This Issue of on Politics Was Printed on Coast Salish Territories. the On

The University of Victoria Undergraduate Journal of Political Science

Volume 14 Issue No.1 Winter 2020

This issue of On Politics was printed on Coast Salish Territories. The On Politics Team acknowledges with respect the Lekwungen peoples on whose traditional territory the university stands and the Songhees, Esquimalt and WSÁNEĆ peoples whose historical relationships with the land continue to this day. The Journal

On Politics is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the University of Victoria Undergraduates of Political Science. It aims to encourage and facilitate undergraduate scholarship by providing students and recent graduates with a unique opportunity to have their work published in a formal medium. The editors of this journal are drawn from the undergraduate student body. Submissions are welcomed from students during our call for papers each semester. On Politics strives to publish writing from a variety of theoretical perspectives, both intra- and interdisciplinary, with a particular focus in uplifting marginalized voices and to showcase emerging undergraduate scholars at the University of Victoria. Although published articles are typically found within the realm of political science, we welcome political work from all fields of study. We especially encourage students from adjacent disciplines to submit, acknowledging the existence of a vast body of political work that crosses beyond the disciplinary boundaries of academia.

Contributors grant On Politics the right of first publication but retain copyright of their work. Articles will also be published online through the University of Victoria Journal Publishing Service. This issue’s cover and layout was done through the joint efforts of Rowan Mackenzie Zouboules and Michael John Lo. Contributors to On Politics agree to release their articles under the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 4.0 International license. Those interested may share material within the journal in any medium or format and may adapt the journal’s content. Sharing adaptation must attribute the work to On Politics and the authors of the affected articles. For more details contact [email protected].

On Politics does not reserve the right to exclusive distribution of published work. Contributors may enter into additional arrangements provided that first publication in On Politics is acknowledged. Table of Contents

Foreword ...... 9 Dr. Chris Kilford

Examining the Effects of Violence and Nonviolence in Indigenous Direct Action ...... 11 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More Dorothy Hodgins

Beyond the Blockade ...... 32 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance

Laura Smith of Contents Table

A Perspective on Identity and Conflict ...... 48 The Ba'athist State's Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria Hamza Badsha

Political Dissidence or Threat of Disintegration ...... 62 The Impacts of the Migrant Crisis on Potential European Disintegration Keiran Ellis

Between Petroleum and Paris ...... 75 Canadian Foreign Policy, Liberal Instituitionalism, and the Paris Agreement James Mager

3 A statement of solidarity and action on combating systemic racism from our undergraduate academic community

September 3rd, 2020 Academic spaces have historically been white-centered, patriarchal, and ableist. This bias continues to be reflected in the silence and tokenistic gestures of our academic institutions, and what they actually do to BIPOC bodies and the citizens of the Global South, their ways of knowing, and their cultures. The events of 2020 have uncovered the exploitation that underpins our society in ways that would be irresponsible for us to ignore. While we recognize the inherent limitations of academic spaces, we refuse to stay passive as voices are systemically silenced within our own system. We commit to using our influence as publishers of student work to privilege BIPOC perspectives. As we embark on this intentional anti-racist work on the unceded territories of the Lekwungen and WSÁNEĆ peoples, we commit to action as allies and conspirators in the fight against a deeply unequal status quo and to unlearning the harmful practices that we have internalized by living in these systems. This year, we pledge to: – Reject literature submissions that can be weaponized against marginalized voices. – Actively seek and promote BIPOC leadership within our own organizations. – Hire and properly compensate BIPOC persons whenever possible in our work. – Publish and encourage the production of papers On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On with diverse perspectives from outside the Western canon and the colonial narratives of the status quo. We hope that this letter inspires and encourages diversity within our journals—not only in content and perspective but also in leadership. We ask you to walk with us and hold us accountable to the anti-racist and decolonial work to which we are committing.

4 Contributors

Hamza Badsha is a fifth-year History student with a minor in Business in his final semester. His areas of interest include Indian Muslim history, broader Islamic religious history and theology, and all things South Asia. His most fond aspect of life at UVic outside of academics has been volunteering with UVic’s World University Services Canada (WUSC) local student committee.

Keiran Ellis is a third-year student majoring in political science with a minor in philosophy. Her areas of study include international relations, international law, and critical race theory. She is also devoted to studying areas of social justice in politics through her research to voice the struggles of equity-seeking groups. She is grateful to have this opportunity to be published in Vol. 14 of the OnPol publication.

Dorothy Hodgins is in her fifth year at UVIC pursuing a double major in Environmental Studies and Political Science and Solidarity Statement & Contributors minoring in Indigenous Studies. Passionate about intersectional climate justice, she enjoys directing her academic knowledge towards volunteer initiatives in the community. Outside of her studies, she enjoys reading and learning from the decolonial work of Leanne Betasamosake Simpson (Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg) and Lee Maracle (Sto:lo).

James Mager is a fourth-year undergraduate student focusing on political science and environmental studies. His major interests include political theory, analytic philosophy, and law. Outside of school you can find him on his bike or near the ocean. He cannot stop talking about climate change.

Laura Smith is a fourth-year student majoring in Political Science with a minor in Professional Communications. Her main areas of interest include the impact media has on politics, and vice versa, as well as international relations with particular focus on Eastern Europe. She also produces a bi-weekly news podcast at the Martlet and is involved with UVic’s Model UN Club.

5 Editors

Sage Blumstengel is passionate about environmental and Indigenous politics, and is coming to the end of her undergrad with a double major in environmental studies and political science. She is looking forward to editing some really amazing papers this year, as well as working with some awesome people!

Lily Jones is a fourth-year Political Science student with a minor in Global Development Studies. Lily’s primary interests are in exploring structures of oppression and theories of injustice. Lily is currently writing her honors thesis on how stigma interacts with legislation governing prostitute autonomy.

Rowan Zouboules is a fifth-year Political Science Student and policy nerd with publication credits in Global Public Health Journal and Health and Social Care in the Community. They previously worked as a research assistant for the University of Toronto’s Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work, and for the Workers’ Safety and Compensation Commission of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut. Rowan brings academic knowledge in publishing, research methods, copy-editing, and literary critique to support students in their writing. Academic accessibility is of particular interest to them, and they are looking forward to collaborating with classmates this upcoming year.

Dorothy Poon is a fourth-year Honours Sociology student who is also working towards a minor in Professional Communications. She is particularly interested in the sociopolitical dimensions of migration patterns, transnationalism, and identity construction.

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Dorothy is excited to work with a team of talented undergraduate writers and student editors to make this year’s OnPol journal the best it can be!

6 Editorial Assistants

Saiyah Aujla is a first-year political science student. Her interests are currently in international relations and political theory. She’s stoked to be part of the team this year and can’t wait to showcase some awesome papers.

Malanya Gaudet is a first-year political science student that’s excited to work with On Politics's amazing editorial team this year!

Proof Readers

Dante André-Kahan Katy Berglund Olivia T Brown Team Editors & Editorial Aza Bryson Mary Heeg Seamus Lim-Heley Joyce Ma

Editor-in-Chief

Michael John Lo is in his third year of majoring in Political Science major and minoring in Journalism. He is interested in exploring non-statecentric visions of transnational solidarity and the relationship between media and political socialization. Originally he became OnPol’s Editor-in-Chief as a favour for a friend. He did not know what he was getting into but is now grateful for the opportunity to foster academic community during this critical moment of intersection in the world.

7 Acknowledgements

On Politics would like to thank the University of Victoria Students' Society, the Department of Political Science, and the Undergraduates of Political Science course union for their continued support and investments in undergraduate publishing and writing.

Special thanks to the experts who reviewed submissions:

Dr. Colin Bennett (University of Victoria) Dr. waaseyaa’sin Christine Sy (University of Victoria) Dr. Chris Kilford (CIC Victoria) Kenneth Macartney (CIC Victoria) Marc Lortie (CIC Victoria)

Additional acknowledgements to:

CIC Victoria Liason, Paul Seguna Former OnPol EiC, Mary Heeg, for her infinite wisdom Seamus Lim-Heley, for securing funding Lindsey Young from Newton, Kansas for layout support The Covid-19 Pandemic, for keeping things interesting On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On

8 Foreword

Dear Reader, I am delighted to introduce this latest edition of On Politics. Indeed, during what has been a very busy university year made doubly challenging with the disruption that Covid-19 has brought, the OnPol editorial team has somehow managed to assemble a first-class collection of undergraduate student essays covering a wide-range of highly significant topics. Undoubtedly, what you are about to read is the product of many hours of work by the editorial team, the authors and those who have happily volunteered their time to read through and evaluate every submission. This edition is very much centered on the theme of resistance in all its various forms. It begins with an essay by Dorothy Hodgins that Acknowlegements & Foreword examines the Red Power movement of the 1960s/1970s in the U.S. and the Idle No More movement of 2012/2013 in Canada to explore the ways a settler state responds to violent and non-violent forms of Indigenous resistance. Continuing this, Laura Smith follows with an examination of the Occupy Wall Street and Ende Gelände movements to analyze how social networking has transformed traditional acts of resistance. Hamza Badsha’s essay, also with resistance in mind, focuses on Syria and the sectarianizing and self-preservationist behaviour of Bashar Al-Assad’s government that has resulted in millions of refugees and displaced people searching for new homes and opportunities. Hamza’s essay is also an excellent segue to Keiran Ellis’s examination of the migrant crisis, which has placed a significant strain on the European Union’s continued stability. Finally, and bringing us full circle, is James Mager’s essay that questions Canada’s international environmental commitments and its tension with our reliance on fossil fuels and resource extraction.

9 This issue of On Politics is also the start of what I hope will be a continuing collaboration between the journal and the Canadian International Council – Victoria Branch. In particular, I would like to thank Paul Seguna and his team from CIC Victoria that offered advice and conducted an expert review of many of the articles assembled here. I’d also like to pass on my sincere congratulations to Michael John Lo, its volunteer student Editor-in-Chief. With new crises popping-up faster than they fade away, it is vitally important that journals, such as On Politics, exist as an outlet for expressing the necessity for constant attention to what ails our planet and then recommending what we can do to make things better. There are also lessons learned to be found inside this edition that can help us avoid repeating past mistakes. And there’s also every indication, based on the thoughtful collection of essays that Michael has brought together, that moving forward we will be in very safe hands.

Chris Kilford, CD, PhD President Victoria Branch Canadian International Council On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On

10 Examining the Effects of Violence and Nonviolence in Indigenous Direct Action The Red Power Movement and Idle No More

Dorothy Hodgins

Abstract: A focalizing debate within social movement theory considers the efficacy of violence versus nonviolence in direct action. This is especially important to consider in a settler- colonial context where the state is systematically designed to repress mobilizations of Indigenous sovereignty. It often attempts to frame such movements as either vaguely-defined discontent or national security threats - both of which attempt to invalidate the movements’ demands. I use the case studies of the Red Power movement of the 1960s/1970s in the U.S. and the Idle No More movement of 2012/2013 in Canada to explore the ways the settler state responds to violent and non-violent forms of Indigenous resistance. It is my hope that these observed patterns of response are critically read not only by Indigenous Peoples, but also by non-Indigenous folx who wish to actively support these movements rather than passively consume and re-produce the colonial re-narrativization of movement events and intentions.

Acknowledgements: There are many people who made publishing this paper a possibility. Firstly, I would like to thank Sage Blumstengel for providing tireless editing expertise. I also received indispensable editing advice from Dr. waaseyaa’sin Christine Sy (Anishinaabe) who teaches Indigenous Gender Studies at UVIC. Dr. Sy helped me weave in my positionality in a responsible way, and encouraged me to think through my framing patterns. And finally, I would like to thank Michael John Lo for providing support and guidance throughout the process, and the whole OnPol team for putting together a beautiful journal.

11 Hodgins

Introduction It is posited that democracy, as a form of socio-political organization, has the potential to provide social cohesion while protecting individual liberty.1,2 However, democracy’s majoritarian principle can also (re)produce hegemonic privilege at the expense of dissenting minorities.3 This representational deficiency compels minority groups to pursue their visions of justice outside electoral channels — often leading to attention- seeking acts such as civil disobedience.4 Particularly within settler-colonial countries, the voices most often repressed are those with original title to the paramount resource of territory. First Nations’ continued presence and resistance mires the settler state with existential anxiety; the colonial logic of elimination undergirds ongoing systemic strategies of assimilation and erasure.5 George Manuel (Secwepemc) maintains, however, that these schemes have continuously been met with creative Indigenous resistance and independent assertions of sovereignty that defy the state’s constructed authority of legitimizing recognition.6 Large Indigenous resistance initiatives fit within the broader category of social movements, which are “organized yet informal social entities” engaged in extra-institutional conflict with a particular aim.7 A focalizing debate within social movement theory considers the efficacy of violence versus nonviolence; the former is typically attributed to civil resistance against undemocratic regimes, while the latter is often associated with civil disobedience within a democracy.8 The ‘civil’ in

1 I respectfully acknowledge that this paper was researched and produced on the unceded territories of the Lekwungen-speaking Songhees and W̱ SÁNEĆ peoples, whose historic relations with the land and water continue to this day. 2 Bernard Crick, Democracy: A Very Short Introduction (2002), https://ebookcentral-proquest-com.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/lib/uvic/detail.action? docID=232920. 3 John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971), 312. 4 Ibid., 321. 5 Patrick Wolfe, “Settler colonialism and the elimination of the native”, in Journal of Geno- On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On cide Research 8, no. 4 (2006). 6 George Manuel and Michael Posluns, The Fourth World: An Indian Reality (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2019). 7 Jonathan Christiansen, Four Stages of Social Movements (EBSCO Publishing Inc.: EBS- CO Research Starters, 2009), 2. 8 Gene Sharp, From Dictatorship to Democracy: A Conceptual Framework for Liberation (East Boston: Albert Einstein Institution, 2010), 1, https://www.aeinstein.org/wp-content/ uploads/2013/09/FDTD.pdf.; James Tully, “On Global Citizenship,” in On Global Citizen- ship: James Tully in Dialogue (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014), 19, https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/on-global-citizenship-james-tully-in-dia-

12 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More civil disobedience links this noninstitutionalized practice of challenging unilateral power relation ships to a conception of nonviolence and peacefulness.9 However, Celikates also cautions against the uncritical acceptance of this essentializing dichotomy, for it allows governments to favour and promote certain types of minimally-challenging protest over the more status-quo-destabilizing types that usually come from marginalized groups who lack equitable access to the political opportunity structure.10 This caveat must be kept in mind, particularly in the context of Indigenous movements. Mobilizations of Indigenous sovereignty and social capital are repressed systematically by the settler-colonial regime, which leads it to frame such movements as threats to (uni)national security via a discourse of violence that renews savagery stereotypes. Sharp explains that since governments derive legitimacy from the cooperation, submission, and obedience of civil society and institutions, political defiance is better able to end government domination than violence.11 Direct action sits within the sphere of political defiance and features extra-institutional protest, persuasion and intervention activities such as blockades, occupations, marches, and demonstrations.12 Indigenous peoples have always acted to re-occupy their lives, lands, and waters; this direct action proclivity gaining increasing media coverage since the 1960s.13 According to John Borrows (Anishinaabe), Indigenous

Peoples engage in civil disobedience and pragmatic direct action to create Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of new spaces of representation in response to external domination and incongruous Indigenous-government relationships.14 He emphasizes the transformative potential inherent in Indigenous mobilization: “the shift from the assembly hall to the highway highlights the relationship between cooperation and rebellion in reproducing domination and freedom.”15 logue/ch1-on-global-citizenship.pdf; Robin Celikates, “Learning from the Streets: Civil Disobedience in Theory and Practice,” in Global Activism: Art and Conflict in the 21st Century, ed. Peter Weibel (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2015), 66. 9 Robin Celikates, “Learning from the Streets: Civil Disobedience in Theory and Practice,” in Global Activism: Art and Conflict in the 21st Century, ed. Peter Weibel (Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2015), 65. 10 Ibid., 67. 11 Sharp, From Dictatorship to Democracy, 30. 12 Michael Morden, “Rights and Resistance: Norms, Interests and Indigenous Direct Action in Canada,” Ethnopolitics 14, no. 3, (2015): 256. 13 Ibid., 269. 14 John Borrows, Freedom and Indigenous Constitutionalism (Toronto: University of To- ronto Press, 2016), 51. 15 Ibid., 50.

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Morden notes that despite the unique potentiality of Indigenous resistance, there has been little scholarly inquiry into this phenomenon beyond normative analyses that focus on the ethical need for decolonization.16 I intend to expand upon this by using a decolonial lens to comparatively analyze the development of two Indigenous movements of the past century that drew global attention: the Red Power movement (RPM) of the 1960s/1970s in the U.S. and the Idle No More movement (INM) of 2012/2013 in Canada. Considering the recent international wave of Indigenous resistance and rights discourse from Mi’kmaq fishery attacks in Nova Scotia17 to protests against President Bolsonaro in Brazil,18 it is important for Indigenous land defenders and allies to glean lessons from these previous movements: Red Power for its emergent novelty and Idle No More for its use of modern communications technology. Dina Gigilo-Whitaker (Colville Confederated Tribes) describes how although arising out of different events and often diverging in expression, both movements pursued a vision of justice rooted in sustainable self- determination.19 A critical difference between the two worth exploring is their respective employment of direct action tactics: the Red Power movement is frequently associated with militant leadership and a violent style of intervention, while non-violent tactics of disruption are attributed to Idle No More.20 With consideration for the ways settler media, police and state frame Indigenous resistance, I will analyze the connection between violent and nonviolent direct action and the colonial state’s method of response to such movements’ demands. I will use Jonathen Christiansen’s lifecycle model21 to chronologically examine the two campaigns through a decolonial comparativist lens by highlighting both Indigenous and non-Indigenous analyses of events and general mobilization theories. This historicization will include examining leadership and mobilization styles, media framing and reception, and the political opportunity structures that incentivized violent/nonviolent

16 Morden, “Rights and Resistance,” Ethnopolitics, 256. 17“Dear non-Mi’kmaw fishers: Mi’kmaq in Nova Scotia have an inherent right to fish, you On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On do not,” APTN Nation to Nation, October 8, 2020. https://www.aptnnews.ca/nation-to-nation/dear-non-mikmaw-fishers-mikmaq-in-nova-scotia-have-an-inherent-right-to-fish-you- do-not/ (accessed November 23, 2020). 18 Mídia Ninja, “Indigenous movements in Brazil to stand up to Bolsonaro’s ‘project of genocide’,” Nationalia, January 20, 2020. https://www.nationalia.info/new/11284/indigenous-movement-in-brazil-to-stand-up-to-bolsonaros-project-of-genocide 19 Dina Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World Social Movements in the New Millenium,” South African Quarterly 114, no. 4, (2015): 871. 20 Ibid., 868. 21 Christiansen, Four Stages of Social Movements.

