The
Challenge of Interdependence
Notes for
remarks by Hon. David Kilgour, Secretary
of State (Latin America & Africa), M.P.
Edmonton Southeast
To the Canadian Student Leadership Conference
Chateau Cartier, Aylmer, Québec,
January 25, 2001
It is a great
pleasure to be here speaking with leaders
of tomorrow. I’d like to thank the
organizers at Queen’s University for
allowing me to participate in this year’s
Canadian Student Leadership Conference.
Your theme this year – interdependence
– is one with major ramifications internationally.
As someone whose responsibilities daily
involve the international arena, I’m
delighted to add a some thoughts.
Currently
Canada is preparing to host the Third Summit
of the Americas in Québec City in
April. For Canada, this event culminates
a process that has taken place over the
past decade. Since 1990, we’ve moved
from relative isolation on hemispheric affairs
to becoming a leading participant.
Throughout
the Americas, free trade agreements are
blossoming and economies are becoming more
integrated. The eventual goal is a Free
Trade Area of the Americas that will unite
34 countries of the hemisphere into the
world’s largest trading bloc of 800
million people reaching from Alaska to Tierra
del Fuego.
Events are
moving very rapidly; it is an exciting time
to be a Secretary of State responsible for
Latin America and the Caribbean. Last year,
Canada began a consultation process aimed
at establishing a free trade agreement with
four countries of Central America –
in addition to Costa Rica, with which talks
are already underway. Last week I returned
from talks in Jamaica with the CARICOM countries.
There it was agreed by the heads of governments
to begin talks on free trade between Canada
and its Caribbean neighbours.
With today’s
active engagement of our hemispheric neighbours,
it is easy to forget that until 1990 Canada
remained outside the Organization of American
States – the OAS – the principle
club of nations of the Americas. A lot has
happened in just over a decade, and clearly
we are becoming much more interdependent
with our neighbours.
More than
trade
Interdependence,
however, is not just about increased trade.
With all the talk of globalization, we need
to constantly remind ourselves of this.
Just as a family is much more than an economic
arrangement, so too is our "gran familia,"
as the Prime Minister has referred to our
hemispheric family. We share not only in
commerce and prosperity, but also in the
challenges and difficulties faced by our
neighbours. Their conflicts, social tensions,
crime and natural disasters have become
our problems too.
Participants
at previous Summits of the Americas recognized
this, and social concerns and realizing
human potential will also figure largely
on the agenda at Québec. In addition
to fostering freer trade, earlier summits
also focussed on promoting and consolidating
democracy, protecting human rights and enhancing
human security and the rule of law generally.
The challenge of bringing together countries
ranging from small Caribbean island nations
to the U.S. superpower requires sensitivity
to enormous disparities. For this reason,
past summits in Miami and Santiago have
also looked at such other aspects as development
cooperation, reducing inequality, managing
migration issues, promoting education and
working together on telecommunications infrastructure.
Africa
The other
global region under my responsibility, Africa,
is also moving toward greater cooperation
and interdependence. Granted, the degree
of integration into the global economy is
much more modest in Africa. This continent
of 750 million inhabitants has only 14 million
phone lines – fewer than downtown Tokyo.
At a time when the developed world is more
and more interconnected through the Internet,
only 0.1% of Sub-Saharan Africans are currently
online. The international knowledge gap
is very real, and is a challenge that you
as the leaders of tomorrow will certainly
face.
Africa is,
however, moving forward, and some of its
countries are experiencing the fastest economic
growth in the world in percentage terms.
Botswana, for example, has an annual GNP
growth rate of 13% and its industrial sector
has for years been among the fastest growing
in the world. As well, the beginnings of
regional trade and economic groupings are
forming in West Africa, Southern Africa
and East Africa. The Southern African Development
Community, for example, represents a market
of 186 million people with a combined GNP
of US$ 178 billion. This region aims to
establish a free trade area by 2002.
Technology,
communications and economics all work to
make globalization and our increasing interconnection
with each other inevitable. Countries cannot
succeed in isolation today. A poor country
that closes its borders to investment is
likely to stay poor. Canada, more than most
countries, depends on exports – about
43 per cent of our gross domestic output
is now exports. Globally, more than $1.5
trillion is now exchanged on the world’s
currency markets every day. Nearly a fifth
of all goods and services produced are traded.
Economists
have talked about globalization for many
decades, though the term itself has been
popularized more recently. Many speak of
a borderless world, but that is far from
today’s reality where boundaries are
still very real. Even though financial capital
and international pop culture flow more
freely today, national identities remain
strong, and states still guard their jurisdictions.
Too often
globalization is thought of as synonymous
with unbridled capitalism where any entrepreneur
can raise money anywhere in the world, make
anything and sell it anywhere. But globalization
is also about the free flow of ideas, the
exchange of culture and values, and the
greater attention now being given to issues
such as human rights, environmental protection
and technological advances. New communications
technologies have brought people closer
than ever before.
