Competing Perspectives on Canadian Development Assistance Policies
| Date | 01 June 1996 |
| Published date | 01 June 1996 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070209605100203 |
| Author | Cranford Pratt |
| Subject Matter | Article |
CRANFORD
PRATT
Competing
perspectives
on
Canadian
development
assistance
policies
The
winter
1983-4 issue
of
Internationalfournal
contained
eight
articles
on
the domestic
sources
of
Canada's
foreign
policy.
Two,
the
lead
article
by
Kim
Richard
Nossal
and
an
article
of
mine,
along
with
the
publication
a
few
months
earlier
of
a
major
vol-
ume
on
Canadian foreign
policy
by
David
Dewitt
and
John
Kirton,
initiated
a
sustained
scholarly
discussion
of
the
deter-
minants of
Canadian foreign
policy.'
A
significant
portion
of the
discussion
quickly
focussed
on
the
determinants
of
policies deal-
ing
with
the
world's
less-developed
countries,
and
especially
with
Canadian
development
assistance
policies.
Narrowing
the
focus
of
discourse
was
perhaps
wise:
as
Mau-
reen
Appel
Molot
noted:
'there
are
limits
to
the
intellectual
progress
that
can
emanate
from
grand
theory.'"
The
benefits
in
relevance
and
precision
that
this
sharper
focus
brought
to
the
discussions
doubtless outweighed anything
that
might
have
been
lost
in
comprehensiveness
of
coverage.
In
any
case,
since
Emeritus
Professor
of
Political
Science,
University
of
Toronto, and
editor
of
Canadian
hIternational
Development
Assistance
Policies:
An.
Appraisal,
McGill-
Queen's
University Press, 1994
and
1996.
I
Kim
Richard
Nossal,
'Analyzing
the
domestic
sources
of
Canadian
foreign
policy'
International
Journal
39(winter
1983-4),
l-22:
Cranford Pratt,
'Domi-
nant
class
theory and
Canadian
foreign
policy:
the
case
of
the
counter-
consensus,'
ibid, 99-135:
and
David
B.
Dewitt
and
John
J.
Kirton,
Canada
as
a
Principal
Power
(Toronto:
John
Wiley
1983).
2
Maureen
Appel
Molot, 'Where
do
we,
should
we,
or
can
we sit? A
review
of
Canadian
foreign
policy
literature,' International
Journal
of
Canadian
Studies,
nos
-.
2(spring-fall
199o),
86.
InternationalJouIrnal
LI
SPRING
1996
236
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
that
issue
of
the
Journal,
a
rather
sizeable
body
of
literature
has
appeared
on
the
determinants
of
Canadian
policies
towards
the
less
developed countries.
In
this
sustained
Canadian
discussion,
much attention
has
been
given
in
particular
to
statist
and
dominant
class
ap-
proaches.
Nossal
and
Kirton
and
Dewitt
have
frequently
been
identified
as
the major
exponents
of
two
variations
of
the
first
approach
while
Linda Freeman
and
I
have
served
to
illustrate
neo-marxist
and
non-marxist
exponents
respectively
of
the
second.
Freeman's
contribution
to
this
academic
discussion
was
sub-
stantial
in
the
early
years.
Indeed
her
most
sustained
theoretical
writing,
an
influential
but
unpublished paper,
was
the
first major
development
of
a
neo-marxist
or
dominant
class
approach
to
the
study
of
Canadian
policies
towards
the
Third
World.3
Two
articles
followed
which
applied
her
theoretical
perspective
and
demonstrated
its
power.
4
She
drew
clearly
on
structural
marxism
and
offered
a
perspective
which
at
the
time
I
thought
was
too
uncompromisingly
monistic.
She
no
doubt
thought
that
my
writ-
ings
lacked
rigour
and,
if
so,
perhaps
we
were
both
right.
How-
ever,
in
her
two
published
articles,
she
was
able
to
strike
a
balance
within
her
approach
between
the
importance
of
dom-
inant
class
interests
and
the
pursuit
by
the
state
of
autonomously
defined
interests
that
was
not
dissimilar
to
the
balance
which
I
was
seeking.
Unfortunately, Freeman
did
not
contribute further
to this
particular
academic
debate.
However,
her
forthcoming
major
volume
on Canadian
policies
towards
southern
Africa
is
3
Linda
Freeman
'The
political
economy
of
Canada's
foreign
aid
programme,'
paper
presented
to
the
annual
meetings,
Canadian
Political
Science
Asso-
ciation,
Montreal,
198o.
Robert
Carty
and
Virginia
Smith's
Perpetuating
Poverty:
The
Political
Economy
of
Canadian
Foreign
Aid
(Toronto:
Between
the
Lines
198
t)
was
an
effective
and
able
application
of
a
broadly
marxist
analysis
but
did
not
develop
its
theoretical
perspective.
4
Linda
Freeman
'CIDA,
wheat
and
rural
development
in
Tanzania,'
Canadian
Journal
of
Afiican
Studies
16(no
3,
1982)
479-504:
and 'The
effect
of
the
world
crisis
on
Canada's
involvement
with
Africa,'
Studies
in
Political
Economny
17(summer
1985),
107-39.
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