14 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More action. While I cannot attest to the experience of land defenders and their ancestors as a cisgender white settler and therefore cannot make fully- informed prescriptions for how their resistance should be performed, I have examined and synthesized Indigenous and non-Indigenous accounts of past movements to draw out patterns that could inform contemporary and future movements. It is my hope that these patterns, in elucidating the way the settler state moves to invalidate Indigenous sovereignty assertion(s), are critically read not only by Indigenous peoples, but also by non-Indigenous folx who wish to actively support these movements rather than passively consume and re-produce the colonial re-narrativization of events and intentions. Considering my positionality, this research has helped me interrogate my long-conditioned understanding of the relationship between violence and disobedience. Far from the universal and categorical allegorical dichotomy it is painted as, obedience often upholds violence — which raises the important questions of obedience to whom and for whom? I argue that the ability of an Indigenous resistance movement such as Red Power or Idle No More to overpower colonial neutralization attempts is dependent on its garnering and maintenance of public support for its anticolonial objective(s), which can be impacted by settler-constructed media images of reckless violence, or conversely, by allowing supporters to over-broaden the struggle identity and dilute specificity. Examining the Effects of Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of

His/Herstorical-Contextual Genesis

Red Power Movement In comparing Red Power and Idle No More, it is crucial to resist equivocating the historical contexts of the countries they originated in, which are indeed similar but also crucially distinctive. In the United States, Indigenous resistance to settler expansion sparked the Indian Wars, which carried throughout the 17th﹘19th centuries, and ended with the Wounded Knee massacre of 1890. From this point forward, the settler government adopted an assimilation strategy that systematized the colonial logic of elimination until it was challenged during the “revolutionary fever” of the 1970s.22 The peak of unrest was in the generational wake of the 1953 House Concurrent Resolution 108, which advanced total assimilation as

22 Brian Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 2, last modified August 8, 2018, https://socialistworker.org/2018/08/08/1968-the-rise-of-the-red-power-movement.

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an end to the “Indian Problem” calling for the immediate disassembly of reservations and the ceasing of federal services and protections in order to eliminate all autonomy embedded in land claims and treaty rights.23 While the policy of termination did devastate rural communities, it also brought Indigenous masses to the cities and consequently facilitated the emergence of a strong urban pan-indigenous collective empowered to seek justice.24 Radicalized by termination, police brutality, over-incarceration and unemployment in the 1960s, the Black Power movement’s message of ethnic nationalism inspired young educated urban Indigenous communities.25 As the National Indian Youth Council began articulating a vision of self-determination, the group Indians of All Tribes nestled itself at the heart of the emerging Red Power movement when they took over Alcatraz Island, announcing reclamation and emphasizing the deserted prison’s ironic likeness to reservations.26 Although the occupation only lasted for a few hours, its successful garnering of attention was noted by another emerging group that came to define the RPM: the American Indian Movement (AIM).27 AIM formed in Minneapolis in 1968 with the mission of protecting Indigenous people from police brutality and over-incarceration, adopting the Black Panther Party’s community self-defence patrol style.28 With rapid national chapter proliferation and popularity gain, it quickly centred itself as the RPM’s organizational expression.29 Acting as a local social service of sorts, it aided community members in job searches, education attainment and loan bargaining while pursuing an ultimate vision of cultural preservation and disavowal of the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA).30 Five years after the original Alcatraz invasion,

23 Ibid., para. 8. 24 Ibid., para. 16. 25 Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 21; Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World,” 870. 26 Kelly Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,”Perspective: A Journal of Historical Inquiry 35, (2008): 45-46, http://www.calstatela.edu/sites/default/files/groups/ On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Perspectives/Vol35/rios.pdf. 27 Ibid., 47 28 Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 16. 29 Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 48. 30 Jason A. Heppler, “Framing Red Power: The American Indian Movement, the Trail of Broken Treaties, and the Politics of Media,” (Unpublished master’s thesis, University of Nebraska, 2009), 35, https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1020&- context=historydiss ; Dean J. Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond: The Nixon and Ford Administrations Respond to Native American Protest,” Pacific Historical Review 72, no. 2, 211, doi: 10.1525/phr.2003.72.2.201.

16 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More

AIM organized a second occupation that lasted nineteen months.31 This occupation drew attention to the policy of termination and insisted on the establishment of Indigenous colleges, museums, cultural centres and other preservation programs.32 The U.S. government did not address these demands or attempt to remove the protestors, but instead took on a stand- by approach that proved successful when AIM eventually lost the social capital of public captivation as the press moved on.33 Despite this ultimate secession, AIM had successfully motivated a large collective to take direct action, which undoubtedly frightened the federal government. Following the occupation, President Richard Nixon, eager to aid the Indigenous population (as a ‘safe’ minority that, unlike African Americans, did not seek integration), urged Congress to pass eight bills rejecting termination, promoting tribal autonomy, and strengthening the BIA.34 These concessions were also notably influenced by the Cold War’s political context, in which domestic troubles limited the state’s ability to participate in the international arena.35 Despite these reforms’ progressive appearance, Nixon’s slogan of “self-determination without termination” disappointed radicals who desired treaty renegotiation and emancipation from the BIA as a structure of Anglo wardship and normalized colonialism.36 In response to Nixon’s seeming attempt to neutralize these concerns, the RPM gained collective capacity and a greater willingness to engage in confrontational actions.37 AIM, never too concerned with the principle of nonviolence, encouraged civil disobedience as a core strategy of liberation38 — which Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of came to shape the repertoire of contentious action that defined the Red Power movement and predetermined both its efficacy and its ultimate downfall.

Idle No More In Canada, the settlement process was uneven but continuous; the settler government announcing its sovereignty by virtue of the Doctrine of Discovery first through theRoyal Proclamation (1763),39 and then

31 Ibid. 32 Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 48. 33 Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond,” 208. 34 Ibid., 206-209. 35 Heppler, “Framing Red Power,” 21. 36 Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond,” 210. 37 Ibid., 210. 38 Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World,” 870. 39 Arthur Manuel, Ronald M Derrickson, and Naomi Klein, Unsettling Canada: A National

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through the British North America Act (1867).40 Its initial legislative attempts at Indigenous assimilation and elimination were eventually amalgamated under the Indian Act (1876), which seeks to control every aspect of Indigenous life. Lisa Monchalin (Algonquin, Huron, Métis) notes that amendments motivated by post-war societal introspection in the 1950s removed the worst restrictions.41 In 1969, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau proposed the White Paper on Indian Policy, which resembled the United States House Concurrent Resolution 108 (1953) in its attempt to terminate all federal responsibility and special accommodations for First Nations (including reservations, Indian status and Indian Affairs).42 Sparking outrage within the Indigenous community, President of the Indian Association of Alberta Harold Cardinal (Cree) drafted the ‘Red Paper’ in response, which proposed the concept of First Nations as “Citizens Plus” deserving all the rights of Canadians and then some.43 This political declaration seemed to empower many to pursue greater articulation and protection of these special rights through juridico-political channels, resulting in a slew of lawsuits that produced widespread reform: adding s.35 to the Constitution Act in 1982 recognizing existing Aboriginal and Treaty rights; Bill C-31 in 1985 restoring the status of some Aboriginal women; forming the 1996 Royal Commission on Aboriginal Peoples to investigate the Indian Act (1876); and the 1999 First Nations Land Management Act allowing limited self-government, among other legislation. Arthur Manuel (Secwepemc) cautions that despite this progress, every move forward has been accompanied by caveats that delimit the full expression of any right that could potentially threaten state sovereignty, which effectively further systematizes colonialism under an image of conscientious reform.44 As a result, state institutions have low legitimacy within Indigenous communities; this illegitimacy norm produces a collective inclination towards engaging in extra-institutional action without requiring the stimulus of new threats to political or material resources.45 It was within this context of historically-grounded discontent that Idle No More arose. On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Wake-up Call (Toronto: Between the Lines, 2015), 3. 40 Ibid., 62. 41 Lisa Monchalin, The Colonial Problem: an Indigenous Perspective on Crime and Injus- tice in Canada (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016), 111. 42 Arthuer Manuel, & Ronald Derrickson, The Reconciliation Manifesto: Recovering the Land, Rebuilding the Economy (Toronto: James Lorimer Limited, 2018), 94-95. 43 Monchalin, The Colonial Problem, 120. 44 Manuel and Derrickson, The Reconciliation Manifesto. 45 Morden, “Rights and Resistance,” 272.

18 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More

Compared to the RPM, Idle No More had a much softer emergence. It began as a series of emails between a group of nêhiyaw (Cree) women Nina Wilson, Sylvia McAdam, and Jessica Gordon, and one white settler woman Sheelah Mclean in Saskatchewan, who sought to contest the omnibus Bill C-45. Bill C-45 proposed a series of unilateral amendments to various environmental protection acts that would have significant repercussions for Indigenous nations and their treaty rights.46 Wilson, McAdam, Gordon and McLean started a Facebook page that quickly garnered mass support, and by the late fall of 2012, #IdleNoMore had become a popular social media campaign as well as the focus of contentious political debate in Canada.47 Although specifically arising to contest Bill C-45, the movement’s rapid gathering of support led to a strategic broadening of its goals: nesting the targeted mission within the larger imperatives of environmental preservation, Indigenous sovereignty, and colonial status quo disruption.48 The first site-based collective action was a mass teach-in in Saskatoon on November 10th, which precipitated a series of other protests and rallies.49 On December 11th — International Human Rights Day — (Mushkego Cree) Chief Theresa Spence of Attawapiskat First Nation, which is located on James Bay in northern Ontario, capitalized on the juncture between symbolism, momentum and media attention by beginning a hunger strike to solicit a meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Governor General David Johnston in regards to rectifying Treaty 9 infringements.50 Spence’s hunger strike Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of was a form of psychological nonviolent intervention that is often credited as the seminal initiating action of INM, carrying a symbolic meaning that Sharp contends is characteristic of emerging nonviolent protest movements.51 Indeed, Spence’s peaceful resistance imbued calls for justice

46 Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World,” 867; Jarrett Martineau, “Rhythms of Change: Mobilizing Decolonial Consciousness, Indigenous Resurgence and the Idle No More Movement,” in More Will Sing Their Way to Freedom, ed. Elaine Colburn (Halifax: Fernwood Publishing, 2015), 232. 47 Martineau, “Rhythms of Change,” 231. 48 Ibid., 236. 49 Febna Caven, “Being Idle No More: The Women Behind the Movement,” Cultural Survival Quarterly Magazine, March 2013, para. 3, https://www.culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/being-idle-no-more-women-behind-movement. 50 Ibid., para. 1. 51 Sharp, From Dictatorship to Democracy: A Conceptual Framework for Liberation, 60.

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with greater urgency, and soon the movement’s message spilt over into the international arena, becoming a powerful Fourth World social movement in which other Indigenous nations felt empowered to demand respect of their inherent rights.52

Development & Peak

Red Power Movement Following the Alcatraz occupation and subsequent Nixon reforms, AIM leaders — like those of the Black Power movement — realized that the most effective way to capture and maintain visibility and relevancy was through confrontational politics that drew press coverage, for better or worse.53 Russell Means (Oglala Lakota), a prominent AIM leader explained: “the only way we could get publicity was by threats... we had to threaten the institutions we were trying to change.”54 In November of 1972, they initiated their second mass direct action, the ‘Trail of Broken Treaties’: a cross-country caravan collecting hundreds of supporters to stage events in Washington D.C.55 A central objective was to present their focalizing ‘Twenty Points’ document to the government, which cumulatively called for the restoration of Indian treaty-making authority and dissolution of the BIA.56 The action’s intent was nonviolence, but a series of miscommunications led to their hostile takeover of the BIA headquarters, which lasted seven days.57 They left after being paid $66,000 and promised that their demands would be given formal attention.58 While the occupation did put a spotlight on the RPM, images of $2 million worth of damages to the building and stolen files released after their departure were what endured in the public mind rather than the purpose of the action.59 This prevailing image eroded support received

52 Caven, “Being Idle No More,” para. 1; Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On World,” 866. 53 Heppler, “Framing Red Power,” 36; August H. Nimtz, “Violence and/or Nonviolence in the Success of the Civil Rights Movement: The Malcolm X–Martin Luther King, Jr. Nex- us,” New Political Science 38, no. 1, (2016). 54 Ibid., 37. 55 Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 49. 56 Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 33. 57 Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond,” 211. 58 Ibid., 211. 59 Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 50.

20 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More from both the American and Native American public as they became associated with reckless violence and militancy.60 This also led Nixon to frustratedly abandon Native American issues as a policy focus,61 and indeed represented a decisive turning point in the RPM. Its objectives and methods were cognitively separated from popular conceptions of justice, and consequently heightened calls for (settler-colonial) law and order.62 Both informing and informed by popular sentiment, the relationship between AIM and the press began to decay after the Trail. However, they did retain relevance as a news item and exploded back onto the scene a year later with their most infamous action: the occupation of Wounded Knee.63 In response to community requests to highlight tribal government corruption, 300 armed Oglala Lakota and AIM activists travelled to Wounded Knee, where they set up roadblocks, took over the trading post and church, and announced it a liberated territory.64 Despite the site’s extraordinary symbolic significance limiting the socially- acceptable paths of action the government could take in response,65 they were also highly motivated by concerns that the powerful moment would initiate a true revolution or erosion of government legitimacy and authority.66 These concerns led the government to run the risk of condemnation and respond with crushing force, surrounding Wounded Knee with masses of FBI agents, federal marshals, BIA police and tribal police, who took the lives of two activists, wounded several others, Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of and eventually arrested 120 people.67 Perhaps to counteract the public denunciation of this violent suppression, Congress approved a string of Indian reforms between 1973 and 1975: restoring terminated tribes and approving the Indian Financing Act (1974) and Indian Self-Determination and Education Act (1975).68 This reformist response showed that despite AIM’s post-Trail loss of public support due to media stereotyping and lawlessness and factionalism frames,69 Native American activists had successfully drawn political gains by appealing to the sympathies of the

60 Ibid. 61 Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond,” 212. 62 Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 50; Heppler, “Framing Red Power,” 73. 63 Heppler, “Framing Red Power,”52. 64 Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 35. 65 Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 52. 66 Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 38. 67 Ibid., para. 38. 68 Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond,” 217. 69 Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World,” 869.

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American public by capitalizing on the symbolic irony of the Wounded Knee situation.70 Alcatraz had incentivized the President to articulate an intention regarding Indigenous rights, but Wounded Knee pushed Congress to begin implementing it in earnest.71

Idle No More Compared to AIM’s violent guidance of the RPM, Idle No More remained committed to a nonviolence principle that informed its performance strategy of brief place-based actions that invoked the language of occupation rather than the protracted presence. Much like Gandhi72 (1909), INM’s leaders posited nonviolence as a code of conduct that drew on the spiritual strength of self-suffering and a doctrine of love to bring about sovereignty, or ‘home-rule’.73 It had also allowed connection to the environmental movement and Leftist ideology as a whole, which furnished partnerships with other renowned activists and effectively broadened their support base, but also diluted their message in the global news coverage.74 While the RPM was characterized by a paradoxically violent sympathy-gathering strategy of action that focalized around their original demands, INM focused on a nonviolent alliance- based development strategy that gained wide support at the expense of co-opting their initiating demands to a degree. Regardless, the political capital of this broad support base was evident on the “Global Day of Action” in solidarity on January 13th, 2013, which saw rallies in Australia, New Zealand, Chile and the U.S.75 Months later, the leaders organized the “Sovereignty Summer” campaign to publicize their list of six demands invoking the 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples principle of “free, prior, and informed consent”.76 According to Sharp, the main nonviolent methods used in INM’s campaigns were formal statements, drama and music, public assemblies, symbolic strikes, rejection of authority, psychological interventions, physical interventions, On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On 70 Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 52. 71 Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond,” 217. 72 Gandhi, M. (1909). Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule. Retrieved from https://coursespaces.uvic.ca/pluginfile.php/2251089/mod_resource/content/1/Gandhi-excerpts-1-Hind- Swaraj.pdf 73 Caven, “Being Idle No More.” 74 Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World,” 872. 75 Ibid., 868. 76 Ibid., 873.

22 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More and social interventions.77 Jarrett Martineau (Plains Cree) explains the special significance of dance and music-based physical interventions, as the “Round Dance Revolution” disrupted commercial centres across the country.78 While these representational gestures of Indigenous resistance and struggle continuity produced effective appeal, their fleeting temporality limited their ability to bring about systemic change.79 The hypervisibility and technological reliance of this previously private court- based struggle made Indigenous repertoires of contentious action legible and therefore vulnerable to state surveillance and repression.80

“Decline” & Legacy

Red Power Movement Following Wounded Knee, the RPM began to fade as a direct action movement, shifting to the type of legal-judicial activism that had characterized the pre-INM era in Canada — but critically with less

independent prerogative. AIM members arrested at Wounded Knee were Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of forced into court battles that the government prolonged in order to weaken and bankrupt the organization.81 This first government repression tactic was buttressed by an FBI COINTELPRO infiltration scheme that served to foster paranoia and compound internal divisions within AIM.82 Although AIM did not achieve its original desires of BIA abolishment and treaty renegotiation, and despite their volatile relationship with the American and Native American public, the RPM as a whole did result in policy changes that brought greater power and attention to First Nations in the U.S.83

77 Sharp, From Dictatorship to Democracy, 79-86. 78 Martineau, “Rhythms of Change,” 232. 79 Ibid., 237. 80 Martineau, “Rhythms of Change,” 235. 81 Kotlowski, “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond,” 218; Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 46. 82 Ward, “1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement,” para. 43-47. 83 Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World,” 870; Rios, “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement,” 35.

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According to Christiansen’s delineation of social movements,84 the RPM moved through all four lifecycle stages in order: emerging from collective discontent; coalescing through leadership and strategy development; bureaucratizing through the formalization of principles in an organization; and declining both through repression and establishment within the governmental mainstream (via the Indian Self-Determination and Education Act of 1975.) These concurrent government strategies of repression and institutionalization do show, however, that Indigenous social movements profoundly threaten state sovereignty and government legitimacy. This threat is powerful enough that the language of self- determination must be recast within government frameworks of accommodation that perpetuate the colonial power imbalance.

Idle No More While the Red Power Movement resulted in sweeping policy changes, Idle No More seemed to plateau and fade from the media spotlight. Scholars such as Taiaiake Alfred (Mohawk) and Arthur Manuel (Secwepemc) believe this was due to the fact that Chief Spence, having been granted a meeting with the Harper government but not the Governor General (of great symbolic significance), eventually joined with the Assembly of First Nations and the Opposition parties to draft and sign a reformist ‘13 Point Declaration’ that outlined steps forward and divided movement supporters.85 Despite, once again, bringing attention to Canada’s colonial mistreatment of Indigenous Peoples, the initial expression of the movement had not succeeded in stopping the legislation it rose to contest.86 Scholars such as Jarrett Martineau (Plains Cree) also find that INM’s social media-based organization allowed for the neutralizing control of radicalism within colonial-capitalist media’s networked logics, facilitating state surveillance and anticipation of

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On 84 Christiansen, Four Stages of Social Movements, 1-5. 85 Gerard Taiaiake Alfred, “Indigenous Nationhood: Beyond Idle No More,” Common Dreams (January 29, 2013): 2. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2013/01/29/indigenous-nationhood-beyond-idle-no-more; Arthur Manuel, “Idle No More, the Effective Voice ofIndigenous Peoples: Current AFN Negotiations with Prime Minister a Go-No- where Approach,” The Media Co-op, January 14, 2013, http://www.mediacoop.ca/story/ idle-no-more-effective-voice-indigenous-peoples/15603. 86 Gerard Taiaiake Alfred, “Indigenous Nationhood: Beyond Idle No More,” Common Dreams (January 29, 2013): 2. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2013/01/29/indigenous-nationhood-beyond-idle-no-more.