Technology
You, as leaders
of tomorrow, will need to operate comfortably
in this new interconnected, interdependent
environment. I cannot emphasize enough the
importance of gaining international experience,
and learning other languages – especially
both Canadian official languages and Spanish
and Portuguese. Most of you are far more
comfortable with computer technology than
people of my generation. The knowledge economy
increasingly is dividing the world’s
haves from the have-nots.
As Dani Rodrik
of Harvard has pointed out, globalization
has introduced three sources of social tension:
1) It makes
the services of large segments of working
populations more easily substitutable across
boundaries,
2) Trade
can unleash forces that undermine norms
in national practices, for example when
child labour in Honduras replaces workers
in South Carolina, or cuts in pension benefits
in France are called for in response to
the requirements of the Maastricht treaty,
3) Globalization
and its competitive pressures make it more
difficult for governments to carry out the
important functions of providing the social
programs which since World War II helped
to maintain social cohesion and domestic
support for liberalization.
Rodrik concludes
that successful globalizers have had pro-active
governments, adequate social programs, and
have integrated into the world economy on
their own terms. This conflicts with conventional
wisdom that globalization requires small
government and reduced welfare states. He
argues that it is the overall quality of
a society’s domestic institutions rather
than labour costs or taxes that determines
where most investments go. This has obvious
implications for the ability of poor countries
to successfully enter the global economy.
Disparities
between the rich and poor of the world are
growing. This is a disturbing trend that
can’t be ignored and contributes to
instability. Problems that fester in one
part of the world can quickly become human
security problems for neighbours –
especially as we become more interdependent.
The concept
of "human security" is perhaps
the flip side of economic globalization.
This is the idea that threats to the well-being
of individual citizens increasingly know
no borders. No longer is the greatest menace
to our security the possibility of conflict
between states. Today, a host of other threats
affect civilians directly and involve non-state
actors: terrorism, international organized
crime, drug trafficking, money laundering,
small weapons proliferation, exploitation
of children, disease, famine and environmental
degradation – to name just a few.
Colombia
Colombia
is an excellent example of how the domestic
problems of one country can easily spill
over and affect neighbours. Some might call
it a poster child for Canada’s concept
of human security. Consider the following:
- One person
is killed every 20 minutes in Colombia,
and seven people are kidnapped every day.
-
Colombia is engaged in a civil war involving
the government, left-wing guerrilla groups
and right-wing paramilitaries; international
drug cartels fuel the conflict and help
to finance combatants.
-
Even aside from deaths related to the conflict,
Colombia’s homicide rate is among the
highest in the world – 72 violent deaths
a day at present. The city of
Barrancabermeja,
with a population of 300,000, had roughly
as many violent deaths last year as the
570 in all of Canada.
Colombia produces about 520 metric tons
of cocaine and eight tons of heroin annually.
It is by far the world’s leading cocaine
producer, and it is rapidly becoming the
leading source of heroin consumed in some
parts of North America; one drug cartel
alone was responsible for the deaths of
nearly 4,000 ordinary Colombians, cabinet
ministers, presidential candidates, police,
judges and others.
About 2 million people were displaced from
their homes due to the violence since 1985
– roughly a quarter million last year
alone.
Perhaps you’re asking at this point
what the conflict in Colombia has to do
with you and your leadership aspirations.
Why do I even mention it in a talk about
interdependence and globalization? The fact
is that Colombia’s problems are also
its neighbours’ problems and ultimately
yours. That is the reality of interdependence.
Canadian
streets
Colombia’s
drugs end up on Canadian streets. One report
conservatively estimated the cost of all
substance abuse in Canada at $18.45 billion
in 1992, of which $1.4 billion was illicit
drugs. How does one measure the impact of
drugs on families, individual lives or on
the workplace? What about the international
criminal organizations fostered by the drug
trade? What are the policing costs, and
the cost of petty and serious crime committed
by drug addicts to support their habits?
Colombia’s
war has affected its immediate neighbours
even more severely. Paramilitaries and guerrillas
have made incursions into Panama and Venezuela.
Refugees steadily trickle into Ecuador.
Amazon rainforests are destroyed for coca
production, and further environmental damage
is done by aerial spraying against the illicit
crops. Money laundering and transhipment of drugs has spread corruption and challenged
law enforcement agencies throughout Central
America, Mexico and the Caribbean.
Canada’s
decision was the right one to become more
actively engaged with its neighbours in
the Americas. Some go so far as to say we
have ended the chapter of our history in
which we were tied to Europe as an Atlantic
nation. I don’t go quite that far,
but my own crystal ball indicates we are
now a nation of the Americas, which maintains
an interest in Europe, Africa and Asia.
When the
Summit of the Americas takes place in Quebec
City in April, we will be taking further
steps forward in building a community of
nations in this hemisphere. Our economic
future is becoming more intertwined. This
interdependent relationship is also creating
new challenges, such as the ones I have
described.
You, the
leaders of tomorrow, have your work cut
out for you.
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