced officers with the capacity for big picture thinking. They are central to generating and promoting ideas that bring about change.

Today, however, I find that too many officers have their scarce time diverted to the management of "plumbing and tour guiding" (day-to-day crises and operational demands). This is itself partly a manifestation of the pressures brought down on all MFAs by the faster pace of globalization. So I will not say that I want the Department to become some kind of think-tank -- there will always be important operational demands, and we must be geared for response. And I will not say that I want the Department to have a greater policy capacity - because the capacity is largely already there. But I do want to see policy development grounded in solid analyses and data and geared to development of appropriate strategic options for action. This must be a priority through F.A.C.

I also want to see the Department become more agile. I want to ensure that processes and structures are in place to get the right people, doing the right job, at the right time. This is key to crisis management. For a particular crisis, where Canadian interests are at stake, this may result in us moving outside the traditional branch, bureau and divisional structures.

It may mean more frequent use of task forces, and ad hoc teams drawn from throughout the Department - and sometimes from outside the department - to deal with priority issues. But it also means we have to open the foreign ministry up so that we migrate our talent to other departments and refresh our own regularly.

Next, I am guided by the notion that - as important as ideas are, they are really nothing without influence. The ability to influence on the basis of your ideas and your interests is the very essence of effective diplomacy, and it depends on skill, knowledge, and the ability to access networks which are today greater in number and diversity than ever before. And on certain issues, one has to be skilled at building new networks, which was Canadian experience in the late 1990s on landmines, where we forged a new kind of partnership with civil society.

To tap into these networks, and to build them, you need an international platform. And here is an area where the Department has great existing strengths:

• 170 missions in 112 countries, including 8 multilateral posts
• 2,186 properties abroad which support not only our own Department's activities, but also key resources and programs run by other government departments, including Citizenship and Immigration, Agriculture, CIDA, National Defence, and Public Safety, EDC.
• Indeed, we are a minority tenant in our missions abroad;
• and we have skilled people who, over the course of their careers, have established and worked to maintain relationships with influence brokers around the world.

These are impressive assets, but we can take steps to maximize our access to the variety of international networks that our platform affords. First, we need to put a higher proportion of our people into the field. We are the most headquarters-heavy foreign ministry in the G8, with roughly 75% of our officers serving in Ottawa, and 25% at post. I want to see that ratio balanced-out over the next few years.

I also want renewed emphasis on third language training for our officers, especially in difficult languages. Language is still, after all, the foundation for cross-cultural understanding and for influence.

But, to repeat, diplomats are no longer the only ones who exert a nation's international influence. Canada's new diplomacy must include an emphasis on public diplomacy, and the creation of new partnerships with Canadians, who themselves are internationally active and are a global expression of this country. As a Department, we need to ensure that high service standards -- passport, consular, arts and innovation promotion -- remain a focus in order to support Canadians in their international endeavours, which are expanding.

For partnerships, we will be looking more to universities, the business community, provinces and cities for access to the unique input and insights that come with their daily participation in international networks.

In Ottawa, and at our missions abroad, Foreign Affairs has an important role in shaping coherence across, and between, the Government's international and domestic agendas. With so many "domestic" government departments now home to international secretariats that look after the international side of their mandates -- Fisheries and Oceans, Health Canada, Agriculture, Transport, Finance, Environment, not to speak of Cabinet offices, and others -- the job of ensuring whole-of-government coherence in international affairs is a growing challenge.

The solution, in my view, is to make sure the Foreign Ministry has, in residence, sufficient levels of expertise in these areas. This is not about duplicating issue-expertise found elsewhere in Government. But it does mean creating within Foreign Affairs what I call "docking mechanisms" -- clearly identified interlocutors at the Pearson Building, who -- although not health, or oceans, or finance experts -- posses good and credible measures of knowledge about those issues, so they can at least interact on common ground with their counterparts from expert departments, and truly understand the issues at stake.

Their service to the other departments - to whole-of-government - is their ability to fuse outside subject expertise with a Foreign Ministry's appreciation for the wider international context, for linkages between global issues, and with our ability to exert influence on those issues internationally, when called upon.

These kinds of changes are necessary now because they are responses to global changes. But in addition to that imperative, we are faced with the more immediate implications stemming from the departure of the trade elements from Foreign Affairs, and the creation of International Trade Canada. The most important message I have on this matter is that our highest priority is to ensure continued operational cohesion between the two departments, especially at missions abroad.

At every post, trade strategies and services must continue to inform our overall relations, and vice versa.

But Trade's departure does leave us deficient, as a Foreign Ministry, in one important respect: our capacity for economic analysis. Our international economic policy capacity must be replenished. The economic aspects of international affairs, and of globalization, are so all-encompassing that it is a virtual imperative, for any Foreign Ministry of a country as deeply embedded in the global economy as Canada, to have substantial competencies in the economic sphere.

To sum up, our needs as a Foreign Ministry respond to the main features of globalization:

• a multiplicity of actors;
• horizontal issues;
• the new complexities of influence; and
• the global citizenship of Canadians.

The main requirements are:

• elevated policy capacity to generate catalytic ideas for the world at-large;
• institutional agility to respond to the constant of change;
• a platform geared for access to diverse networks of influence;
• a commitment to public diplomacy;
• docking mechanisms to help cultivate whole-of-government coherence; and
• replenished capacity for economic policy.

In my view, these are the kinds of adjustments the Department will need to make as we move forward with the International Policy Review and beyond.

These are the new instruments and practices that will gear the Department for globalization, and allow the Government to continue projecting Canada's values and promoting Canada's interests on the world stage.

Thank you.