24 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More actions.87 A significant challenge for INM was coordinating between social media’s temporal support and offline place-based organizing within an economy of fleeting attention.88 Tufekci identifies the inability of media- based protests to produce substantive policy or institutional changes as a problem of adaptive capacity plaguing contemporary social movements in general.89 Following a final national day of action on January 16th, there was a decline in direct action as leaders called for the movement to scale back and relocalize action within communities — which the mainstream news media took as a signal of cessation.90 Accepting this interpretation of INM’s decline perhaps dangerously reinscribes indigeneity as an inherently political identity and a normalized subject of oppression. However, Idle No More did not die: it reconstructed itself as the Indigenous Nationhood Movement, which continues to champion a “Reclaim, Rename, Reoccupy” mission.91 Pamela Palmater (Mi’kmaq) asserts that INM “was never meant to be a flashy one month, then go away. This is something that’s years in the making... You’ll see it take different forms at different times, but it’s not going away anytime soon.”92 Palmater, alongside other Indigenous feminists such as Leanne Simpson (Anishinaabe) and Dory Nason (Anishinaabe) claim that the female-led grassroots nature of such movements are what imbibe decolonization with such transformative potential.93 Furthermore, the movement provoked a Examining the Effects of Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of 87 Martineau, “Rhythms of Change,” 232. 88 Ibid., 238. 89 Ibid., 243. 90 Martineau, “Rhythms of Change,” 247; Glen Coulthard, Red Skin, White Masks: Reject- ing the Colonial Politics of Recognition, (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014), 165. 91 “Indigenous Nationhood Movement.” n.d. Accessed November 24, 2020, https://www. nationsrising.org/. 92 Natalie Stechyson, “Idle No More Movement Fizzles Out Online, Analysis Finds,” Vancouver Sun, February 10, 2013, http://www.vancouversun.com/news/national/ Idle+More+movement+fizzles+online+analysis+finds/7945480/story.html, quoted in Coulthard, Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition, 165. 93 Pamela Palmater, “Why We Are Idle No More,” Ottawa Citizen, December 29, 2012, http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/archives/story.html?id=63dd9779-10eb-4807- bd47-223817524aa2 and Leanne Simpson, “Fish Broth and Fasting,” DividedNoMore Blog, January 16, 2013, http://dividednomore.ca/2013/01/16/fish-broth-fasting/, quoted in Coulthard, Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition, 162; Dory Nason, “We Hold Our Hands Up: On Indigenous Women’s Love and Resistance,” Decolonization: Indigeneity, Education, and Society Blog, February 12, 2013, http:// decolonization.wordpress.com/2013/02/13/we-hold-our-hands-up-on-indigenous-womens- love-and-resistance, quoted in Coulthard, Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition, 176.

25 Hodgins

massive transformation in Indigenous representation in Canada: leading to the genesis of “CBC Indigenous”, flooding the Canadian arts scene with decolonial work, and creating room for critical alliances and discussion regarding settler-colonialism and Indigenous (re)surgence.94 Despite the passing of Bill C-45, INM was (and is) the largest sustained Indigenous nationhood movement to arise in response to oppressive colonial legislation since the proposed White Paper of 1969.95 According to Christiansen’s model,96 INM moved through the social movement stages differently than the RPM: emerging as a sentiment of both general and targeted discontent; coalescing through the leadership of the four women who created the Facebook group and articulated a vision of nonviolence; and declining through reterritorialization and cooptation framed by corporate media as failure. If the end of a social movement ideally signals its success, then the systematic adoption of UNDRIP’s principle of FPIC according to the six demands would hypothetically mark the end of INM.

Conclusion Comparing the use of violence and nonviolence between the Red Power Movement and Idle No More is a useful way of exploring how the settler state responds to different expressions of Indigenous sovereignty. As the RPM progressed from Alcatraz to the Trail of Broken Treaties to Wounded Knee, it adopted increasingly violent direct action methods that surprisingly did not cause a complete erosion of support — likely due to the powerful symbolism of the Wounded Knee site and the government’s violent response. The true cause of their decline was incorporation into the policy mainstream (which eroded incentive), and government repression (which eroded resources). Comparatively, Idle No More was a decentralized movement of nonviolent resistance marked by brief performance-based physical interventions that, although also misrepresented by the media, managed to attract a diverse support base On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On both domestically and internationally. In some ways, its rise in popularity paradoxically contributed to its failure in terms of stopping Bill C-45: that focalizing goal was subsumed within the larger less immediately- actualizable language of self-determination as the movement entered the Fourth World sphere of political dispute. Furthermore, this broadening of

94 Christine Sy, email message to the author, November 19, 2020. 95 Coulthard, Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition, 161. 96 Christiansen, Four Stages of Social Movements.

26 The Red Power Movement and Idle No More the struggle identity also incorporated non-Indigenous environmentalists with less explicitly decolonial agendas. However, it is impossible to make definitive statements regarding the effects of this massive network creation, as a more open and conscientious government than Harper’s might have responded more actively to the widespread external pressure. Comparing the policy reform initiated by the Red Power Movement’s centralized leadership and the sustained solidarity network created through Idle No More’s dynamic character might suggest that a combination strategy of direct-action based civil resistance could most peacefully and productively pressure settler governments to accept and engage with Indigenous sovereignty assertions. Whether violent or nonviolent, Indigenous social movements create critical moments of acute attention to seams in the political power matrix which have the potential to widen and produce new forms of peaceful relationality. The two forms of protest also importantly do not exist in isolation of each other: Glen Coulthard (Yellowknives Dene) importantly notes that preceding most nonviolent negotiations are so- called ‘violent’ disruptions of the colonial status quo.97 The transformative potentiality embedded in Fourth World nations’ calls for self-determination explains why they are often met with confusion and apprehension, as there is no designated place for them in the state-centric international system.98 Indigenous movements, therefore, face unique challenges that Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of require them to assert resistant subjectivities through their ontological practices99 and be more flexible than the colonial homeostatic logics that try to absorb them. Alfred argues that due to this systemic proclivity for absorption, Indigenous social movements must formulate a dynamic land-based strategy of action that includes political, economic, social, and legal resistance schemes.100 Supported by an anticolonial mission-driven solidarity network, this comprehensive land-based strategy of action could pave a politics of sustainable self-determination that the settler-colonial government will not be able to ‘recognize’/redefine or invalidate out of its way.

97 Coulthard, Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition, 167. 98 Gigilo-Whitaker, “Idle No More and Fourth World,” 857. 99 Martineau, “Rhythms of Change,” 251. 100 Gerard Taiaiake Alfred, Wasa’se: Indigenous Pathways of Action and Freedom (Vancou- ver: University of British Columbia Press, 2005)

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Alfred, Gerard T. Wasase: Indigenous Pathways of Action and Freedom. (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2005). Alfred, Gerard T. “Indigenous Nationhood: Beyond Idle No More.” Common Dreams, January 29, 2013. https://www.commondreams. org/views/2013/01/29/indigenous-nationhood-beyond-idle-no- more Borrows, J. Freedom and Indigenous Constitutionalism. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016). Caven, F. Being Idle No More: The Women Behind the Movement. Cultural Survival Quarterly Magazine, March 2013. https://www. culturalsurvival.org/publications/cultural-survival-quarterly/being- idle-no-more-women-behind-movement Celikates, Robin. “Learning from the Streets: Civil Disobedience in Theory and Practice.” In global aCtIVISm. Act and Conflict in the 21st Century, edited by P. Weibel, 65–72. Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2015. sss.ias.edu/sites/sss.ias.edu/files/pdfs/Crisis-and- Critique-2018-19/celikates_Learning.pdf. Christiansen, Johnathan. Four Stages of Social Movements. Ebscohost Research Starters: Academic Topic Overviews. 2009. Retrieved from www.ebscohost.com/uploads/imported/thisTopic- dbTopic-1248.pdf. Coulthard, G. Red Skin, White Masks: Rejecting the Colonial Politics of Recognition. (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2014). Crick, Bernard. Democracy: A Very Short Introduction. 2002. https://

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On ebookcentral-proquest-com.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/lib/uvic/detail. action?docID=232920. “Dear non-Mi’kmaw fishers: Mi’kmaq in Nova Scotia have an inherent right to fish, you do not.”APTN Nation to Nation. October 8, 2020. https://www.aptnnews.ca/nation-to-nation/dear-non- mikmaw-fishers-mikmaq-in-nova-scotia-have-an-inherent-right- to-fish-you-do-not/.

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Gandhi, Mahatma. Hind Swaraj or Indian Home Rule. 1909. https:// coursespaces.uvic.ca/pluginfile.php/2251089/mod_resource/ content/1/Gandhi-excerpts-1-Hind-Swaraj.pdf. Gilio-Whitaker, Dina. “Idle No More and Fourth World Social Movements in the New Millennium.” South Atlantic Quarterly 114, no. 4, (2015): 866–877. https://read.dukeupress.edu/south-atlantic- quarterly/article-abstract/114/4/866/52737/Idle-No-More-and- Fourth-World-Social-Movements-in. Heppler, Jason A. “Framing Red Power: The American Indian Movement, the Trail of Broken Treaties, and the Politics of Media” (Unpublished master’s thesis, 2009). University of Nebraska, Lincoln. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/cgi/viewcontent. cgi?article=1020&context=historydiss. “Indigenous Nationhood Movement.” n.d. Accessed November 24, 2020. https://www.nationsrising.org/. Kotlowski, Dean J. “Alcatraz, Wounded Knee, and Beyond: The Nixon and Ford Administrations Respond to Native American Protest.” Pacific Historical Review 72, no. 2, (2003): 201–227. doi:

10.1525/phr.2003.72.2.201. Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of Manuel, Arthur. “Idle No More, the Effective Voice of Indigenous Peoples: Current AFN Negotiations with Prime Minister a Go-Nowhere Approach.” The Media Co-op. January 14, 2013. http://www. mediacoop.ca/story/idle-no-more-effective-voice-indigenous- peoples/15603. Manuel, Arthur, and Ronald M. Derrickson. The Reconciliation Manifesto: Recovering the Land, Rebuilding the Economy. Toronto: James Lorimer Limited, 2018. Manuel, Arthur, Ronald M. Derrickson, and Naomi Klein. Unsettling Canada: A National Wake-up Call. Toronto: Between the Lines, 2015. Manuel, George, and Michael Posluns. The Fourth World: An Indian Reality. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2019.

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Martineau, Jarrett. “Rhythms of Change: Mobilizing Decolonial Consciousness, Indigenous Resurgence and the Idle No More Movement.” In More Will Sing Their Way to Freedom, edited by E. Coburn, 229–253. Halifax: Fernwood Publishing, 2015. Monchalin, Lisa. The Colonial Problem: an Indigenous Perspective on Crime and Injustice in Canada. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016. Morden, Michael. “Right and Resistance: Norms, Interests and Indigenous Direct Action in Canada.” Ethnopolitics 14, no. 3, (2015): 256- 276. doi: 10.1080/17449057.2014.949444. Nimtz, August H. “Violence and/or Nonviolence in the Success of the Civil Rights Movement: The Malcolm X–Martin Luther King, Jr. Nexus.” New Political Science, 38, no. 1, (2016): 1–22. doi: 10.1080/07393148.2015.1125116. Ninja, Mídia. “Indigenous movements in Brazil to stand up to Bolsonaro’s ‘project of genocide’.” Nationalia, January 20, 2020. https://www. nationalia.info/new/11284/indigenous-movement-in-brazil-to- stand-up-to-bolsonaros-project-of-genocide. Rawls, John. A Theory of Justice. 1971. https://coursespaces.uvic.ca/ pluginfile.php/2244240/mod_resource/content/1/Rawls—Theory- of-Justice—excerpts.pdf. Rios, Kelly. “The Efficacy of the Red Power Movement.”Perspectives: A Journal of Historical Inquiry 35, (2008): 43-54. http://www. calstatela.edu/sites/default/files/groups/Perspectives/Vol35/rios. pdf. Sharp, Gene. From Dictatorship to Democracy. 4th ed. Massachusetts: The Albert Einstein Institution, 2010. Retrieved from https://www. aeinstein.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/FDTD.pdf. On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Tully, James. “On Global Citizenship.” In On Global Citizenship: James Tully in Dialogue, 3–100. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014. Retrieved from https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/book/ on-global-citizenship-james-tully-in-dialogue/ch1-on-global- citizenship.pdf.

30 Ward, Brian. (2018, August 8). 1968: The Rise of the Red Power Movement. Accessed March 10, 2020, from https:// socialistworker.org/2018/08/08/1968-the-rise-of-the-red-power- movement. Wolfe, Patrick. “Settler Colonialism and the Elimination of the Native.” Journal of Genocide Research 8, no. 4, (2006): 387-409. doi: 10.1080/1462352060105624. Examining the Effects of Violence & Nonviolence Examining the Effects of

31 Beyond the Blockade How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance

Laura Smith

Abstract: Social media has indisputably played a role in how acts of resistance occur in the modern world. However, a prominent narrative on how social networking has impacted protest states that the influence of social media has completely reinvented resistance. This ignores the aspects of traditional resistance that remain essential to the success of a movement. This includes leadership, dissemination of information, and the creation of strong ties between participants. In this paper I use the case studies of the Occupy Wall Street and Ende Gelände movements to analyze how traditional acts of resistance have shifted and transformed through social networking. Specific attention is given to the structure and reach of these movements. The findings show that instead of a distinct spilt between traditional and online-influenced resistance, those online and offline aspects of protests should be considered interlinked. The traditional aspects have changed in appearance, but their core aspects remain in the realm of social media. Online and offline efforts work together to achieve success of a movement.

Acknowledgements: I would like to thank a few fantastic people who helped make this paper come together. Dorothy Poon, who did amazing job editing and refining this paper; Dr. Colin Bennett, who helped strengthen my arguments and make sure everything was clear; Michael John Lo, who provided much support and helped me consider new aspects of this topic; and of course the whole On Politics Team for making this journal happen!

32 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance

Introduction In politics and marketing, there is a concept of the ground war and air war. Ground refers to interpersonal efforts, which might take the form of speeches or flyers. Air refers to media, and increasingly so, social media. To win a political campaign or to promote a business in today’s climate, both are needed to be successful. The same goes for acts of resistance. Writings on forms of civil disobedience have been around for a while, but the definition most people connect with is from John Rawls's A Theory of Justice. In 1971 this work, Rawls defines civil disobedience as a “public, nonviolent, conscientious yet political act contrary to law usually done with the aim of bringing about a change in the law or policies of the government.”1 But in this ever-changing world, the simplicity of this definition can no longer account for the variety of modern protests. Social media resistance is a large part of this change. However, once the definition and scope of civil disobedience is adjusted to include online activism, the line between traditional and digital protest blur. This is common in democratic states with wider access to social networking platforms. Protests that blur this line between the digital and physical Beyond the Blockade world still reinforce structure and hierarchy, just through informal processes disbursement of information and social capital is just as important, but it is done so online by more than just the movement leaders; and strong interpersonal ties remain as important as ever. This paper argues that while social media has pushed civil resistance into a more communal, loosely structed sphere that draws more on ideal-based causes rather than specific organizations, it has not undergone as vast of a change that the media and scholars often assume. By examining at the case studies of the 2011 Occupy Wall Street and the current ongoing Ende Gelände Movement, I argue that examining actors of resistance should consider both online and offline engagement. It is important to consider terminology when discussing resistance, as different words become linked to different connotations. Civic resistance will be the primary framework that this paper uses, as opposed to the traditional phrase, civil disobedience. There are two reasons behind this. Civic is used over civil in reference to James Tully’s work on global citizenship. As will be expanded upon later, social media has contributed to the globalization and interconnection of the world. Because of this, people can contribute to and support movements in a different city or even

1 John Rawls, “Duty and Obligation,” in A Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971), 320.

33 Smith

state; resistance no longer is tied to one location’s population as implied with the word “civil.” To remain with the word “civil” would suggest that protests cannot exist transnationally or that they are only legitimate when appealing to a national entity.2 Resistance is used in place of disobedience, following the lead of many modern scholars studying unrest, since the term disobedience is too closely linked to the traditional view of Rawls. While this paper seeks to point out that many of the main roots of resistance have remained in the online world, it also strives to expand on from the narrowness of previous definitions of disobedience. Occupy Wall Street (OWS) and the Ende Gelände movements are analyzed in this paper because they both highlight how social media has moved civic resistance beyond the form of physical protests while remaining engaged with the core aspects of traditional disobedience. They also both take place in democratic countries: while online activism has played an immense role in struggles against undemocratic regimes, the nature of resistance functions very differently in these situations and are not discussed in this paper. More familiar to most is the Occupy Wall Street Movement, a response to the 2008 economic crisis and subsequent recession. Vancouver-based magazine Adbusters published a blog post that called for the occupation of Zuccotti Park, near the New York Stock Exchange,.3 This post, alongside extensive sharing of information on social media platforms, in particular Twitter, led to the September 17th occupation of the park as well as numerous camps set up across the United States in solidarity. Due to their branding of protesting the “1%” and quick spread of information online, the movement gained significant public support. Despite extensive backing, the encampment at Zuccotti was taken down on the 15th of November.4 While much has been written on OWS, technology has evolved a lot in the few years since then, so it is important to also reference a current movement. Ende Gelände, a coalition against coal mining in Germany,

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On has been active since 2015 and organizes a series of protests each year that include blockades, marches, and sit ins. Their organization and recruitment

2 James Tully, “On Global Citizenship,” in On Global Citizenship: James Tully in Dialogue (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2014), 10. 3 Tan Yangfang, “ 2012, “A Review of the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ Movement and its Global Influence,”International Critical Thought 2, no.2 (2012): 248. 4 Paolo Gerbaudo, “Follow Me, but don’t Ask Me to Lead You!: Liquid Organising and Choreographic Leadership,” in Tweets and the Streets:Social Media and Contemporary Activism (London: Pluto Press, 2012):103-104.

34 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance occur mainly through their websites and on social media. One of their most intensive operations has been the camp in the Hambach Forest, where protesters have set up treehouses and blockades to campaign against the open-pit coal mine that has existed in the area since 1978.5

The Structure of Digital Resistance There are many ways in which social media platforms have changed the course of civil disobedience, both in the examples focused on in this paper as well as others occurring in the current digital climate. One of the most notable aspects involves the changes to the structuring and leadership of a movement. As scholar Robin Celikates states, “in contrast to what the liberal mainstream suggests, [civil disobedience] is rarely a matter of isolated individuals standing up for their rights or their conscience against the state or the majority: more often, and paradigmatically, civil disobedience is the collective assertion of political agency.”6 Civil disobedience has always been public, to make an impact a movement needs many people to catch the attention of the government Beyond the Blockade they are resisting, but Celikates’ quote refers to the collective process of resistance, a process enhanced by social media platforms. Now, often instead of seeing movements defined by theirleaders, such as those led by Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr, resistance acts display what some have called “liquid structured movements,” referring to the informal and fluid structures of these protests.7 A large part of this is due to the increased power of platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. The digital tools on these sites, like event pages and posts, are now often considered substitutes of the traditional organizational requirements like in-person planning.8 Instead of one person or a small group leading movements, protests organized online tend to rely on mass spread of knowledge. Some scholars believe that due to the availability of modern social networking technology, traditional hierarchical command structures are no longer needed. Instead, movements can rely on this communal intelligence.

