Mutual Interests
| Published date | 01 March 1999 |
| Date | 01 March 1999 |
| Author | Allan Gotlieb |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070209905400112 |
| Subject Matter | The Readers' Column |
THE
READERS'
COLUMN
Mutual
interests
Allan
Gotlieb
IN
HIS
COMMENT
IN
YOUR
LAST
ISSUE
ON
MY
REVIEW
OF
HIS
BOOK,
Wrestling
with
the
Elephant:
the
Inside
Story
of
the
Canada-
U.S.
Trade
War,
Gordon
Ritchie
states
that
he
welcomes
the presentation
of
my
personal
account
of
the
final
days
of
the
negotiations.
I
am
glad
to have
brought
these activities to
his
attention,
thus
reinforcing,
as
he
very
generously
put
it,
his
assessment
of
my
'truly
indispensable'
contribu-
tion
to
the agreement. But
contrary
to
what
Ritchie
says,
I
was
never
'anxious to settle
at
a
much
earlier
period'
than the
others.
There
is
no
truth
whatsoever
in
this.
I
never
advocated,
favoured,
or
suggested
set-
tling
for
less
than
what
we
finally
achieved
in
the
agreement.
Ritchie
repeats
a
remark
in
his
book
that
the
'tension'
between
me
'the
fixer'
and
the
negotiators
served
a
purpose
as
my
'insistence
on
accommodating
the Americans
pushed
us
to
find
better
solutions.'
'Gotlieb,'
he
now
writes,
'did
his
job,
I
did
mine.'
I
never
saw
it
as
my
job
to
'accommodate'
the Americans,
nor
did
I
ever
advocate
'accommodating'
them.
I always
proposed
and
advocat-
ed
positions
that
were in
Canada's
own
national interest. Animosity
towards
the
Americans
(and,
as
Ritchie
puts
it,
'their odious
and
anti-
competitive
fair
trade
laws')
should
not
obscure
the
fact
that
it
was
just
possible,
from time
to
time,
that
their
position
on
a
particular
matter
may
have
corresponded
to
our
own
or
furthered
our
own
goals and
interests
as
well
as
theirs.
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Winter
1998-9
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