By David McNally
National myths die hard. And few Canadian myths are more entrenched than the notion of this country as a peacekeeper, free from the militarism and imperialism of the US. Yet this image is a wild fantasy that obscures some ugly truths. Take Canadian participation in the war on Iraq, for instance. While many in Canada believed that this country’s armed forces were not part of the war, the reality was different. Twenty-five military planners from Canada were active members of the US military’s central command (CENTCOM) in Qatar, the body that planned and oversaw the assault on Iraq. About 1300 military personnel on three Canadian warships provided protection for US aircraft carriers from which much of the air war was launched. Canada also had 31 troops inside Iraq working with US and British forces, including ten Canadian pilots who participated in the aerial bombing of Iraq. On top of all this, the Canadian government allowed US aircraft bound for the Persian Gulf to refuel and change crews in Newfoundland. So, however questionable his motives, when US ambassador Paul Cellucci claimed that Canada was offering more support to the war in Iraq than all but three or four nations, he was right. In addition to this direct military involvement, Canadian business is a major producer of equipment for the US war machine. Canadian firms export almost $3 billion worth of military hardware to the US every year. Canadian-built simulators, flight management systems, data networks and computer equipment guided US helicopters, stealth bombers, fighter jets, armoured vehicles and ships used in the attack on Iraq. Not surprisingly, Canada’s business elite came out loudly in favour of the war. This is not because the Canadian business class is a mere puppet of US capitalists, as some commentators suggest. On the contrary, the business class in Canada represents a powerful and well-organized section of international capitalism which profits from imperialist undertakings of its own.
CANADIAN IMPERIALISM
While Talisman Energy of Calgary is the Canadian company that has gained the most notoriety in recent years (for its ties to a government that tolerated slavery and used terror against civilians), it is far from an isolated case. Earlier this year, for instance, a UN panel charged that eight Canadian mining companies are violating international standards in their business activities in the Congo, where three million people have died in civil wars. These charges come on top of repeated claims that Canadian mining firms operating in Tanzania authorized mass killings of miners.
As these reports make clear, mining companies from Canada are exploiting cheap labour, working with corrupt governments, and turning a blind eye to (if not participating in) terror against civilians in parts of Africa—the very sorts of charges raised against the world’s most rapacious corporations. And these mining companies are far from the only Canadian-based firms exploiting abundant resources, oppressed workers and shady arrangements with governments in the Third World.
We should not be surprised that Third World critics are pointing fingers at Canadian companies since Canada is home to scores of multinational corporations in telecommunications, aluminum, forestry, energy, shoes, rubber, and more. In addition, Canadian-based banks operate extensively in global markets, not least in the Caribbean where they are often among the dominant foreign financial institutions. This is especially true of the Royal Bank of Canada whose roots in the West Indies go back to 1882.
Rather than a small, dependent economy, Canada is a component part of the capitalistically developed world and home to major-league banks and corporations. As the author of a major study of global firms in Canada put it, “Canadian multinationals are not third-rate imitators, but are often at or near the top of their respective industries.” And these corporations are as exploitative and imperialist as can be.
Some Canadian nationalists argue that businesses in this country are in danger of being completely absorbed by US capital, but the facts tell a different story. In fact, Canadian capitalists are also major players in the world of foreign investment and global takeovers. If anything, they have become more significant actors in the world economy.
Between 1994 and 2001, for example, 384 more US businesses were bought up by Canadian corporations than the number of Canadian businesses that US companies managed to purchase. Judged in dollar amounts, Canadian capitalists spent $46 billion more purchasing US businesses than did the latter buying firms in this country. As a result, Canadian corporations have strengthened their presence in the front ranks of global business. In the early 1990s, for instance, the foreign assets of Canadian companies were equal to 23 percent of this country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). By 2001, foreign holdings by Canadian businesses had rocketed to 54 percent of GDP. As a result, since 2000 Canadian capitalism has run a “dividend surplus”— meaning that dividend flows into Canada derived from foreign holdings exceed dividend income flowing out of Canada—to the tune of $3.5 billion.
THIRD WORLD OPPOSITION
It should come as no surprise, then, that Canadian-based corporations have often been targets of opposition in the Third World. Most recently, Talisman Energy has been the focus of a worldwide campaign which ultimately forced it to sell off its operations in Sudan. But Talisman is far from an isolated case. One of the most celebrated cases of Third World opposition to Canadian capital took place in Trinidad in 1970.
Events there began in 1968-69 when black students at Sir George Williams University in Montreal (now Concordia U) began protesting racism at the school. When administrators failed to address their demands, the students occupied the university’s computer center. Rather than negotiate, the administration called in riot police. Of the 97 arrested protesters, ten were students from Trinidad.
As Montreal trials against the protesters opened in early 1970, protests broke out in Trinidad directed at both the Canadian High Commission and the main branch of the Royal Bank of Canada. When the Montreal students were convicted, further demonstrations were organized. The 700-strong Trinidad Regiment mutinied rather than repress the movement.
Like protesters in Africa today, those who took to the streets of Trinidad in 1970 were pointing directly at the racism and imperialism upon which Canadian capitalism has been built. While much of this legacy involves the colonization of indigenous peoples and the conquest of the people of New France (later Québec), we should never forget the international imperialist operations of Canadian corporations.
ANTI-IMPERIALISM
In sum, Canadian capital is an important player within the structures of world capitalism. True, Canadian business is not in the same league as US corporate power (and the war machine on which it can rely). But no other nationally-based capitalist class matches the US’s at the moment. This does not prevent the ruling classes of France, Britain, Germany, Japan, Italy, Belgium and Canada from having their own distinct interests, which they pursue globally. All of these countries, including Canada, are home to major multinational corporations and banks that form a significant part of world imperialism and are complicit in the racism that sustains it.
So, when anti-war activists and others embrace anti-imperialism, they should not equate it simply with opposition to the American empire, crucial as that is. Consistent anti-imperialism means opposition to the exploitative practices of all multinational corporations and banks and the governments and armies that protect them. Where Canada is concerned, anti-imperialism begins at home.
David McNally is a member of the New Socialist Group.
http://www.newsocialist.org/magazine/41/article01.html