5 “Ende Gelände 2020 - Startpage,” Ende Gelände, 2020, https://www.ende-gelaende.org. 6 Robin Celikates, “Learning from the Streets: Civil Disobedience in Theory and Practice,” in global aCtIVISm. Art and Conflict in the 21st Century (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press): 69. 7 Gerbaudo, “Follow Me,”136. 8 Jen Schradie, “Moral Monday Is More Than a Hashtag: The Strong Ties of Social Movement Emergence in the Digital Era,”in Social Media + Society no.1 (2018): 2.

35 Smith

The Occupy Wall Street Protest took pride in its ability to be a leaderless movement and used the communal nature of the structure to emphasize the power of the “average person” as a significant part of their resistance.9 Instead of identifying as part of a specific organization or religion that was protesting; people felt that they were individually a part of the cause itself.10 Likewise, in interviews conducted by Democracy Now!, an independent news source, on the Ende Gelände movement, protesters expressed that they were united under a shared desire to stop the Hambach coal mine, indicating that they were not moved to action by a central figure but a collective political want.11 Despite many movements declaring themselves leaderless, there are always participants who fall into a role of organizer: these roles are now just filled informally. In some cases, this refers to highly engaged social media activists who end up shaping the actions of the movements due to their stronger degree of influence and control over the communication flow.12 For example, serial activists and influencers who used the OWS hashtags during the movement had a much larger following than the average user, meaning that the information those users dispersed was consumed at a higher rate and took up a disproportionate amount of the knowledge base. This, in turn, shaped the direction of the movement by identifying what aspects of the cause were most important to the group.13 As well, the initial call to action came from a specific place, the Vancouver-based magazine, Adbusters, showing that while the movement may have been decentralized, there were individuals that shaped those initial messages. This suggests that while the growth of social media platforms have altered the structuring of civil disobedience movements, they have not disassembled structures as many sources of media have suggested. Protests like OWS grow much faster, and do not have the traditional central figure, but still are rooted in having key activists that spread the message and recruit. These actions just also happen online now.

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Beyond the structuring of organizations itself, social media has also added to the way in which information is spread to both supporters

9 Gerbaudo, “Follow Me,” 134. 10 Gerbaudo, 136. 11 Amy Goodman “Special Report from the Occupied Forest: Meet Activists Fighting Europe’s Largest Open-Pit Coal Mine.” Democracy Now!, 2017 12 Gerbaudo, “Follow Me,” 135. 13 Dan Mercea and Marco Bastos, “Being a Serial Transnational Activist,” Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 21, no. 2 (2016): 142.

36 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance and the general public. Gathering, storing, and dispersing data is one of the most crucial aspects of any collective action, and advancements in technology has led to this all happening much quicker than ever before.14 In traditional forms of civil resistance, information, branding, and messages were all passed on through word of mouth or slower forms of media, often through pre-existent organizations such as churches. With access to social media, messages can now be sent and relayed to a wider and more varied audience.15 One supporter sharing a post can connect to hundreds of others, who in turn may also share that post, relaying the information to their online circles. The fact that these online connections are not always personal ones spreads the information to a much wider range than previously possible. No longer do movements rely on a slow spread between individuals, now, given the right circumstances as was seen with OWS, support can be gained almost instantly. With the combination of loose organization and quick information spread, people who would traditionally take the role of support in a movement now find themselves occupying both a supporter and recruiter

role. Clay Shirky, a prominent scholar of digital media, has asserted that Beyond the Blockade social media has allowed the public to turn from consumers of media, through means such as television or radio, to producers of it, due to the interactive nature of the internet.16 Protests participants have now become producers of resistance through their own social media circles. Previously, the public would simply support and follow the leaders of a protest or uprising by consuming the messages those leaders produced. They may have relayed those messages to other potential supporters but would not be creating their own forms of recruitment. Now, average members of the public can produce their own content for the movement they are a part of. Since social media platforms have minimal entry costs and limited external regulation, at least in comparison to other communication platforms, nearly anyone can open an account to curate and share information.17 On those more creative platforms like YouTube, supporters can even create

14Bruce Bimber et al, “Reconceptualizing Collective Action in the Contemporary Media Environment,” Communication Theory 15 no.4 (2005): 371. 15 Patrick Gillham et al, “The Mobilizing Effects of Economic Threats and Resources on the Formation of Local Occupy Wall Street Protest Groups,” Sociological Perspectives 62 no.4 (2019): 447. 16 Clay Shirky, “Gin, Television, and Cognitive Surplus,” in The Best Technology Writing (New Haven: Yale University Press. 2009): 216. 17Jason Gainous et al, “Traditional Versus Internet Media in a Restricted Information Environment: How Trust in the Medium Matters,” Polit Behav 41 (2019): 403.

37 Smith

and share their own content like videos to educate, inspire, and recruit. Even so, as the power of social media increases, so does the potential for abuse of that power through censorship, political influence, fake news, and more. Despite the problems of social technology, becoming involved in a social movement now not only involves joining a previously created discourse, but also contributing and creating your own public sphere. Even for those not creating their own content, they contribute to knowledge construction and informal teaching by participating online.18 In sharing and retweeting specific posts, everyone in the movement curates a sphere of knowledge. The aspects that are shared the most, the ones that appear in the most individual sphere’s, often move into a curated public sphere where new members gain their background knowledge on the movement. This increased individual involvement is why social media activism is a legitimate form of resistance. By only using Rawls's definition, these acts would not be considered disobedience as they are not breaking the law or may not even be ‘public’ if they are only sharing to a specific group of followers. Online engagement may not be as outwardly disobedient as an activist participating in a blockade, but since participants are engaging and not just consuming content, even the minimally active online user becomes an integral part of building the discourse of resistance. The fluidity of organization and information of social media activism may also lead to higher levels of support from participants. In a study conducted on Twitter users who used the OWS hashtag, results showed that many participants felt and expressed appreciation for having acquired a role in the movement through their active Twitter participation. This suggests that the lack of leadership allowed for participants to feel more engaged and involved in the movement.19 Even those with minimal knowledge of other contributors have opportunities to contribute to the information pools others will use to educate themselves.20 There are also, however, negatives to this change in information disbursement, such as the issue of digital security and the increasing concern of the influence On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On of the political elite influence on social platforms. The transition of participants from supporters to creators does shift away from those traditional concepts of resistance but again not as strongly as some would

18 Benjamin Gleason, “#Occupy Wall Street: Exploring Informal Learning About a Social Movement on Twitter,” American Behavioral Scientist 57 no.7 (2013): 968. 19 Mercea and Bastos, “Being a Serial Transnational Activist,” 148. 20 Bimber et al, “Reconceptualizing Collective Action,” 272.

38 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance suggest. Recruitment has always been integral to building support, and support is necessary for a movement to succeed. With online activism, that recruitment process has just been opened to participation from a broader sphere.

Transnational Activism Social media active has also opened resistance beyond borders and specific organizations. With the increase of social media use, a movement’s message may reach not only the specific people who have been affected by the injustice but also people from all over the world who can become involved or at the very least become aware. This ability for movements to cross borders has resulted in what has been termed “transnational activism.”21 Civic resistance has traditionally been intertwined with the specific physical geographies that are associated. Sometimes this takes form in a literal sense such as with the Ende Gelände movement’s Hambach forest camp and other times more symbolically 22 such as with the OWS proximity to the New York Stock Exchange. Beyond the Blockade The locational attributes have traditionally shaped the movement just as much as the cause itself, for example, the Ende Gelände takes place in Germany so it will attract mainly Germans whose cultural background naturally will shape choices of the movement. As well, beyond the fact that movements are often determined by local factors, there is also the issue that traditionally, the focus is on a political problem instituted by a specific government. With the rise of globalization and social media connecting more and more people around the world, it is difficult to pinpoint who will remain in the realm of resistance. Specifically, scholars have pointed to the fact that there is no post-nationalist authority to appeal to; in other words, there is an ambiguity to who the resistance is directed at if not at the civic leaders in charge of the state where the issue started.23 Some types of

21 Michael Dahlberg-Grundberg and Johan Örestig, “Extending the local: activist types and forms of social media use in the case of an anti-mining struggle,” Social Movement Studies 16 no.3 (2017): 309. 22 Ibid. 23 William Scheuerman, “Civil Disobedience in the Shadows of Postnationalization and Privatization,” Journal of International Political Theory 12 no.3 (2016): 244.

39 Smith

civil resistance are easier to justify, such as with environmental justice, as climate change is a global issue.24 With most other types of movements, it is more difficult to agree on who should be considered participating in resistance. Despite the confusion, most modern movements have increasingly committed to a diversity of ideological commitments, identities, and aims.25 Someone who is merely supporting a movement is still in the sphere of resistance: while they might not be personally affected, they still resonate with and promote the identities or ideals of the movement. This spread has been introduced by “global activity on social media [which] amplifies the public consciousness of…popular uprisings.” Support can now be garnered from much farther than before.26 Such additional support may lead to more pressure on the government to change the law or action being protested. The suggestion that digital resistance from abroad is legitimate echoes the concept that “citizenship is not a status given by the institutions of the modern constitutional state and international law, but negotiated practices in which one becomes a citizen through participation.”27 This refers to the fact that one may not be a citizen of the state facing the protest but can still be a part of the overarching ideals of the movement. With the OWS movement, the Zuccotti occupation may have been taken down, but “Occupy” protests popped up all over the world afterwards.28 The concept of the 99% protesting has remained popular to this day, leading to the resurgence of the Democratic Socialists of America.29 The sharing of a movement’s message has always been essential to the impact of a protest, as there is very limited ability to pressure a government without enough support: online civic resistance is just an extension of the appeals for support that have always been used in resistance movements. All these arguments culminate in the fact that a harsh division between online and offline protest should not be the way in which civic resistance is discussed. Instead, the scope should be broadened to

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On encompass both: a hybrid approach, in which neither traditional offline nor online forms are excluded. Civic resistance overlaps these spaces, its organization and structure may begin or be enhanced online, but the

24 Scheuerman, 241. 25 Celikates, “Learning from the Streets,” 70. 26 Mercea and Bastos, “Being a Serial Transnational Activist,” 140. 27 Tully, “On Global Citizenship,” 9. 28 Yangfang, “Review of Occupy Wall Street,” 248. 29 Emily Stewart, “We Are (Still) the 99 Percent,” Vox, 2019.

40 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance protests like sit ins and blockades that happen in the offline world are still just as significant they previously were.30 Multiple aspects can be stated as overlapping between the online and offline spaces of protest. These include: the facilitation of face-to-face protests, live reporting of protests, expressing personal opinions about the movement, and making connections with fellow activists.31 These aspects underline why it is better to use the term civic resistance, as civil disobedience is too associated with those original, now too narrow concepts. At the same time, however, the idea that resistance of the modern day should not be considered a completely new concept, severed from the past. Social media acts as an extension of its previous forms, not a new creation independent from previous iterations.

Weak and Strong Ties Important to this conversation also is the presence of weak versus strong ties in movements. Social movements online are considered to create weak ties as they are a collection of individuals only loosely Beyond the Blockade connected through the internet. Strong ties are made through trusted connections of people in personal or professional circles. Malcolm Gladwell argues in his New Yorker article that social media cannot give way to any huge revolution due to the weak ties it creates, with reference to Martin Luther King Jr’s need for discipline and strategy that would not have been possible through tweets or posts.32 It is a strong argument, especially when you compare it to how quickly the OWS occupation was dismantled or the disparity between the thousands of people who supported the movement online versus the three hundred that physically showed up.33 Other researchers have countered with the argument that the internet can link weak-tied individuals for motivation through the ability to personalize messages for a wider audience. This argument considers strong ties as non-essential, which is a difficult concept to agree with.

30 Dahlberg-Grundberg and Örestig, “Extending the local,” 311. 31 Joel Penney and Caroline Dadas, “(Re)Tweeting in the service of protest: Digital composition and circulation in the Occupy Wall Street movement,” New Media & Society, 16 no.1 (2013): 79 32 Malcolm Gladwell, “Why the revolution will not be tweeted,” The New Yorker. 2010. 33 Paolo Gerbaudo, “The Hashtag which did (Not) Start a Revolution: The Laborious Adding Up to the 99,” In Tweets and the Streets: Social Media and Contemporary Activism (London: Pluto Press, 2015) 102.

41 Smith

Most movements that rely only on weak ties have generally not been acts of resistance and more acts of awareness. These acts are ones that do not try to change a law but simply encourage the public to consider an issue. However, neither argument seems to fit the current climate of civic resistance. Instead, the idea posed by Schradie that strong ties often pre-exist within groups and the weak ties simply enhance pre-existing connections seems to be the most compelling.34 The Ende Gelände movement highlights this transitive nature of new civic resistance. Calls go out to potential activists through their social media platforms. Recruitment videos are sent to followers, posts are shared of their own camps as well as other news reports on environmental degradation, and through these social media interactions weak ties are created between potential activists. Those that actively engage with those posts are already moving towards the actual, physical form of resistance. But it is not the general public that would engage with a group that participates in environmental blockades and sit-ins. It is more likely that those individuals already have a strong tie connection with others involved in environmentalism or the cause itself. As with most kinds of resistance, one of the first steps of a successful movement is finding “a means of identifying people with relevant, potential interests in the public good.”35 This might be through the founding of a Instagram page for environmentalists, where people can invite weak-tied online relations but also strong-tied friendships to engage with the sphere. Additionally, those strong ties are strengthened with the physical actions that the participant chooses to partake in. This further supports the idea that while social media has adjusted the way in which civic resistance is organized, the root elements have remained similar.

Conclusion Going back to my original analogy, the newer forms of resistance,

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On the air warfare, is not a separate branch from traditional ground warfare, instead they have become interdependent of one another: the weak ties of the online sphere support the strong ties of the offline sphere, and vice versa. It also echoes Celikates’ sentiments that the newer forms of civil disobedience have a much wider and more creative repertoire of ways to engage, not only with acts of disobedience but also in recruitment of

34 Schradie, “Moral Monday is More than a Hashtag,” 3. 35 Bimber et al, “Reconceptualizing Collective Action,” 374.

42 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance individuals and identities.36 Successful movements, like Ende Gelände, are just bypassing the old form of recruitment and engagement with social media to gain a wider base so that when the time comes, there will be physical support in acts of protests, with digital supporters echoing and enhancing their calls. Social media will remain essential around the world. It has indisputably contributed to some of the changes civic resistance has undergone. No longer can resistance be neatly fit into the definition Rawls gave it in 1971, the narrowness of that concept misses out on some of the crucial aspects of current movements. The organization of a campaign and efforts on social media should be considered under the umbrella of civic resistance because without that aspect, the protest would have never occurred. However, it is inefficient to only look at the physical acts themselves. One reason for that could simply be that for one to study a civic resistance movement happening today without looking at social media, nearly all the organizational and recruitment aspects would not be included in the research. This would lead to very incomplete and unsatisfying results. Beyond the Blockade Even more importantly, there is a fluid line between social media resistance and physical resistance. Traditional aspects of recruitment, organization and knowledge sharing happen on both online and offline spheres. Weak ties are made online but are enhanced by strong ties made either before organization or during protests themselves. These elements may function differently, with most now happening online, but their root functions remain as they always had. There are certainly issues with the online sphere, censorship, fake news, and unequal distributions of technology across the global population to name a few, but new forms of resistance have been cultivated in these platforms. The idea that social media has created a completely new form of resistance, or that Facebook and Twitter are not a place for resistance may seem more dramatic, but in reality, social media has just adjusted the way in which these movements occur. The air and ground warfare that occurs in the field of resistance seem to be intertwining more and more as the digital sphere increases its prominence in our lives. Between the ever changing nature of social networking, and the growing influences of tech

36 Celikates, “Learning from the Streets,” 71.

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companies and government, no one can know the role social media will play in future acts of resistance; however, we can say that it has become an essential tool for resistance, keeping these new protests rooted in traditional resistance while expanding the movement’s reach. On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On

44 How Social Media has Changed the Face of Resistance

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Bimber, Bruce, Andrew Flanagin, and Cynthia Stohl. 2005. “Reconceptualizing Collective Action in the Contemporary Media Environment.” In Communication Theory 15(4): 365–388. https://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/10.1111/j.1468-2885.2005. tb00340.x. Celikates, Robin. 2015. “Learning from the Streets: Civil Disobedience in Theory and Practice.” In global aCtIVISm. Art and Conflict in the 21st Century, edited by Peter Weibel, 65–72. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press. Dahlberg-Grundberg, Michael, and Johan Örestig. 2017. “Extending the local: activist types and forms of social media use in the case of an anti-mining struggle.” In Social Movement Studies 16(3): 309-322, http://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/10.1080/14742837.2016.126 8955. Beyond the Blockade “Ende Gelände 2020 - Startpage.” 2020. Ende Gelände. Last accessed April 1, 2020. https://www.ende-gelaende.org/en/ Gainous, Jason, Jason Abbott, and Kevin Wagner. 2019. “Traditional Versus Internet Media in a Restricted Information Environment: How Trust in the Medium Matters.” In Political Behaviour 41: 401–422. https://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/10.1007/s11109- 018-9456-6. Gerbaudo, Paolo. 2015a. “‘Follow Me, but don’t Ask Me to Lead You!: Liquid Organising and Choreographic Leadership.” In Tweets and the Streets: Social Media and Contemporary Activism, 134-157. London: Pluto Press. Gerbaudo, Paolo. 2015b. “The Hashtag which did (Not) Start a Revolution: The Laborious Adding Up to the 99.” In Tweets and the Streets: Social Media and Contemporary Activism, 102-133 London: Pluto Press

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Gillham, Patrick, Nathan Lindstedt, Bob Edwards,and Erik Johnson. 2019. “The Mobilizing Effects of Economic Threats and Resources on the Formation of Local Occupy Wall Street Protest Groups.” In Sociological Perspectives 62(4): 433–454. http://doi-org.ezproxy. library.uvic.ca/10.1177/0731121418817249 Gladwell, Malcom. 2010. “Why the revolution will not be tweeted.’ The New Yorker. Last accessed April 3, 2020. https://www.newyorker. com/magazine/2010/10/04/small-change-malcolm-gladwell Gleason, Benjamin. 2013 “#Occupy Wall Street: Exploring Informal Learning About a Social Movement on Twitter.” In American Behavioral Scientist 57 (7): 966–82. https://doi-org.ezproxy. library.uvic.ca/10.1177/0002764213479372. Goodman, Amy. 2017. “Special Report from the Occupied Forest: Meet Activists Fighting Europe’s Largest Open-Pit Coal Mine.” Democracy Now! Last Accessed March 31, 2020. https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=XtXLeWJzhGU Mercea, Dan, and Marco Bastos. 2016. “Being a Serial Transnational Activist.” In Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 21(2): 140–155. https://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/10.1111/ jcc4.12150 Penney, Joel, and Caroline Dadas. 2013. “(Re)Tweeting in the service of protest: Digital composition and circulation in the Occupy Wall Street movement” In New Media & Society, 16(1), 74–90. https:// doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/10.1177/1461444813479593 Rawls, John. 1971. “Duty and Obligation.” In A Theory of Justice, 308– 31. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Scheuerman, William. 2016. “Civil Disobedience in the Shadows of Postnationalization and Privatization.” In Journal of International On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Political Theory 12(3): 237–57. http://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic. ca/10.1177/1755088215617192. Schradie, Jen. 2018. “Moral Monday Is More Than a Hashtag: The Strong Ties of Social Movement Emergence in the Digital Era.” In Social Media + Society 1: 1-13. http://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic. ca/10.1177/2056305117750719

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Shirky, Clay. 2009. “Gin, Television, and Cognitive Surplus.” In The Best Technology Writing edited by Steven Johnson, 211-218. New Haven: Yale University Press. Stewart, Emily. 2019.“We Are (Still) the 99 Percent.” Vox. Last accessed March 28, 2020. https://www.vox.com/the- highlight/2019/4/23/18284303/occupy-wall-street-bernie-sanders- dsa-socialism Tully, James. 2014. “On Global Citizenship.” In On Global Citizenship: James Tully in Dialogue, 3–100. London: Bloomsbury Academic. Yangfang, Tan. 2012. “A Review of the ‘Occupy Wall Street’ Movement and its Global Influence.” In International Critical Thought 2 (2): 247-254. https://doi-org.ezproxy.library.uvic. ca/10.1080/21598282.2012.684287 Beyond the Blockade

47 A Perspective on Identity and Conflict

The Ba’athist State’s Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria

Hamza Badsha

Abstract: With the outbreak of conflict in 2011, the Syrian predicament became of great interest not only to the actors and people directly affected, but also to a global audience that mostly understands the region from a reductionist, essentialist perspective. While acknowledging elements of this conflict had sectarian undertones, this paper departs from popular civilizational discourse that seeks to paint the MENA in sectarian terms. By exploring the role Bashar Al- Assad’s government played in “sectarianizing” the Syrian conflict, this analysis will look at the ways in which Bashar’s government engages with actors across confessional divides in some instances, and shores up sectarian tensions in others. I argue that the Syrian state implicitly demonstrates that cleavages need to be exploited, and sects mobilized, and that MENA conflict is not inherently about asserting sectarian primacy. Taking guidance from the theoretical framework laid out by Danny Postel and Nader Hashemi, I argue the Syrian state’s sectarianizing and self-preservationist behaviour, is reflective of a regional power struggle and political preservation. Instead, Syrian civil society in 2011 overwhelmingly represented notions of political empowerment, reform, and agency, and not agitation to worsen existing sectarian cleavages.

