If You're Not at the Table, You're on the Menu
Mark Carney's speech at Davos reminded me of lessons from my grade seven classroom about what makes Canada strong.
Yesterday, Mark Carney stood at a podium in Davos and said something that should be written on the front of every classroom: "Middle powers must act together, because if you are not at the table, you are on the menu."
He spoke about Arctic sovereignty, standing firmly with Greenland and Denmark, supporting their right to determine their own future. "The rules-based order is fading," he said.
This isn't about right wing or left wing anymore. Liberal or conservative values. The statute of limitations on party identity seems to have expired. This is a new global Cold War, possibly the early rumblings of something harder to name, and a dangerous time for everyone.
A middle power. It's worth sitting with that term for a moment. The world isn't divided neatly into superpowers and everyone else. Middle powers are nations with real influence, real capacity, real weight in the world, just not the overwhelming military or economic dominance of the biggest players. Canada, Australia, Germany, Japan, South Korea, the Nordic countries. Nations that build coalitions, broker agreements, and often provide the steady hands when the giants are swinging at each other.
Canada isn't a pawn. We're not a has-been British colony clinging to past glory, and we're certainly not weak. We've enjoyed a peaceful relationship with a strong neighbour, and that relationship has worked both ways. American security has benefited from a stable, prosperous, friendly northern border for generations. But our capacity for toughness has been proven again and again. Vimy Ridge. Juno Beach. Korea. The decades of peacekeeping missions that helped define what middle power leadership could look like. We've never had to be loud about it, but the record is there.
I keep thinking about my grade seven teacher. He taught us about Canada's cultural mosaic, how we were geographically and culturally diverse, and how that diversity made us stronger. Not a melting pot where differences dissolve, but a mosaic where distinct pieces create something precisely because they remain distinct.
That same attitude needs to be applied globally now. The new American manifest destiny outlook stands in opposition to this, and that puts us on the hunt for new allies, new trade relationships.
I miss the America I grew up with as a neighbour.
Middle powers must act together. Carney is setting the table, inviting like-minded nations to sit across from us and beside us.
I'm proud to be Canadian.