A realist foreign policy for Canada in the Middle East1
| Author | Thomas Juneau |
| Published date | 01 September 2017 |
| Date | 01 September 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0020702017725045 |
| Subject Matter | Policy Briefs |
Policy Brief
A realist foreign policy
for Canada in the
Middle East
1
Thomas Juneau
Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of
Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
Abstract
Canada’s policies in the Middle East receive large amounts of media attention, but there
is surprisingly little scholarly work about them. Of the few studies on the topic, more-
over, most focus on analyzing past or current policies. This is certainly useful, but there
is virtually no academic work focused on prescription. There is, as such, a need for
theoretically informed studies laying out the rationale for a sound Canadian policy
framework for the region. In this context, this paper proposes to look at Canada’s
Middle East policies from a realist perspective. What are Canada’s interests? How
should these translate into policy? The goal here is not to make specific prescriptions
regarding each conflict or bilateral relation, but rather to propose a comprehensive
framework to guide Ottawa’s broad approach to the Middle East.
Keywords
Canada, foreign policy, defence policy, Middle East, realism, interests
Canada’s policies in the Middle East are understudied compared with those in
other regions. A simple survey of the two main journals in the field,
International Journal (IJ) and Canadian Foreign Policy Journal (CFP), shows
that there have been fewer articles on the topic than on other regions, such as
Europe, the Americas, or Asia, since 2000.
2
Other regions are of course important
International Journal
2017, Vol. 72(3) 401–412
!The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0020702017725045
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1. The Middle East is defined here as the 22 states of the Arab League, Iran, Israel, and Turkey.
Corresponding author:
Thomas Juneau, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Ottawa, 120 Universite
´,
office 6082, Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5, Canada.
Email: tjuneau@uottawa.ca
2. On Europe, see for example the special issue of IJ (66, no. 1, March 2011); on the Americas, the
special issue of CFP (14, no. 3, December 2008); on Asia, the special issue of IJ (66, no. 2, June
2011) and CFP (18, no. 3, December 2012). Conversely, there are no special issues on Canada’s
policies in the Middle East.
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