Acknowledgements: I would like to thank Dr. Martin Bunton, for whose seminar I initially wrote this paper, for providing clear direction and encouraging a practice of inquisitiveness and academic rigor among his students. I would like to thank Dr. Chris Kilford for his time, effort, insights, and extensive guidance in editing this paper. Finally, I would like to thank my editor and the OnPol editorial team for their hard work and facilitation of this effort.

48 State Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria

The March 2011 non-violent protests in the Syrian city of Daraa, following the jailing and torture of several teenage boys, soon led to a brutal military crackdown. What began as a sincere push for reforms by the Syrian people, frustrated with government repression and corruption, soon turned into an increasingly violent conflict that continues to impact the political, economic, and social life of the Syrian people in tremendous ways. At the time of writing, the ongoing discord is not relegated to Syria but has spilled over its borders and gravely impacted all of its neighbours. What started out as a non-violent protest movement from civil society activists from a large cross-section of Syrian society has evolved into a struggle for control between state loyalists, their allies, and militant opposition groups, the latter acting either independently or as clients of external regional actors. The Syrian conflict sees multiple actors vying to secure their regional influence through the conflict, and it has long surpassed being a domestic movement fuelled by the citizenry’s call for political reform. Various groups, from religious extremists like the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and the Al-Nusra Front to state, sub-state, and non-state actors with overtly religious identities such as Turkey, and Iran,

and Hezbollah, exploit existing sectarian differences among the populace Perspective on Identiy & Conflict A to mobilize support and justify their prerogatives. As a result, much of the violence has sectarian overtones and ostensibly pits groups against each other along sectarian lines. We must consider, however, the role that certain actors play in fuelling this sectarian discord, and how sectarian identity can be mobilized for political gain. This paper will examine the Assad government’s role in what Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel would term ‘sectarianizing’ the Syrian civil war. Considering the multiple cases in which the Syrian state participated in alliances that went beyond sectarian affiliation, this paper will assess how the state engaged in sectarianizing rhetoric and efforts to further their interests. By considering the state as a sectarianizing actor, this paper argues that the Syrian conflict cannot be viewed solely in essentialist terms as a conflagration of long-standing hostilities between different sects. By observing how the state formed alliances that do not subscribe to notions of sectarian solidarity in some cases, and how it exploits sectarian concerns in others, it will be shown that the Syrian state consciously played a part in inducing the sectarianized nature of the conflict in Syria, and that the Syrian conflict is not essentially about sectarian divides but instead about the state sectarianizing the conflict for its self-preservationist ends.

49 Badsha

Hashemi and Postel provide three schools of thought — Primordialism, Instrumentalism, and Constructivism — that help explain ethno-nationalist identity and how there is a basis for mobilizing individuals along these lines. Applying a Primordialist lens to sectarian tensions sees conflict arising between group identities “based on a set of intangible elements rooted in biology, history, and tradition that bind the individual to a larger collectivity.”1 Hashemi and Postel write that while Primordialism is useful “in identifying where ethno-religious ties are prevalent, it does not tell us how it can be a factor in mobilizing identity during times of conflict.”2 It explains why ethno-religious identity is prevalent in countries with weak social institutions revolving around gender, labour, and class, but it does not explain why this necessarily mobilizes groups towards conflict with each other on this basis.3 Instrumentalism sees “ethno-religious mobilization [as] a tool in the service of actors who are able to advance their political and economic interests by acting as political entrepreneurs,”4 with ethno-religious leaders doing so by “emphasizing in-group similarities and out-group differences, as well as invoking the fear of assimilation, domination, or annihilation.”5 While Instrumentalism is useful in understanding how actors with authority can mobilize populations along ethno-religious lines, Hashemi and Postel suggest that disagreement can arise over “the degree to which these identities can be manipulated.”6 Constructivism synthesizes Primordialist and Instrumentalist views regarding the nature of ethno-religious identity. Based on Hashemi and Postel’s definition, Constructivists argue that ethno-religious identity “is not fixed but is rather a political construct based on a dense web of social relationships that form in the context of modernity.”7 Constructivists

1 Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel, “Sectarianization: Mapping the new Politics of the Middle East,” The Review of Faith and International Affairs 15, no. 3 (2017): 4. Hashemi and Postel’s article quoted here is adapted from the introductory chapter to their book, Sec- tarianization: Mapping the New Politics of the Middle East, (New York: Oxford University Press and London: Hurst, 2017). Their “sectarianization thesis” explores how authoritar-

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On ian regimes deliberately manipulate pre-existing sectarian identities. This paper borrows heavily from Hashemi and Postel, and working with their theoretical framework, seeks to demonstrate how the Syrian state under Bashar al-Assad behaves as a sectarianizing force. 3 (2017): 4. 2 Ibid. 3 Ibid. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid. 7 Ibid.

50 State Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria would acknowledge both the existence of distinct identities centring around religion and ethnicity and the capacity for actors to capitalize on these divides. Hashemi and Postel tend to agree with this lens when arguing their Sectarianization thesis, which seeks to establish that the current sectarian discord in the Middle East is due to “an active process shaped by political actors operating within specific contexts, pursuing political goals that involve the mobilization of popular sentiments around particular identity markers.”8 These perspectives are valuable when considering the Syrian conflict, as sectarianization appropriately describes the Assad state’s conspicuous role in fomenting sectarian anxieties among sections of its populace to bolster support and gain legitimacy. Hashemi and Postel draw on Vali Nasr’s insights on how state actors are not relegated to having merely political influence, but also see political gain in exploiting and entrenching what Nasr describes as “identity cleavages”9 between different social groups. Nasr suggests that state actors act externally upon these different communities, and unlike societal elites or community actors, do not emerge from within the communities they manipulate through divide and rule tactics.10 Constructivism does not “believe that ethnicity/religion

is inherently conflictual, but rather that conflict flows from ‘pathological Perspective on Identiy & Conflict A social systems’ and ‘political opportunity structures’ that breed conflict from multiple social cleavages beyond the control of the individual.”11 This is a crucial aspect of the Syrian predicament, as the widespread escalation of conflict in the region forced and continues to force those affected to identify with groups ordered around previously existing and deepening sectarian cleavages. These perspectives shift the focus from a purely essentialist view of the seemingly sectarian violence in Syria to one that considers the relationship between the Syrian state and society, insofar as the regime has acted to exploit these sectarian divides to maintain its rule. Bashar’s sectarianization tactics and its implicit divide and rule has its antecedent in his father Hafez Al-Assad’s governance. Hafez assumed power as head of the Ba’ath party and of the Syrian state in 1970. Syrian society under Hafez was diverse, with Sunni Muslims forming the overwhelming majority, Alawis and Christians being significant minorities similar in number, while Druze and other Muslim sects accounted for

8 Ibid, 3. 9 Vali Nasr quoted in Hashemi and Postel, “Sectarianization,” 5. 10 Ibid. 11 Ibid, 4.

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a small minority, around 6% of the population.12 Syrian Kurds would become increasingly important actors as the 2011 conflict progressed, with the state and Kurdish People’s Protection Units becoming de facto allies in the face of Islamist and a Turkish-supported armed opposition. By the late 1990s under Hafez, “An informal, Alawi-dominated core [controlled] the main levers of power in the military and security services; over 90% of the key commands in the armed forces and security apparatus [were] held by Alawis.”13 As Risa Brooks points out, “Appointees with a shared background help to ensure that the military’s preferences are similar to those of the regime. Privileging these interests also creates a constituency with a vested interest in the status quo.”14 However, appointment based on similar ethno-religious background was not the singular concern of Hafez’s strategy, however, as evidenced by how the military exploited an urban-rural divide by tending to draw Sunni officers from the rural lower classes. Organization in Hafez’s military is an example of how the Ba’athist state was cognizant of existing social cleavages – ethnic, sectarian, or socio-economic – and exploited those to secure their political stability. Sectarian affiliation and primacy in the military has not been the party’s primary motivation, evidenced by the presence of strong non- Alawi figureheads like the Sunni Minister of Defense Mustafa Tlass under Hafez and the Greek Orthodox Minister of Defense Daoud Rajiha under Bashar. These existing cleavages accentuated in an institution such as the military were convenient for the purposes of later sectarianization, as we will see in the case of Alawite officers and the 2011 conflict in this paper. The military example is part of the structural legacy Bashar inherited from his father, and the latter’s government was able to capitalize on this. By 2011, Syria remained a diverse society, one stacked in favour of Ba’athist functionaries and beneficiaries, whether from the military or civil society. Bashar’s government deployed their sectarianizing tactics in this context, making self-preservationist moves and only playing along sectarian dynamics when it achieved this end.

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On The dynamics between the Syrian state and leading Sunni religious establishment figures in Syria such as Said Ramadan al-Bouti are an example of how sectarian divides have been used in this regard. Al-Bouti’s close relationship with the Syrian state and his position as a

12 Risa Brooks, Political-military Relations and the Stability of Arab Regimes (Oxford: Oxford University Press for the International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1998), 21. 13 Ibid, 32. 14 Ibid.

52 State Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria spokesperson for state legitimacy was one such opportunistic alliance formed during the conflict that went beyond sectarian affiliation.Assad co-opted the Sunni establishment in the form of figures like Al-Bouti to make his government appear asectarian and legitimate to the majority of Syria’s citizenry, who happened to be Sunni. Al-Bouti denounced protests against the state as being foreign-sponsored Zionist machinations, utilizing such anti-Semitic rhetoric to dismiss the problems Syrian demonstrators had with the government.15 He was vocal in his defence , claiming “his stance was dictated by ‘godly inspiration’.”16 Al-Bouti’s position of immense religious authority and influence was a clear asset to theAssad government, and he was appointed as the spokesperson announcing Bashar al-Assad’s second presidential address following his first address to the People’s Council on March 30, 2011. Al-Bouti announced the lifting of the Law of Emergency, hailing the reforms that the Ba’ath party planned to initiate as an increase in freedoms for the Syrian people. However, the Anti-Terrorist Law that replaced the Law of Emergency was equally restrictive and the first draft constitution released in February 2012 was unpopular with the opposition.17 Al-Bouti’s ready endorsement of these government prerogatives

indicated his disconnect from the Syrian protestors and willingness to toe Perspective on Identiy & Conflict A the Ba’ath party’s line. Al-Bouti, in fact, had his own motives driving his desire for closer association with the state, apparent in the decisions he announced to reinstate “face-veiled teachers and Islamic-leaning members of the Governorate Council of Damascus,”18 to close casinos, launch the Islamic satellite channel Nur al-Sham, and establish the Al-Sham Higher Institute for Religious Sciences.19 These religious prerogatives certainly motivated Al-Bouti to cultivate close ties to the state, and enabled Al- Bouti “to preserve for himself a political role, which a democratic system would not grant him without requiring that he first acquire electoral legitimacy.”20 No doubt, the Assad government also regarded Al-Bouti as a valuable ally, granting him the political and religious agency he sought while mobilizing his authority as a leading Sunni religious figure for their

15 Thomas Pierret, Religion and State in Syria: The Sunni Ulama from Coup to Revolution, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 218. 16 Ibid, 219. 17 Ibid, 220. 18 Ibid. 19 Ibid, The Al-Sham institute would overlook accrediting and nationalizing both Sunni and Shia religious curricula. 20 Ibid.

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own purposes. This crucial intersection between the state’s and Al-Bouti’s interests pointed to the pragmatic approach that Assad’s government took regarding religious matters. The Alawi-headed government saw great value in propping up a leading Sunni scholar, and through this symbiotic relationship Al-Bouti was a legitimating figure for the government, utilizing his position to denounce anti-Assad sentiments and support the state in the name of stability. Rather than thinking of religious leaders like Al-Bouti as apolitical gatekeepers of certain confessional communities, we can instead understand that their actions were largely based on pursuing their own political and religious aims. The conduct on the part of Islamic scholars like Al-Bouti reinforces the notion that the conflict was not essentially sectarian, and sectarian divides did not result in action from one group against the other. Therefore, framing the conflict as inherently sectarian would be disingenuous. The state allowed this close political alliance to develop, and the fact that Al-Bouti was a Sunni figurehead deferring to an Alawi-led government did not seem to matter to both parties and their support bases. This indicates that sects did not matter and preserving the Syrian state was the key issue, and that alliances had to be built to this end. Not long after fighting began in Syria, the International Crisis Group (ICG) released a report in November 2011 that examined the various dynamics in Syrian political and civil society that would determine how the conflict would unfold. The report also discussed the historical ways in which the Syrian state ensured that a section of the Alawite community was sufficiently sectarianized by the time conflict broke out, stating that: the [Syrian] state in effect took the Alawite minority hostage, linking its fate to its own. It did so deliberately and cynically, not least in order to ensure the loyalty of the security services which, far from being a privileged, praetorian elite corps, are predominantly composed of underpaid and overworked Alawites hailing from villages the state has left in a state of abject underdevelopment.21 While rural Alawites lived in a state of abject poverty, the same On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On could not be said of Alawite officers in the military who were favoured and regarded as political assets by the Assad regime. Indeed, the military acted as the regime’s main support base to uphold state legitimacy, and it was for this reason that the state cultivated a close relationship with them, not merely on the basis of their shared religious ties with the Assad family. When protests broke out, the state manufactured anxieties among

21 International Crisis Group (ICG), Uncharted Waters: Thinking Through Syria’s Dynam- ics, 24 November 2011, 2.

54 State Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria

Alawite communities in rural areas, exaggerating or fabricating “stories of the protesters’ alleged sectarian barbarism.”22 Security forces then distributed weapons and fortified Alawite villages — playing to Alawite concerns that stemmed from being a historically marginalized minority — to mobilize these communities to put down local anti-government protests and voice their support for the government. ICG’s report also described anti-Alawite sentiments as being “initially latent and largely repressed,”23 but then exacerbated by the very visible role that these communities had in putting down early protests in rural Syria. With their sectarianizing efforts finding expression, the Syrian state under Assad was complicit in antagonizing the dynamic between certain Alawite communities and sections of the protest movement. Due to their long association with the state, Alawite officers at this early stage may have served the state’s ends out of self-interest. However, as the conflict became more grave and drawn out, they also found themselves doing so because their fate was tied to the state due to the latter’s deliberate historical process of sectarianization.24 While there existed real cause for concern over targeted sectarian violence, Assad’s government contributed to this climate of instability in how they patronized the Alawite military community, keeping them as partially empowered political allies by positioning them favourably in the military. As mentioned previously, this was a continuation of the military Perspective on Identiy & Conflict A predicament under Hafez which made Alawi officers beholden to the state, further otherizing them in the eyes of any hostile Sunni elements. Examining Assad’s alliances with foreign governments from a realist perspective, we see that the Syrian state engages in pragmatic, geo-strategic foreign relations that take on sectarianized optics. A key issue is the support that Iran lent to the Syrian government. Indeed, Assad became an important ally in the region and a crucial link to Hezbollah in Lebanon, and through the latter a proxy that deterred Israel from carrying out strikes on Iran’s nuclear program. From Jackson Diehl’s observations, it is apparent that the close alliance between Assad, Iran, and Hezbollah was borne out of geo-strategic and military pragmatism rather than through emphasis on Shi’i religious ties.25 The religious identities of such state and sub-state actors may have endeared them to certain sections of their populaces, but their engagement with a sectarian line of association has less to do with the actors’ personal belief systems than with the

22 Ibid. 23 Ibid. 24 Ibid. 25 Jackson Diehl, “Lines in the Sand: Assad Plays the Sectarian Card,” World Affairs 175, no. 1 (May/June 2012): 10.

