The Institute's ‘Popular Arm’: The League of Nations Society in Canada
| Published date | 01 March 1978 |
| Author | Donald Page |
| Date | 01 March 1978 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070207803300103 |
| Subject Matter | Opinion and Policy |
DONALD
PAGE
The
Institute's
'popular
arm':
the
League
of
Nations
Society
in
Canada
Adherence
to
democratic
principles
ensures
that
the
making
of
foreign
policy like
other
policies
cannot
be
the
prerogative
solely
of
elected
officials
and
their
bureaucracies.
Without
being
very
specific,
successive
Canadian
secretaries of
state
for
external
affairs
have
publicly
acknowledged
that
'the
public
has
an
integral
part
to
play."
Whether
such
obeisance
to
the
public's
role
has
been
made
because
it
was
a
sacrosanct
component
of
democratic
theory
or
because
it
was
actually
playing
a
significant
and
therefore
de-
monstrable
part
in the
formulation
and direction
of
Canadian
foreign
policy
has yet
to
be
determined.
Regardless
of
the extent
to
which
foreign
policy
is
actually
influenced
by
public
opinion,
it
is
widely
believed
to
do
so
by
governments
who
expend substan-
tial
resources
on
building
acceptance
for
the
broad
perimeters
within
which
decisions
and
actions
can
take
place.
A
climate
of
ill-informed apathy might
make
the
job
of
decision-makers
and
diplomats
easier,
but
in
the
age
of
mass
communication
no
politi-
cian
can
expect
that
climate
to
prevail
for
long
even
if
the
public
in general,
and attentive
publics
in
particular,
appear
sceptical
about
their
capacity actually
to
influence
or
to
alter
the
govern-
ment's
perception
of
the
national interest
upon
which
foreign-
policy
objectives
and
actions are
founded.
Therefore,
means
of
Deputy
Director,
Historical
Division,
Department
of
External
Affairs.
The
author
would
like to
acknowledge
the
assistance
provided
by
NA.M.
Mackenzie,
R.B.
Inch,
E.
MacCallum,
D.
Herperger, and
the
late
C.
Sifton
in
the
preparation
of
this
article. The
views
expressed
in
this
article
do
not
neces-
sarily
represent
those
of
the
Department
of
External
Affairs.
i
Paul Martin,
'The
Public
and
Canadian
Foreign
Policy,'
Department
of
Ex-
ternal
Affairs,
Statements
and
Speeches 67/41.
THE
LEAGUE
OF
NATIONS
SOCIETY
IN
CANADA
29
directing
or
responding
to
attentive
publics must
be
found
and
used if
only
to
maintain
political
credibility.
Inasmuch
as
foreign-policy
objectives are
not
shaped
exclusive-
ly
by
the
pressures
and
constraints
of domestic
requirements
or
external or
organizational
environments,
highly
articulate
and
active
groups
that
collectively
form
the
attentive
public
can
ex-
pect
to
exert
some
influence
on
these
objectives.
2
Their
interests
are most
often
recognized
when
these
are
seen
as
legitimate,
in-
formed,
and
clearly
defined
demands
which
can be
functionally
managed
without
posing
an
unacceptable
threat
to
what
the
deci-
sion-makers
may
regard
as
policy
areas
within
their
exclusive
field
of
expertise
and
discretionary
authority.
When
this
happens
the
attentive
public
organized
into
pressure
or
interest
groups
can
find
self-fulfilment while
performing
useful
functions
in
the
eyes
of
the
decision-makers
or
those whom
the
public
holds
responsi-
ble for
policy
formulation
and
implementation.
Most
important
among
the
functions
of
an
interest
group
are
the group's
capacity
to
act
as a
source
of
new
ideas,
as
an
opinion-maker
for
other
at-
tentive
groups and
perhaps
the
general
public
as
well,
and
as
a
litmus
guide
for
the
government
in
gauging
general
public
accept-
ance
for
its
policies
and
opportunities
for
change.
The
interface
between several
Canadian
governments
and
one
group
of
the
attentive
public,
the
League of
Nations
Society
in
Canada,
is
the
subject
of
this
article.
Thus
far
in Canadian
his-
tory, no
such
group
has
survived
so
long,
has
drawn
so
many
mem-
bers
from
the
population
at
large,
or
has
sought
so
consistently
to
influence
the
direction
of
Canadian
public
thinking
and
govern-
ment
policy
on
foreign-policy
issues.
Furthermore,
the
League
of
Nations
Society
was
the
first
major
attempt
to
create
out
of
a
mass
audience
an
attentive group
with
definite
foreign-policy
interests
and
objectives
that
could be
pressed
on
the
government.
With
the
end
of
the
First
World
War,
most
Canadians found
2
See
Denis Stairs,
'Publics
and
Policy-Makers:
The
Domestic
Environment
of
Canada's
Foreign
Policy
Community,'
International
Journal,
xxvi
(winter
1970-
1),
222,
for
a
discussion
of
the
complex
interaction
among
these
three
environ-
mental
factors.
30
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
themselves
looking
inward
to
their
domestic
problems,
in
the
be-
lief
that
victory
had
liberated
them
from
the
threat
of
future
wars.
But
to
those who
read
the
pessimistic
predictions
or
demoralizing
press
accounts,
European
chaos
seemed
about
to
spread.
This
cloud
of distress
and
confusion
quickly dissipated
the
great
hope
for
a
new
era
engendered
by
the
armistice.
Yet
that
hope,
which had
sustained
Canadians
through
the
agonies
of
war,
was
not
complete-
ly
extinguished. Wilsonian
idealism
was
still
a
force
and
behind
all
the
outward
discouragement
lurked
an
inner
optimism
yearn-
ing
for
a
new
international
era
through
the
League
of
Nations.
'Of
all
the propositions
that
have
ever
been
placed
before
man-
kind,
none
more fully
exemplifies
the
graduation
of
man
from
the
mere
animal
plane
to
the mental and
spiritual
planes
than
this
proposed
peace
pact,'
exclaimed
the
editor
of
the
Halifax
Morning
Chronicle
early
in
1919i.
As
the
League
Covenant,
and the
extent
of
the opposition
to
Wilson's
views
in
Washington,
became
known,
disillusionment
deepened. On
the
very
day
when
the
draft
Covenant
was
made
public,
Prime Minister
Borden
told Canadian
soldiers
in
Paris
that
'the
machinery
itself
will
count
for
little
unless
the
con-
science
and
will
of
the
people
give
it
essential
vitality
and
strength
to
assert,
and
if
necessary
to enforce,
that
supreme
purpose.'
4 But
who
would
shape
that
conscience
and
that
will?
In
parliament
and
press
the
ideal
was
usually
buried
in
the debate
over
'Little
Canadianism,'
and
it
was
not
much
helped
by
the anti-British
tone
of
the
American
debate
on
the
Covenant and
its
challenge
to
Canada's new-found
international
status
through
membership
in
the
League.
During
and
immediately
after
the
war,
the
Prime
Minister
had
sought
to
persuade
Canadians
that
Anglo-American
co-operation
was
the
most
important
factor
in
preserving
peace
and
establishing
a
new
world
order.
That
wartime
dream
evapo-
rated
when
the
Americans used
the
Covenant
as
a
pretext
for
ter-
minating their
active
co-operation
with
Great
Britain
in
world
3
Morning
Chronicle
(Halifax),
17
February
1919.
4
As
reported
in
the
Gazette
(Montreal),
17
February
igig.
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