Lloyd Axworthy's Legacy
| DOI | 10.1177/002070200105600101 |
| Published date | 01 March 2001 |
| Date | 01 March 2001 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
JOE
JOCKEL
&
JOEL
SOKOLSKY
Lloyd
Axworthy's
Legacy
Human
security
and
the
rescue
of
Canadian
defence
policy
THE
POST-COLD
WAR
DEBATES
over
whether
and
how
Canada should
be
involved
in
overseas
conflicts
are
coming
to
a
close.
Canada
will
both
fight
and
keep
the
peace,
due
in
large
part
to Lloyd
Axworthy,
who
stepped
down after
four
years
as
minister
of
foreign
affairs
to
take
a
position
at
the University
of
British
Columbia.
Henceforth,
when
the
Canadian
Forces
go
abroad,
they
will
do
so,
as
they
did
in
Kosovo,
explicitly
or
implicitly
in support
of
'human
security.'
Axworthy,
the
author
of
the
Canadian human
security
agenda,
has
thus
won
an
important
political
victory and
a
long-lasting
ministerial
legacy
extending beyond
the
Department
of
Foreign
Affairs
to
its
sometime
arch-rival,
the
Department
of
National
Defence.
For
with
his
human
security
concept
he has
paved
the
way
for
nothing
short
of
rescuing
Canadian
defence policy
from
military
irrelevance
and
strategic
sterility.
Although
Axworthy
placed
human
security
at
the
heart
of
Canadian
foreign
policy,
he
did not
coin
the term.
It
came
into
inter-
national
parlance
largely
as
a
result
of
a
1994
report
by
the
United
Nations Development
Programme.
Axworthy's
own approach
to
the
concept
has
been
broad.
As
the
Department
of
Foreign
Affairs
put
it
in
a
1999
'concept
paper'
issued
with
his
imprimatur:
'In
essence,
human
security
means
safety
for
people from
both
violent
and
non-violent
threats.
It
is
a
condition
or
state
of
being
characterized
by
freedom
from
pervasive
threats
to
people's rights,
their
safety,
or
even
their
lives.
Joseph
Jockel
is
Professor
and
Director
of
the
Canadian
Studies
Program,
St
Lawrence
University
Canton,
New
York.
Joel
Sokolsky
is
a
Professor
andActing
Dean
ofArts,
Royal
Military
College
of
Canada.
The
views are
those
of
the
authors
alone.
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Winter
2000-2001
Joe
Jockel
&
Joel
Sokoisky
From
a
foreign
policy
perspective,
human
security
is
perhaps
best
understood
as
a
shift
in
perspective
or
orientation.
It
is
an
alternative
way
of
seeing
the
world,
taking
people
as
its
point
of
reference,
rather
than
focusing
on
the
security
of
territory or
governments.
Like
other
security concepts
-
national
security,
economic
security,
food
security
-
it
is
about
protection.
Human
security entails
taking
preventive
mea-
sures
to
reduce
vulnerability
and
minimize
risk
and
taking
remedial
action
where
prevention
fails."
THE
END
OF
THE
NATIONAL INTEREST
The
human
security
concept
will
endure
as
the
justification
for
Canadian
military intervention
overseas,
especially
because
it
has
opened
the
door
to
abandoning
the
Canadian
national
interest
as
the
touchstone
for
decision-making.
As
foreign
minister,
Axworthy
never
quite
gave
up on
the
national interest
when he talked
about
the
role
of
the
Canadian
military
in
human
security. For
example,
in
justifying
Canadian
participation
in
the
Kosovo
War,
he
took
recourse
to the
old
and
creaky
argument
that
the Canadian
national
interest can
be
found
just about
anywhere in
the
world:
'in
an
increasingly
interconnected
world,
where
we
are
travelers,
exporters
and
importers,
investors and
donors,
we
cannot
afford
to ignore
the
problems
of
others
-
even
if
we
wanted
to.'
2
Therefore,
he
went
on,
the
pursuit
of
human
security
over-
seas, as
in Kosovo,
serves
Canadian
interests.
This
approach
is
neither
convincing
nor
necessary
to
justify
human
security
interventions.
Take
Kosovo. Few
Canadians
travel
there,
export
to
or
from
there,
or
invest
money
there.
The
same
can
be
said
of
virtually
all
the
other
places
where
the
Canadian
Forces
recently have
been
deployed
on
peacekeeping
or
peace
enforcement missions.
Where
is
the
Canadian
national interest
in
East
Timor
or,
for
that
matter,
on
the Ethiopian-Eritrean
frontier
where
Canada
recently
dispatched
a
very small
peacekeeping
contingent
to
join
the
United
Nations
effort?
During
the
cold
war,
the
dispatch
of
Canadian
troops on
peace-
keeping
missions
to
distant
places
outside
the
area
of
the
North
Atlantic
Treaty
Organization
(NATO)
was
much
more
clearly
in
the
national
interest. Had
a
nuclear
war
ever
occurred,
the
effects
on
i
Canada,
Department
of
Foreign
Affairs
and
International
Trade,
Human
Security:
Safety
for
People
in
a
Changing
World
(Ottawa:
DFAJT,
April
1999),
5.
2
Canada,
Department
of
Foreign
Affairs
and
International
Trade,
Statement
99/28,
'Notes
for
an
address
by
the
Hon.
Lloyd
Axworthy
...
"Kosovo
and
the
Human
Security
Agenda,'"
Princeton,
New Jersey,
April
1999.
2
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Winter
2000-2001
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