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political clout, either domestic and international, that capitalizing on this posturing gives them. Paulo Pinto points out how this invited confusion and division among the protesters, with the anti-government protests in Daraa eventually incorporating anti-Hezbollah and anti-Iranian slogans “which targeted the international allies of the Assad state [and] was seen as anti-Shi’a sectarianism by many pro-state Alawis.”26 The strategic alliance between Assad, Iran, and Hezbollah also served to evoke sectarian reactions from some elements of the Syrian protest bloc, and so their sectarian posturing endeared them to any minority communities who were understandably concerned over their fate in an environment in which Assad’s government fell.27 The Syrian state, aware of the pragmatism in going beyond sectarian identity, has established mutually beneficial relationships with multiple Sunni actors from business and military sectors. In her recent study of the sectarianization of the Syrian conflict, Line Khatib identified a broad trend in the region in which “the politicization and intensification of [sectarian] divides are a result of moves and manipulations by state actors to reinforce the incumbent authoritarian states in the face of the threat of mass-politics.”28 She further explained that in a case such as Syria, sectarian divisions are important mobilizers for certain groups and are by no means constructed by state actors, but that they are more damaging and noticeable during times in which authoritarian rule is challenged.29 Khatib also pointed to how the Syrian National Defense Forces, the Ba’ath Brigades, and actors backed by the Iranian Quds Brigade were all predominantly Sunni organizations, providing substantial support to the state and funded by Sunni businessmen such as the Ghreiwati family and Muhammad Hamsho.30 The existence of such a crucial pro-regime support network within Syria sustained overwhelmingly by Sunni actors calls into

26 Paulo G. H. Pinto, “The Shattered Nation: The Sectarianization of the Syrian Conflict,” in Sectarianization: Mapping the new Politics of the Middle East, ed. Nader Hashemi and

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Danny Postel (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017), 132. 27 Ibid, Pinto mentions how through his interactions with Christian and Alawite interlocu- tors these concerns were very much alive among these communities and that the rumours that the regime was spreading were effectively taking root. 28 Line Khatib, “Syria, Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E. and Qatar: the ‘sectarianization’ of the Syrian Conflict and Undermining of Democratization in the Region,”British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 46, no. 3 (2019): 386. 29 Ibid, 387. 30 Ibid, 389. Ibid, 389, Hamsho is noted for having close business ties to Bashar’s brother Maher al-Assad.

56 State Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria question a narrative that seeks to explain the conflict in solely sectarian terms. It shows that sectarian identities within the Syrian population were less important compared to political and economic concerns if the Assad government were to fail. This reinforces Khatib’s observation that primordial identities “are fluid, situational and changing,”31 and do not command unyielding adherence from individuals and actors to their respective religious groups when choosing who to side with. Samer Abboud, like Khatib, also argued against the essentialism of reducing this conflict to one centred on sectarian divides. The Ba’ath party historically legitimated their rule in the name of fostering Syrian national unity while simultaneously and cynically deepening sectarian divides through positioning Alawites in “positions of political and security power.”32 Abboud frames this practise as one of political utility rather than stemming from ideological motivations, stating that this “had not come at the complete exclusion of other communities”33 and therefore did not preclude establishing beneficial relationships with actors from other political or social groups. The state could not afford to cultivate support among a populace solely based on sectarian criteria, as Alawites were and still are a minority in Syria and also because there exist numerous more divides among the Syrian populace that go beyond sectarian ones. Abboud also noted that “Regional differences as well as urban/rural divides and Perspective on Identiy & Conflict A class divisions have similarly contributed to Syria’s social mosaic. The stratification of society along sectarian, geographic, and class lines further complicates reducing Syrian identity to sect.”34 Reducing the conflict to merely sectarian terms, therefore, ignores the other interactions between different identity markers in Syrian society. The state recognizes this need for alliances spanning a cross section of Syrian political and civil society. Those established through familial ties such as Rami Makhlouf’s relation to Bashar (brothers in law through Asma Al-Akhras) indicate that the state itself understands that their ambitions and the conflict they help perpetuate to preserve such ambitions go far beyond matters of sectarian identity. The profitable relationship that Assad’s government has with figures such as Rami Makhlouf and other Sunni businesspeople, the favouritism afforded to Maher and Bashar’s

31 Ibid, 387. 32 Samer N. Abboud, Syria (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2016), 183. 33 Ibid. 34 Ibid, 183 – 184.

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in-laws due to their familial ties, and the many young Sunni men who fight in the army are all examples of how beneficial relationships persist without being threatened by the fact that Assad and his support network belong to different religious communities.35 The Syrian state attempted to characterize the early-stage protesters as religious extremists — and so sectarianize the issue — while disingenuous to the fact that economic malaise was an important factor driving this segment of Syrian civil society. An ICG report released in July 2011 pointed to “the pauperisation of the countryside”36 and how economic hardship combined with drought pushed rural Syrians to urban centres such as Damascus, Aleppo, and Homs. Rural migrant workers found themselves still neglected, without proper services and amenities in the suburbs that emerged around urban centres to which they moved to find work in. The report also pointed to the growing conditions of poverty and crime that people faced in these communities. However, as the report further noted it was not an economically compromised middle class and the underprivileged section of Syrian society that gave rise “to an illiterate and fanatical youth with which any rational dialogue would prove elusive”.37 Indeed, the state hoped to characterize the protesters in such terms in order to dismiss their concerns. In actuality, the protestors came from a section of Syrian society that had access to education and thus the tools to express their discontent given the absence of good governance and government excesses. The report suggested that when protests did break out, the state’s attempts to point out parallels between the protestors’ conservatism and the Muslim Brotherhood’s ideological outlook was misguided. At the time, the Brotherhood’s support base in the form of urban elites in Damascus, Homs, Hama, and Aleppo had no interest in joining the protests.38 Attempting to draw parallels between them and the protestors was pure misdirection. In January of 2012, Assad similarly conflated the protesters with groups such as Al-Qaeda in an attempt to use sectarian rhetoric to invalidate their demands and play to any fears that such a conflation might evoke within minority and moderate groups of the Syrian populace. As Pinto observed: On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On

35 Khatib, “Syria, Saudi Arabi, the UAE, and Qatar,” 389-390. 36 International Crisis Group (ICG), Popular Protest in North Africa and the Middle East (VI): The Syrian People’s Slow Motion Revolution, 6 July 2011, 16. 37 Ibid. 38 Ibid.

58 State Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria

From the outset, the state aimed to present the protesters as violent jihadists, isolating them from other groups in Syrian society and legitimizing the brutal repression through the international narrative of the American-led “War on Terror.” Also, by presenting terrorism or the state as only possible choices, Assad’s discourse made clear that the state would in no way take the political demands of the protests into account.39 The state’s efforts to insinuate that the protests were a Salafi conspiracy, Pinto added, were inconsistent with the reality of Islamist participation at the time, as the only politically active Salafi group in Syria, Hizb al-Tahrir, was not a jihadist group and the remainder of the Salafi groups in Syria adhered to Nasiruddin Al-Albani’s form of political quietism. This early attempt at sectarianizing the protests prompted reactions from the protesters themselves, who pointed to the non-Sunni and non-Muslim presences in their movement, evoking the memory of a Christian martyr Hatim Hanna to demonstrate inter-sectarian and national unity.40 From the analyses and commentaries this paper considers, the Syrian state’s conspicuous role in adding to the sectarianized nature of

the Syrian conflict was clear. Hashemi and Postel’s theoretical framework Perspective on Identiy & Conflict A helps us understand the political utility that state actors such as the Assad government saw in manipulating existing societal divides along sectarian lines. In particular, as a government under threat, the Ba’ath party saw an opportunity in mobilizing fear around sectarian concerns to mobilize groups against each other. We see how the Syrian state under Assad co- opted the traditional Sunni establishment by courting political alliances with Al-Bouti. This points to how the state itself did not see sectarian divide as something that necessarily positioned one group in conflict with the other and Al-Bouti saw mutual benefits and opportunity in his alliance with the state. Diehl pointed to the geo-strategic imperatives that the Syria-Iran-Hezbollah bloc safeguards, with their ultimate concern being political and military influence in the region, not ideological primacy. Khatib further pointed to the extensive network of mutually beneficial relationships the state enjoyed with Sunni civil society and the business community, and the significant support Assad received from his Syrian militias composed of Sunni troops. The ICG reports also provided insight into the early days of unrest in Syria, and how these civil society elements resented the state not out of sectarian biases but because of the economic, social, and political neglect they suffered.

39 Pinto, “Shattered Nation,” in Sectarianization, 127. 40 Ibid, 128.

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Regional and socioeconomic identities tied more prevalently into the backgrounds of these protestors, and not the issue of them being Sunni, Shi'a, or Christian. These reports and Pinto’s analysis point to the damaging campaign of sectarianization that Assad’s government engaged in during the outset of the uprising. The state fomented paranoia and dismissed the political demands of the early, non-violent elements of the opposition, immediately framing them in sectarian and religious extremist terms. This widened social cleavage that took root in Syrian society. The Assad government’s manoeuvres in playing to sectarian concerns when necessary to rally support and bolster their legitimacy had the double effect of isolating sections of Syrian society from each other, helping to frame their views in “us versus them” terms. However, sectarian differences were not the root cause behind the uprising and instead it was poor political and economic conditions that drove a cross-section of Syrians to take to the streets in anger. The ensuing conflict still played out functionally in sectarian terms because of actors, like the Syrian state, actively manipulating these existing divides. The Syrian state’s asectarian network of alliances, in some instances, pointed to their cognizance that maintaining domestic and regional power was not about establishing sectarian influence. Their sectarianization efforts targeting sections of Syrian civil society were effective in mobilizing groups against each other and were cynically carried out to preserve their ruling position. From the cases and insights considered, we can understand that the Syrian conflict is heavily sectarianized and is not essentially about sectarian differences.This is confirmed by the state’s own attitude toward sect, in that it holds no doctrinal sway over them as their primary concern is securing political control of Syria. Functionally, their course of action, whether reaching across the sectarian divide or playing to sectarian fears, has been to secure this end. This paper makes the case that viewing the hardship in Syria in solely essentialist terms, as some teleological conclusion to longstanding sectarian cleavages, is disingenuous. It would be a mischaracterization that ignored how the Syrian state under Bashar al-Assad functioned as On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On a sectarianizing actor that mobilized different groups along these lines, this done with the sole aim of preserving its power. Implicit in the state’s sectarianizing and self-preservationist behaviour, is a recognition that this conflict is not about essentialist sectarian divides, but about the pragmatics of a power struggle and political preservation.

60 State Sectarianizing Imperatives in Syria

Bibliography

Abboud, Samer N. Syria. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2016. Brooks, Risa. In Political-military Relations and the Stability of Arab Regimes. Oxford: Oxford University Press for the International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1998. Diehl, Jackson. “Lines in the Sand: Assad Plays the Sectarian Card,” In World Affairs 175, no. 1 (May/June 2012): 7 – 15. URL: https:// www.jstor.org/stable/41638987 Hashemi, Nader and Danny Postel. “Sectarianization: Mapping the new Politics of the Middle East.” In The Review of Faith and International Affairs 15, no. 3 (2017): 1 –13. DOI: 10.1080/15570274.2017.1354462. International Crisis Group (ICG). Popular Protest in North Africa and the Middle East (VI): The Syrian People’s Slow Motion Revolution. 6

July 2011. Perspective on Identiy & Conflict A International Crisis Group (ICG). Uncharted Waters: Thinking Through Syria’s Dynamics. 24 November 2011. Khatib, Line. “Syria, Saudi Arabia, the U.A.E. and Qatar: the ‘sectarianization’ of the Syrian Conflict and Undermining of Democratization in the Region.” In British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 46, no. 3 (2019): 385 – 403. DOI: 10.1080/13530194.2017.1408456 Pierret, Thomas. Religion and State in Syria: The Sunni Ulama from Coup to Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Pinto, Paulo G. “The Shattered Nation: The Sectarianization of the Syrian Conflict.” InSectarianization: Mapping the new Politics of the Middle East, 123 – 142. Edited by Nader Hashemi and Danny Postel. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2017.

61 Political Dissidence or Threat of Disintegration The Impacts of the Migrant Crisis on Potential European Disintegration

Keiran Ellis

Abstract: Ongoing discourses surrounding the success of the European Union (EU) have been brought forth since its inception. But within recent years, the migrant crisis has placed a significant strain on EU homogeneity. To assess the crisis’ impacts, this paper highlights the EU’s pre-existing structural components combined with increased racial tensions to be the potential demise of the system as a whole. Structural components including the Schengen Agreement and the quota system, along with xenophobic sentiments, have all led to division amongst EU members, leaving greater potential for disintegration. The UK’s decision to withdraw from the EU was a clear example of the structural flaws existing in this system, which were only exacerbated with the onset of this crisis. While the likelihood of definite disintegration is contested, a heightened possibility undoubtedly exists since the migrant crisis’ onslaught.

Acknowledgements: I would like to express my appreciation to Dr. Valerie D’Erman for her valuable and constructive proposals during the development of my research. My extended thanks to Rowan Zouboules for their significant editorial contributions and Marc Lortie for his invaluable input on current European affairs, which added unique discourse in this paper. An extended thanks to Editor-in-Chief Michael John Lo and all of the OnPol staff for facilitating tremendous organization and dedication to producing an outstanding issue of this journal.

62 The Impacts of the Migrant Crisis

The European Union (EU) is facing a dichotomy. How can it create uniformity amongst its member states while concurrently maintaining each country’s national values? This tension has been a challenge to the EU since its inception. The 2015 migrant crisis displaced millions of Syrian, Turkish, Lebanese, Jordanian, and Libyan citizens from their homes, leaving them to flee to nearby countries to seek asylum and protection. The EU, in responding to this flux of migrants during the crisis, encountered many obstacles surrounding their displacement. The political and legal challenges the EU faced, which included open-border crossings due to the Schengen Agreement, the quota system, and xenophobic attitudes tied to the rise of right-wing populist politics, have led to greater disagreement amongst EU member states. Foundations of the EU rely on unity and homogeneity, and this crisis has created greater division and thus an increased possibility for EU disintegration. The purpose of this paper is to examine the ramifications of these three factors, which ultimately led to disagreement and consequently a heightened potential for EU collapse. This paper will consider how these factors have led to the heightened potential of disintegration within the EU and also situate Brexit within the context of this crisis. With the basis of the EU being prefaced around homogeneity, the rise of the migrant crisis in 2015 poses a significant threat to EU homogeneity and increases the chances of disintegration. Political Dissidence or Disintegration Current quarrels may give way to greater disparities of opinion between current EU members, which should be considered a driving force for possible separation from the EU. The distinction between the terms ‘migrant’ and ‘refugee’ is important conceptually for understanding the crisis itself. The term ‘refugee’ refers to people seeking asylum who are forced to flee their country due to political instability, turmoil, oppression or economic persecution.1 ‘Migrant’ refers to the entire movement of people, which includes refugees, immigrants, and those searching for improved life in a different country, regardless of status, the cause for movement, and the length of stay.2 This distinction is important because the political arguments surrounding the swells of incoming people to Europe with an attempt to depoliticize the element of economics proposes a dehumanitarian front that is inherently political.3 The migrant crisis has been the largest and most unprecedented crisis for Europe since World

1 United Nations. “Migration.” United Nations: Peace, Dignity, and Equality on a Healthy Planet. United Nations. Accessed November 14, 2019. 2 United Nations. “Migration.” United Nations: Peace, Dignity, and Equality on a Healthy Planet. United Nations. Accessed November 14, 2019. 3 D’Erman, lecture and personal communication, October 22, 2019.

63 Ellis

War II.4 The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) noted that there was a 16% rise in displaced peoples globally, which equated to roughly 60 million worldwide; the migrant crisis accounted for a significant portion of this displacement.5 This flux of migrants seeking asylum in Europe was due to the political and religious turmoil, conflict, and instability in Middle Eastern countries, including Syria, Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan, but also in Africa, namely Libya.6 Syrian refugees were at the forefront of discussion surrounding this crisis: their migration to Europe was due to both the corruption of leadership that existed within Syria, as well as the Islamic States’ (ISIS’) rise to power.7 Moreover, poor conditions that existed in nearby refugee camps were insufficient for many due to lack of supplies and overcrowding; as a result, many fled to Europe to improve their quality of life.8 The Schengen Area represents 26 countries comprising 22 EU members and four non-members, which allows open-border crossings between each other.9 This gives individuals residing in the Schengen Area the ability to move from state to state without long-winded checks at each state’s border. Upon the influx of migrants in 2015, the element of open borders posed a significant perceived threat to national sovereignty for many European countries. There was also evidence of a great deal of political disparity amongst EU member states. In September of 2015, a summit was held whereby member states expressed their concerns for security with the large swells of migrants moving freely between the Schengen countries.10 Subsequently, a smaller coalition formed, which included Australia, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Finland, Germany, Greece and Sweden. This smaller coalition met to discuss the crisis itself and which countries would be willing to admit a higher number of migrants.11 The existence of both summits speaks to the lack of uniformity and strength, which could have existed in the European

4 Blasina, Niki. “Europe’s Migrant Crisis Explained,” The Wall Street Journal, 2015 5 Khan, Mishal S, et al., “Pathogens, Prejudice, and Politics: The Role of the Global Health Community in the European Refugee Crisis.” The Lancet Infectious Diseases 16, no. 8

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On (August 2016). 6 Blasina, Niki. “Europe’s Migrant Crisis Explained,” The Wall Street Journal, 2015 7 Ibid. 8 Ibid. 9 Brunet-Jailly, Emmanuel, Achim Hurrelmann, and Amy Verdun, eds. European Union Governance and Policy Making: A Canadian Perspective. University of Toronto Press, 2018. 10 Lehne, Stefan. “How the Refugee Crisis Will Reshape the EU.” Carnegie Europe, Febru- ary 4, 2016. 11 Ibid.

64 The Impacts of the Migrant Crisis

Council through this crisis. The ‘mini’ Schengen brought forth by Dutch finance minister Jeroen Dijsselbloem was proposed such that specific countries with a like-minded degree of acceptance would band together on issues surrounding the crisis.12 It is important here to note the initial levels of disagreement, as the inception of the ‘mini’ Schengen created cracks in the EU’s political uniformity.13 The increasing divide, which has arisen due to varying degrees of acceptance of migrants, has increased the possibility for a future divide. These varying degrees of acceptance coupled with the initiation of small-scale discussion groups excluding countries that disagreed, certainly did not create any form of structural strength to the EU: rather, it had the opposite effect.14 The partition which exists amongst the EU’s 28 member states suggests that these disagreements contribute to the potential for European disintegration. In an attempt to manage the open-borders, the Frontex Institution was the agency that oversaw border control of the Schengen regions, which was in alignment with regions of security along the coast.15 However, Frontex could not adequately control the unprecedented amount of border crossings, which occurred in 2015 due to lack of funding.16 Major political decisions were made amongst the European

Council, including the relocation of 160,000 refugees from countries Political Dissidence or Disintegration bordering water, such as Italy and Greece, to other countries who were a part of the Schengen Agreement.17 German Chancellor Angela Merkel clearly asserted that the Schengen Agreement was in jeopardy if countries did not accept their portion of refugees.18 Both Germany and Austria restored border controls after the acceptance of nearly 40,000 refugees over the course of one weekend.19 Germany and Austria attempted to ameliorate this resounding opposition to the influx of migrants, yet several countries still opposed these protocols. Hungary established a high fenced border to prevent the mass movement of migrants; the country initially received a great deal of backlash, but other Schengen states later followed

12 Ibid. 13 Ibid. 14 Ibid. 15 Frontex. “Key Facts.” Frontex. Accessed November 14, 2019. 16 Lehne, Stefan. “How the Refugee Crisis Will Reshape the EU.” Carnegie Europe, Febru- ary 4, 2016. 17 Ibid. 18 Park, Jeanne. “Europe’s migration crisis.” New York: Council of Foreign Relations (2015): 311-325. 19 Ibid.

65 Ellis

in Hungary’s footsteps.20 The reinstatement of borders has been considered one of the largest setbacks to the Schengen zone in all of its existence.21 Merkel’s push for cooperation amongst EU members resulted in further fragmentation and opposition towards accepting migrants. In 2015, the quota system was introduced by the European Commission under German leadership by Merkel through a proposal to distribute aid and to shelter asylum seekers to EU members proportionally. This was done with considerations for both the population and the economic factors of each state. There were immediate countermeasures upon this suggestion, such as the reinstatement of borders and Hungary’s physical representation of a border to prevent the perceived “invasion” of migrants.22 European countries continuously pushed back against the idea of a long-term quota, which became evident when appeals to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) were made based on an opposition to the quota system as a whole. This opposition to the quota system was supported by Hungary, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic.23 Hungary›s Minister of Justice, Laszlo Trócsányi, argued that the quota system (1) sent the wrong message to migrants, (2) was ineffective, and (3) posed an issue to sovereignty.24 Trócsányi also asserted that the distribution process was ineffective because migrants will return to their country of choice after they have been relocated. The ECJ ruled in favour of the quota system. Not only did the decision made by the ECJ exacerbate existing tensions amongst EU members, but it exemplified migrants’ favour towards particular states. Shortly after, The European Commission accused Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic of non-compliance with the Commission’s push for the relocation of migrants.25 Regardless of the varying degrees of hostility towards migrants, the existence of these disparities only continued to create a greater divide amongst EU members.

20 Lehne, Stefan. “How the Refugee Crisis Will Reshape the EU.” Carnegie Europe, Febru- ary 4, 2016. On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On 21 Park, Jeanne. “Europe’s migration crisis.” New York: Council of Foreign Relations (2015): 311-325. 22 Walker, Shaun. “Hungarian Leader Says Europe Is Now ‘Under Invasion’ by Migrants.” The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, March 15, 2018. para 3 23 Kanter, James. “E.U. Countries Must Accept Their Share of Migrants, Court Rules.” The New York Times, September 6, 2017. 24 Deutsche Welle. “Hungary and Slovakia Take EU Refugee Quota Scheme to Court.” Deutsche Welle. 2017. 25 BBC “EU to Sue Poland, Hungary and Czechs for Refusing Refugee Quotas.” BBC News. December 07, 2017.

66 The Impacts of the Migrant Crisis

In 2017, Germany had a total of 478, 581 migrants, whereas countries such as Spain and Poland both had less than 15,000.26 The large number of migrants in Germany can partially be attributed to Chancellor Merkel’s push for proportionality of migrant intake, but also due to the high favourability of residing within this state. Germany is around the same size as Spain, but its population is roughly double: the proportionality of migrants does not reflect this economically or demographically. The Schengen Agreement and the quota system only exacerbated this trend. Despite the intentions of the quota system, migrants were allowed freedom of movement. Large swells of migrants were most notably seen in Germany, perhaps due to both welcoming migrants with open arms, but also its advantageous living conditions. Prime Minister Andrej Babis of the Czech Republic highlighted that this quota system has only propagated anti-immigrant attitudes, and “played into the hands of the far-right.”27 Xenophobia is premised on the hatred and fear of the perceived ‘other’ and relates to elements of anti-immigrant prejudice.28 This terminology has specifically become more widely used after the inception of this crisis. The hostility held by particular EU members towards the acceptance of migrants only 29

intensified xenophobia across the EU. This has created a greater divide Political Dissidence or Disintegration amongst countries willing to accept displaced peoples against those who are not. The migrant crisis has made many European citizens feel endangered and threatened by people dissimilar to themselves, by which a demand for deportations and the formation of barriers to entry have been voiced.30 For instance, countries such as Poland have demonstrated to have high amounts of fear towards Syrian and Iraqi refugees, insisting that they are dangerous despite Poland receiving a considerably low number of migrants comparatively speaking.31 Conventional thought is that increased migration is directly correlated with anti-immigrant sentiment overall.32

26 Map Room. “Map Room: Fear Thy Neighbor: Crime and Xenophobia in Europe.” World Policy Journal 34, no. 2 (2017): 36-37. 27 BBC “EU to Sue Poland, Hungary and Czechs for Refusing Refugee Quotas.” BBC News. December 07, 2017. para 11. 28 Yakushko, Oksana. Modern-day xenophobia: Critical historical and theoretical perspectives on the roots of anti-immigrant prejudice. Springer, 2018. 29 Ibid. 30 Park, Jeanne. “Europe’s migration crisis.” New York: Council of Foreign Relations (2015): 311-325. 31 Map Room. “Map Room: Fear Thy Neighbor: Crime and Xenophobia in Europe.” World Policy Journal 34, no. 2 (2017): 36-37. 32 The Economist. “European Xenophobia Reflects Racial Diversity, Not Asylum Applica- tions.” The Economist Newspaper, July 25, 2018.

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While this idea is widely held, it is not completely accurate. Correlational studies examining public opinion polls released by the Eurobarometer have revealed that although there is no direct link between the resentment of foreigners and the heightened flow of refugees. There is, in fact, a notably growing divide between accepting and hostile attitudes from different EU members.33 There has been a 6% increase in positive sentiment towards migrants coming from western and southern EU members, whilst the northern and eastern regions of the EU have tended to become increasingly adverse towards migrants.34 This increasing division of opinions towards migrants domestically has more broadly facilitated in increasing tensions amongst EU members collectively. Not only have xenophobic sentiments created inconsistencies amongst EU countries, but also between EU citizens and incoming migrants. These attitudes can have detrimental impacts on the favourability of the EU and heighten the potential for nationalist ideals and a push for disunion. As EU member states’ political viewpoints begin to stray further from each other, fragmentation is what will continue to follow to not only lead to decreased solidarity amongst EU members but also the increased potential for disintegration. The perceived threat of migrant differences and mounting racism has fueled right-wing nationalistic passions. This exemplifies this idea in that after long processes of integration within the EU, the return of national values is resurging significantly.35 In the 2016 Austrian election, Norbert Hofer, a far-right party leader, was notably favoured, which demonstrated a resurgence in both populism and nationalism.36 Italian populist movements have also recently been on the rise.37 Merkel’s advantageous work in Germany also does not go unnoticed, yet her work paid the political price as the far-right populist political party, Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) remains the official opposition in Germany.38 While Merkel maintains the position of the most currently popular political figure in Germany, the rise of AfD speaks to the resurgence of nationalistic anti-immigrant sentiments. With fear-

33 On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Ibid. 34 The Economist. “European Xenophobia Reflects Racial Diversity, Not Asylum Applica- tions.” The Economist Newspaper, July 25, 2018. 35 Postelnicescu, Claudia. “Europe’s New Identity: The Refugee Crisis and the Rise of Nationalism.” Europe’s Journal of Psychology 12, no. 2 (2016): 203-209. doi:10.5964/ejop. v12i2.1191 36 Ibid. 37 Julian Coman, “’Italians First’: How the Populist Right Became Italy’s Dominant Force,” The Guardian, 2018. 38 Lortie, Marc, email message to author, November 25, 2020.

68 The Impacts of the Migrant Crisis mongering broadcasts continually being put forth by those maintaining nationalistic ideas, people may look to feel protected and safe: this is something that populist leaders are perceived to offer.39 This impression explains the rise of populism as nationalistic ideals tend to create an othering effect on outsiders.40 However, this is highly problematic for migrants. The sharing of borders with a country that is willing to accept a high number of migrants becomes troubling to countries that are unwilling. Expert on European affairs Marc Lortie, former Canadian ambassador and diplomat asserts: The EU is a political institution in constant evolution and construction. Member states are the ultimate decision makers. They will need to decide whether it is worthy to make compromises and deal with migration or face disintegration. Populist forces are pulling for no more Europe and Europeanists are pushing for more integration.41 This dichotomy becomes increasingly apparent with the rise of populism within the EU. It is true that member states do indeed hold the ultimate authority in this process. Even if the EU did not objectively disintegrate, this dichotomy creates instability in a community that is premised on uniformity. This worry that has been instilled in European citizens from the migrant intake has given rise to isolation and a potential Political Dissidence or Disintegration push to leave the EU altogether. The increasing crossroads the EU faces in managing both national values and uniformity is not a new struggle. However, the migrant crisis has only exacerbated these tensions, causing structural cracks in the EU’s system of governance, which has incentivized countries to withdraw from this union. A common contestation that arises regarding EU tensions and the migrant crisis is that additional asylum laws implemented in response to the refugee crisis supersede the disparities which exist amongst EU member states. Clear examples of asylum laws that attempted to create a degree of uniformity for incoming refugees include the Common European Asylum System (CEAS), The revised Asylum Procedures Directive, and The revised Qualification Directive.42 While this system and these directives offer valuable guidelines for European countries,

39 Postelnicescu, Claudia. “Europe’s New Identity: The Refugee Crisis and the Rise of Nationalism.” Europe’s Journal of Psychology 12, no. 2 (2016): 203-209. doi:10.5964/ejop. v12i2.1191 40 Ibid. 41 Lortie, Marc, email message to author, November 25, 2020. 42 European Commission. “Common European Asylum System.” Migration and Home Affairs - European Commission, December 6, 2016.

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fragmentation and disparity continue to exist amongst EU members: these asylum laws have been characterized as unfair and inequitable.43 This is evident in both the opinion on open-border crossings, the quota system, and xenophobia. The differences which have arisen have disrupted EU uniformity and overall solidarity, which counters the basis on which the EU relies upon.44 Because this fragmentation has occurred due to the refugee crisis, there is now a heightened chance for disintegration. One clear demonstration of this notion in practice is the United Kingdom’s (UK’s) push for withdrawal from the EU, which is commonly referred to as ‘Brexit.’ Increased migration has been one of the many driving forces behind the UK’s decision for withdrawing itself from the EU. The issue of free movement for refugees in the EU was a key component in the UK’s Leave campaign.45 Although economic and industrial factors also heavily played into the UK’s decision to leave, the migrant crisis undoubtedly played a large role in this decision.46 There is a general perception that the refugee crisis could be mended through the UK’s relinquishing of autonomy and control, but this is a “fostered delusion.”47 Rather, implicit bias and a degree of hostility towards being an EU member, along with elements of xenophobia, is a formula that largely accounts for the actual reasons behind Brexit.48 Despite the ongoing debate surrounding the causes behind Brexit, the UK’s implicit push to leave the EU can undoubtedly be partially attributed to the rise in hostility and disagreement in conjunction with the migrant crisis. The rise of right-wing populism and nationalist ideals also becomes a greater threat to EU stability and solidarity. Not only have these right-wing, populist political campaigns coupled with xenophobic sentiments created an inhospitable environment for displaced migrants, but they have fueled a fire for disintegration whereby other countries could potentially follow in the UK’s footsteps. The EU has faced significant struggles between the maintenance and regulation of national values and creating uniformity amongst its

43 On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Maani, Lana. “Refugees in the European Union: The Harsh Reality of the Dublin Regu- lation.” Notre Dame Journal of International & Comparative Law 8, no. 2 (2018): 83. 44 Brunet-Jailly, Emmanuel, Achim Hurrelmann, and Amy Verdun, eds. European Union Governance and Policy Making: A Canadian Perspective. University of Toronto Press, 2018. 45 Outhwaite, William. “Migration Crisis and “Brexit”.” The Oxford Handbook of Migra- tion Crises (2019): 93. 46 Ibid. 47 Ibid, para 2. 48 Ibid.

70 The Impacts of the Migrant Crisis members. With the migrant crisis came political and legal implications, which created fractures in the structural components of the EU, including the Schengen Agreement and the quota system. Xenophobic sentiments heavily associated with the resurgence of right-wing populist politics have only created greater disparities and challenges to EU uniformity. Challenges to the EU are not new. However, these implications pose significant problems for EU solidarity and uniformity, as a greater division amongst EU members has been made evident by Brexit. With the divide on public opinion ever-increasing along with the anxiety of preserving nationalistic values, there is a greater chance for future disintegration. The EU’s reactionary measures were seen as insufficient for some of its members. The EU will continue to face conflicting visions of identity and must continue to work to regulate and appease its member states to maintain power and solidarity. If the EU fails to do so, its member states are likely to follow in the footsteps of the UK and push to leave a supranational entity that has failed to properly regulate the challenges it faces. Political Dissidence or Disintegration

71 Ellis

Bibliography

BBC. “EU to Sue Poland, Hungary and Czechs for Refusing Refugee Quotas.” BBC News. December 07, 2017. Accessed November 14, 2019. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-42270239. Blasina, Niki. “Europe’s Migrant Crisis Explained,” The Wall Street Journal, published on September 10, 2015, YouTube video, https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=12FT7cOLaZ4. Brunet-Jailly, Emmanuel, Achim Hurrelmann, and Amy Verdun, eds. European Union Governance and Policy Making: A Canadian Perspective. University of Toronto Press, 2018. Coman, Julian. “’Italians First’: How the Populist Right Became Italy’s Dominant Force.” The Guardian. 2018. https://www.theguardian. com/world/2018/dec/01/italians-first-matteo-salvini-the-league- rise-rightwing-populism.. Deutsche Welle. “Hungary and Slovakia Take EU Refugee Quota Scheme to Court.” Deutsche Welle. 2017. https://www.dw.com/ en/hungary-and-slovakia-take-eu-refugee-quota-scheme-to- court/a-38781422. European Commission. “Common European Asylum System.” Migration and Home Affairs - European Commission, December 6, 2016. https://ec.europa.eu/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/asylum_en. Frontex. “Key Facts.” Frontex. Accessed November 14, 2019. https:// frontex.europa.eu/faq/key-facts/. Kanter, James. “E.U. Countries Must Accept Their Share of Migrants, Court Rules.” The New York Times, September 6, 2017. https://

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On www.nytimes.com/2017/09/06/world/europe/eu-migrants- hungary-slovakia.html. Khan, Mishal S, Anna Osei-Kofi, Abbas Omar, Hilary Kirkbride, Anthony Kessel, Aula Abbara, David Heymann, Alimuddin Zumla, and Osman Dar. “Pathogens, Prejudice, and Politics: The Role of the Global Health Community in the European Refugee Crisis.” The Lancet Infectious Diseases 16, no. 8 (August 2016). https://doi. org/10.1016/s1473-3099(16)30134-7.

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Lehne, Stefan. “How the Refugee Crisis Will Reshape the EU.” Carnegie Europe, February 4, 2016. https://carnegieeurope.eu/2016/02/04/ how-refugee-crisis-will-reshape-eu-pub-62650. Maani, Lana. “Refugees in the European Union: The Harsh Reality of the Dublin Regulation.” Notre Dame Journal of International & Comparative Law 8, no. 2 (2018): 83. https://scholarship.law. nd.edu/ndjicl/vol8/iss2/7/. Map Room. “Map Room: Fear Thy Neighbor: Crime and Xenophobia in Europe.” World Policy Journal 34, no. 2 (2017): 36- 37. https://read.dukeupress.edu/world-policy-journal/ article/34/2/36-37/130422. Outhwaite, William. “Migration Crisis and “Brexit”.” The Oxford Handbook of Migration Crises (2019): 93. https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/ oxfordhb/9780190856908.001.0001/oxfordhb- 9780190856908-e-7. Park, Jeanne. “Europe’s Migration Crisis.” New York: Council of Foreign Relations (2015): 311-325. Political Dissidence or Disintegration Postelnicescu, Claudia. “Europe’s New Identity: The Refugee Crisis and the Rise of Nationalism.” Europe’s Journal of Psychology 12, no. 2 (2016): 203-209. doi:10.5964/ejop.v12i2.1191. The Economist. “European Xenophobia Reflects Racial Diversity, Not Asylum Applications.” The Economist Newspaper, July 25, 2018. https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2018/07/25/european- xenophobia-reflects-racial-diversity-not-asylum-applications. United Nations. “Migration.” United Nations: Peace, Dignity, and Equality on a Healthy Planet. United Nations. Accessed November 14, 2019. https://www.un.org/en/sections/issues-depth/migration/ index.html. Walker, Shaun. “Hungarian Leader Says Europe Is Now ‘Under Invasion’ by Migrants.” The Guardian. Guardian News and Media, March 15, 2018. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/15/ hungarian-leader-says-europe-is-now-under-invasion-by-migrants.

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Yakushko, Oksana. Modern-day xenophobia: Critical historical and theoretical perspectives on the roots of anti-immigrant prejudice. Springer, 2018. https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030- 00644-0. On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On

74 Between Petroleum and Paris Canadian Foreign Policy, Liberal Internationalism, and the Paris Agreement

James Mager

Abstract: In the 20th century, Canada’s natural resource-based economy came to a head with the burgeoning environmentalism movement. The country’s dependency on oil and gas was a blight on its domestic and international profile. To reform the nation’s public image and develop its environmental credentials, Canada became an active participant in international environmental fora. The country’s reliance on fossil fuels and resource extraction, however, continued unabated. I examine Canadian Environmental Foreign Policy (EFP) through the lens of liberal internationalism, highlighting the tensions between the Canadian economy and environmental politics, using the Paris Agreement (2015) as a focal point.

Acknowledgements: Thank you to Lily Jones and Michael John Lo for their indispensable editing and guidance, to Kenneth Macartney for his expert peer review, and to Dr. Wilfrid Greaves for inspiring my interest in Canadian foreign policy.

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Introduction

“…Our fair Dominion now extends / From Cape Race to Nootka Sound;

May peace forever be our lot, / And plenteous store abound…”

Alexander Muir immortalized these words near the dawn of confederation in “The Maple Leaf Forever,” a de facto national anthem predating “O Canada.”1 Muir’s lyrics reflect a deep reverence for the sprawling landscapes and natural beauty that lies at the heart of Canada’s identity. For economists like Harold Innis, this “plenteous store” was not celebrated poetically but discretely analyzed and considered to be the engine of wealth in Canada. Innis’s “staples thesis”2 became a seminal history of the nation’s political economy, articulating its significant reliance on raw resources, extraction, and export. These facets of Canadian identity and political economy encapsulate the tension between its ecological aspirations and dependency on fossil fuels. A mid-20th century surge in environmentalism, inspired by popular media like Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring, lead to “renewed protests against environmental degradation.”3 The fossil fuel sector, due to its significant greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and diffuse externalities,4 became a blight on Canada’s façade. Thus Canada became an active participant in international environmental institutions and agreements; however, its fossil fuel extraction continued unabated. This balancing act was recently exemplified when a delegation of notable Canadians, led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, attended the United Nations’ Conference of the Parties 21 (COP 21). The climate talks afforded Canada the opportunity to exercise its environmental leadership while simultaneously protecting its economic interests.5

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On 1 Kallmann, Helmut. 2012. “‘The Maple Leaf For Ever.’” “The Maple Leaf For Ever” | The Canadian Encyclopedia. August 19. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/article/ quotthe-maple-leaf-for-everquot-emc. 2 Watkins, Melville H. 1963. “A Staple Theory of Economic Growth.” The Canadian Jour- nal of Economics and Political Science 29 (2): 141. doi:10.2307/139461. Page 141. 3 MacDowell, Laurel Sefton. 2014. An Environmental History of Canada. Vancouver: UBC Press. Page 5. 4 Ibid. 5 Christoff, Peter. 2016. “The Promissory Note: COP 21 and the Paris Climate Agree- ment.” Environmental Politics 25 (5): 765–87. doi:10.1080/09644016.2016.1191818. 773.

76 CanFP, LI, and the Paris Agreement

In this essay I argue that Canada’s ratification of the Paris Agreement (2015), despite its ostensible tension with the nation’s political economy, is most appropriately viewed through the lens of liberal internationalist (LI) foreign policy. Using a definition of LI derived from Roland Paris, I examine Canada’s recent history of environmental foreign policy (EFP) through its climate change policy and international conduct, outline the determinants surrounding the ratification of the Paris Agreement, and conclude with a normative analysis of Canadian EFP and its consequences.

Canadian Liberal Internationalism According to Roland Paris, LI foreign policy promotes Canadian “interests and values” through “energetic multilateral diplomacy” with an emphasis on a rules-based international order.6 The theory characterizes Canada as a middle power in the global hierarchy due to its geographic size, economic output, and population.7 This middle power status differentiates Canada from highly autonomous nations like the United

States of America (US), whose foreign policy is largely uninhibited due Between Petroleum and Paris to its domineering stature, and from entirely dependent nations whose foreign policy is predicated on extra-national forces. Without principal power status, Canada exerts influence through multilateral cooperation,8 demonstrating its capabilities and acting as a ‘helpful fixer’ in international affairs.9 These criteria will be the LI baseline for interpreting Canadian EFP.

Canada’s Environmental Foreign Policy Through The Ages Legal scholar Daniel Bodansky divides the history of 20th century environmental policy into three periods: “conservationist,” “pollution-

6 Paris, Roland. 2014. “Are Canadians Still Liberal Internationalists? Foreign Policy and Public Opinion in the Harper Era.” International Journal: Canadas Journal of Global Policy Analysis 69 (3): 274–307. doi:10.1177/0020702014540282. Page 274. 7 Greaves, Wilfrid. 2020. “Week 5 – Theories of CanFP.” Week 5 – Theories of CanFP. February 3. Page 8. 8 Greaves 2020, 8. 9 Greaves 2020, 8.

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prevention” and “sustainable development.”10 Bookended by Prime Ministers (PM) Pierre Elliot Trudeau and Justin Trudeau, with a brief diversion during Stephen Harper’s era, Bodansky’s analysis outlines the path towards the ratification of the Paris Agreement. P.E. Trudeau’s EFP focused on conservation through multilateral diplomacy and institutional cooperation. During Trudeau’s tenure, Canada ratified the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (1973)11—which aimed to protect 35,000 animal and plant species—and emphasized Canadian eco- politics through the appointment of Maurice Strong to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), who served as the inaugural Executive Director.12 With a Canadian at the helm of a novel UN environmental programme, the country’s ecological bona fides appeared evident; however, tension between this public image and the energy sector was inescapable, as Maurice Strong was deeply embedded in the fossil fuel industry, working as a senior manager in the oil sector and later becoming the Chief Executive Officer of Petro-Canada.13 The conflict between ecology and economy continued with PM Brian Mulroney’s Progressive Conservative government. During his time in office, Canada participated in the 1987 Montreal Protocol, hosted the Toronto Conference (1988), and ratified the first UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 1994, all of which focused on mitigating atmospheric pollution and decreasing carbon dioxide emissions.14 According to scholars Nelson Michaud and Kim Nossal, Mulroney’s foreign policy during his tenure was exemplary “middlepowermanship.”15 Playing host and active negotiator brought

10 quoted in Stoett, Peter J. 2018. “Substantive but Inconsistent: Canada’s Role in Glob- al Environmental Governance, 1968–2017.” Canadian Foreign Policy Journal 24 (3): 316–28. doi:10.1080/11926422.2018.1462722. Page 321. 11 Ibid, 320. 12 Ibid, 320. On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On 13 “Maurice F. Strong Is First Non-U.S. Citizen To Receive Public Welfare Medal, Acad- emy’s Highest Honor.” 2003. National Academies Web Server www8.Nationalacademies. org. December 3. https://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?Recor- dID=12032003. 14 Maciunas, Silvia, and Géraud De Lassus Saint-Geniès. 2018. “The Evolution of Canada’s International and Domestic Climate Policy:” Reflections on Canadas Past, Present and Future in International Law/Réflexions Sur Le Passé, Le Présent Et Lavenir Du Canada En Droit International, April, 281–98. doi:10.2307/j.ctv2n7q7t.26. Page 3. 15 Quoted in Smith, Heather A. 2009. “Political Parties and Canadian Climate Change Policy.” International Journal: Canadas Journal of Global Policy Analysis 64 (1): 47–66.

78 CanFP, LI, and the Paris Agreement praise on “Canada, Mulroney, and the experts housed in Environment Canada,”16 fulfilling Canada’s ‘helpful fixer’ role in international politics. But the discrepancy between performative politics and practical reality remained. Mulroney announced further subsidies to the Hibernia oil fields off the coast of Newfoundland following the Toronto Conference, and his domestic “Green Plan” environmental policies, were seen by critics as “neoliberal economic tools in a green veneer.”17 Canada's environmental policy clearly remained in conflict with more influential forces in Canadian politics, as the country missed its emission targets under Mulroney’s leadership. Following Mulroney, Liberal PM Jean Chrétien took a stronger position on EFP, along with his United States (US) counterpart, President Bill Clinton, setting ambitious targets during COP 3 in Kyoto, Japan. Canada far exceeded the agreement’s requirement by pledging a 6 per cent reduction “below [the] 1990 base-lines by the 2008 to 2012 period.”18 Laudable as this target may have been, there was notable dissension by Members of Parliament surrounding its ratification. Business interests and the provinces stood in opposition to Chrétien, voicing economic concerns.

But with a Liberal majority in the House of Commons, and the “strong Between Petroleum and Paris party discipline”19 inherent to the parliamentary system, Chrétien had the institutional capacity to ratify the agreement. The same could not be said for the US: Congress prevented Clinton from following suit, voting overwhelmingly in opposition.20 In this instance, Canada was able to assert its independence from the US in light of its ally’s reluctancy—an example of the “moderate autonomy”21 articulated in Paris’s definition. Additionally, Canada’s participation in the JUSSCANZ coalition (Japan, US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and others) at Kyoto provided a cooperative opportunity external to the traditional Can-US bilateral partnership.22 doi:10.1177/002070200906400104. Page 62. 16 Ibid, 48. 17 Ibid, 49. 18 Harrison, Kathryn. 2007. “The Road Not Taken: Climate Change Policy in Cana- da and the United States.” Global Environmental Politics 7 (4): 92–117. doi:10.1162/ glep.2007.7.4.92. Page 92. 19 Ibid, 112. 20 Harrison, Kathryn. 2007. “The Road Not Taken: Climate Change Policy in Cana- da and the United States.” Global Environmental Politics 7 (4): 92–117. doi:10.1162/ glep.2007.7.4.92. Page 112. 21 Paris 2014, 274. 22 Smith 2008, 50.

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The ‘Golden Age’ of liberal internationalism would soon to come to an end as PM Stephen Harper and the Conservative party took office. In contrast with the previous 30 years of Canadian EFP, the Harper government turned its gaze inward, quickly countering the green internationalist streak.23 Harper campaigned on a promise to withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol, citing economic concerns and emphasizing the previous government’s failure to achieve its targets.24 Invoking hyperbolic rhetoric, Harper referred to the Kyoto Protocol as a “socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations.”25 Exaggeration aside, his critique of the Liberal government’s inability to meet emission targets was largely correct; Jean Chrétien (and, by succession, PM Paul Martin) had set their goals—perhaps knowingly—too high.26 Withdrawing from the agreement meant ignoring the emissions trading mechanisms embedded within the protocol that were explicitly established to prevent ratifiers from exiting.27 Even more consequential to Canada’s international persona, simply paying the punitive damages would have allowed the country to remain in the treaty without denigrating the institutional agreement; contingency measures that endowed the agreement with any fundamental value in the first place. But with the power of a majority government, Harper pulled out of the agreement in 2011 and proposed a supplementary “Made-in-Canada” climate plan which focused on domestic tax incentives and “support for energy efficiency,” eschewing international standards established by the Kyoto Protocol.28 This proposal curried economic favour with the energy sector in Alberta while offering a “green” agenda— save the internationalist bent.29 Harper’s political about-face offers a valuable foil to contrast the LI model of EFP. The rejection of the agreement and total dismissal of the protocol’s trading rules exhibited elements of Complex Neorealism, a theory of Canadian foreign policy in which multilateralism and institutional cooperation are secondary to self-interest and autonomy.30 Harper appeared to prioritize the interests of the Conservative party and

On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Smith 2008, 66. 24 Harrison 2007, 110. 25 Ibid. 26 Curry, Bill. 2007. “Chrétien Takes Heat over Kyoto.” The Globe and Mail, February 23. https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/chretien-takes-heat-over-kyoto/arti- cle679792/. 27 Harris 2007, 102. 28 Smith 2008, 59. 29 Ibid, 53. 30 Greaves 2020, 15.

80 CanFP, LI, and the Paris Agreement fossil fuel industry over much of Canada, as the agreement gained positive support from the general public after ratification.31 On the international stage it promoted the idea that Canada’s individual wants superseded the global community’s goals.

A Paradigm Shift: The 2015 Federal Election Contrasting the domestic and international conditions between the 2011 and 2015 federal elections sheds light on the contemporary determinants of Canadian EFP. In both instances, the federal Conservative base was a population economically and geographically tied to fossil fuels.32 Alberta, for reference, was responsible for approximately 80 per cent of Canadian oil production at that time.33 While overall voter turnout for the 2011 federal election was low at 61.1 per cent,34 there was unwavering Conservative support throughout the oil-producing provinces (see Figure 1).35 These factors, combined with a massive transfer of seats from the Liberal Party to the New Democratic Party, resulted in a Conservative majority precipitating the withdrawal. Between Petroleum and Paris

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31 Smith 2008, 58. 32 “Map of Official Results for the 41st General Election (2011).” n.d. Map of Official Results for the 41st General Election (2011). https://www.elections.ca/res/cir/maps/map. asp?map=ERMap_41&lang=e. Please see Figure 1. 33 “Additional Statistics on Energy.” 2016. Natural Resources Canada. February 1. https:// www.nrcan.gc.ca/publications/statistics-facts/1239. 34 “Voter Turnout by Age Group.” 2016. Elections Canada. September 27. https:// www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=res&dir=rec/eval/pes2015/vtsa&document=table1&lang=e. 35 “Map of Official Results for the 41st General Election (2011).”. 2011.

81 Mager

Leading up to the 2015 federal election, however, public opinion surrounding climate change remediation was stronger than ever. An Oracle Research poll of over 3,000 Canadian found that 61 per cent of people surveyed “agreed or strongly agreed” with prioritizing environmental protection over building the Energy East pipeline.36 Similarly, an Angus Reid poll found a majority of Canadians in support of either a “national cap-and-trade or carbon tax policy”—75 per cent and 56 per cent, respectively.37 Harper’s domestically-motived environmental policies may have been strategically savvy in earlier years, but, as the conversation around global action on climate change heated up, it looked increasingly antiquated. The international determinants changed significantly during this period as well. When Harper took office in 2006, his southern counterpart was Republican George W. Bush, an ex-governor of Texas with deep ties to the petroleum industry and a hostility toward climate change policy.38 But after Barack Obama’s Presidential win in 2008, that buttress disappeared. On the campaign trail, the US Democratic nominee had called for an end to “the age of oil”39 and had shed the global stigma that haunted his predecessor. Once in office, Obama’s climate related executive actions, like the “Clean Power Plan,” further highlighted Canada’s relative inaction following Harper’s withdrawal.40 This international shift was an inauspicious preview of the Conservative party’s future. The 2015 Canadian federal election marked the dramatic ascendency of a Liberal majority lead by Justin Trudeau. The Liberals had rebounded exceptionally, growing from 34 to 184 seats in the House of Commons.41 Contributing to Trudeau’s success was a significant increase in participation; voter turnout increased in every province, hitting 68.3 per

36 Maclean, Jason. 2018. “Will We Ever Have Paris? Canadas Climate Change Policy and Federalism 3.0.” Alberta Law Review, 889–932. doi:10.29173/alr2481. Page 23. 37 ibid. 38 Pischke, Erin C., Barry Solomon, Adam Wellstead, Alberto Acevedo, Amarella East- On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On mond, Fernando De Oliveira, Suani Coelho, and Oswaldo Lucon. 2018. “From Kyoto to Paris: Measuring Renewable Energy Policy Regimes in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Mexico and the United States.” Energy Research & Social Science 50 (November): 82–91. doi:10.1016/j.erss.2018.11.010. Page 89. 39 MacLean, Jason. n.d. “Paris and Pipelines? Canada’s Climate Policy Puzzle.” Jour- nal of Environmental Law and Practice 32 (1). https://www.researchgate.net/ publication/327716676_Paris_and_Pipelines_Canada›s_Climate_Policy_Puzzle. 40 Pischke 2018, 89. 41 “Elections Canada.” n.d. Elections Canada. https://www.elections.ca/res/rep/off/ ovr2015app/41/table4E.html.

82 CanFP, LI, and the Paris Agreement cent nationally.42 More importantly, turnout among voters aged 18 to 24 years increased by a staggering 18.3 per cent.43 According to the Canadian Broadcasting Centre’s Vote Compass, “18- to 34-year-olds determined the environment was most important [issue]”44 based on a survey done in the lead up to the election. Trudeau would be crowned the winner, proceeding to trumpet the liberal internationalist screed nearly verbatim. In his victory speech, Trudeau quoted PM Wilfrid Laurier’s famous “sunny ways” expression,45 alluding to the former PM’s diplomatic and unifying persona, effectively distancing himself from Harper’s “Made-in-Canada” insularity. Similarly, Trudeau’s promises to “put a price on carbon”46 and develop a nation-wide emissions reduction plan were a breath of fresh air for environmentalists. Just weeks after assuming office, Trudeau was provided the first opportunity for the newly-minted Prime Minister to flaunt his diplomatic prowess at the UN’s Conference of the Parties 21.

Trudeau Takes Paris Between Petroleum and Paris Supporting PM Trudeau at the climate talks was a 300 member Canadian delegation, including: the Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Catherine McKenna; the Premiers of Alberta, Ontario, and British Columbia; Indigenous leaders and a host of civil servants.47 In total nearly 40,000 attendees representing 195 countries and a litany of environmental institutions traveled to Paris, France for the UNFCCC summit.48 In Trudeau’s opening remarks he referred to climate change as a “top priority” for Canada and espoused cooperation between

42 “Elections Canada.” n.d. Elections Canada. https://www.elections.ca/res/rep/off/ ovr2015app/41/table4E.html. 43 “Voter Turnout by Age Group 2011 and 2015 General Elections.” 2016. Elections Canada. September 27. https://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=res&dir=rec/eval/ pes2015/vtsa&document=table1&lang=e. 44 CBC News. 2015. “Vote Compass: Economy and Environment Rate as Top Issues.” CBC News, September 10. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/vote-compass-canada-election-2015-issues-canadians-1.3222945. 45 “For the Record: A Full Transcript of Justin Trudeau’s Speech.” 2015. Macleans.ca. October 20. https://www.macleans.ca/politics/ottawa/justin-trudeau-for-the-record-we-beat- fear-with-hope/. 46 Maciunas and de Lassus Saint-Geniés 2018, 9. 47 “Canada at COP 21”. Environment and Climate Change Canada. January 2016. Page 2. 48 Ibid.

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provincial, territory and Indigenous leadership.49 Carbon pricing, a “coal- fired electricity” ban and “sustainable development,” Trudeau stated, were at the core of Canada’s low-carbon transition.50 He concluded his opening remarks with an arguably sincere—but rather tongue-in-cheek— Trudeauism: “Canada is back, my good friends.”51 It was a quip that would make supporters swoon and the National Post fire up its printing press.52 Much like his “sunny ways” speech, this was a nod—or perhaps an apology—to the United Nations audience which had witnessed Harper snub their community for years. While favourable conditions had lead Trudeau to the summit, a powerful set of determinants constrained the negotiations as the tension between climate change action and staple economics persisted. As of 2014, Canadian production of natural gas and crude oil was 4th and 5th in the world, and the country was ranked the 3rd largest exporter of crude oil.53 In the same year, the oil and gas segment of energy production accounted for roughly 10.6 percent of Canada’s gross domestic product (GDP), employing nearly 4.1 per cent of the working population.54 Despite the influx of young supporters in 2015 employment and economic concerns would still be of paramount importance to the majority of voters.55 Corporate influence had also played a major factor prior to COP 21, as Canadian business interests and the fossil fuel sector were weary of a more stringent EFP. The Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers (CAPP), the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, and the Canadian Chamber of Commerce all lobbied heavily against binding international agreements.56 These pressures had previously lead the federal government to focus on “voluntary programs…rather than more effective, but politically contentious, taxes or regulations,”57 and were not solely directed at government actors. In 2014, for example, a CAPP-funded public

49 Trudeau, Justin. 2015. “Canada’s National Statement at COP21.” Canada’s National Statement at COP21. November 30. 50 Ibid. 51 On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On Trudeau, Justin. 2015. 52 Postmedia Staff. 2015. “Justin Trudeau Says Canada ‘Is Back’ at Climate-Change Meeting.” National Post, November 30. https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/trudeau-on- climate-change-indigenous-peoples-have-known-for-thousands-of-years-how-to-care-for- our-planet. 53 Energy Fact Book 2015-2016. n.d. Energy Fact Book 2015-2016. Page 3. 54 Ibid. Page 4. 55 CBC News. 2015. 56 MacLean 2018, 55. 57 Harrison 2007, 113.

84 CanFP, LI, and the Paris Agreement relations campaign called on “energy citizens” to “join the team” on social media, tying pipelines and the carbon economy to Canadian identity.58 These phenomena exhibited the many social and economic determinants contributing to the Canadian delegation’s behaviour in Paris. Throughout COP 21, the delegation emphasized the developed world’s significant burden of responsibility while simultaneously opposing other measures, such as financially compensating developing countries for the “Loss and Damages” related to climate change.59 Similarly, Trudeau’s gung-ho environmentalism seemed to deflate whenever discussion of legally binding states to their pledges was unearthed.60 And while Minister McKenna was lauded for her role in facilitating Article 6, this segment was predicated on entirely voluntary mechanisms for emissions reduction.61 Canada would join multiple initiatives geared toward carbon pricing and fossil fuel subsidies reform, yet was awarded “Fossil of the Day” by the Climate Action Network for “standing in the way of increasing ambition.”62 Even the delegation’s inordinate size—more than double the US and triple the UK—was questionable,63 and individual acts by the delegates appeared contradictory. Ontario Premiere Kathleen Wynne, for

example, was reported to have taken two round-trip flights from Toronto to Between Petroleum and Paris Paris during the summit.64 The Canadian delegation was not entirely curtailed by economic determinants, powerful as they may have been. Canada pledged $2.65 billion toward “renewable energy technologies,” “adaption to climate change”, and to “manage risk” in developing countries.65 Additionally, the group successfully promoted social issues and leveraged its middle- power influence to amplify less powerful voices. The Canadian focus on Indigenous peoples and the “Gender Action Plan” contributed to increased

58 MacLean 2018, 55. 59 Maciunas and de Lassus Saint-Geniés 2018, 10. 60 Ibid. 61 Ibid, 9. 62 Prystupa, Mychaylo. 2015. “Canada Wins ‘Fossil of the Day Award’ at the COP21.” Na- tionalOberserver.com, December 10. https://www.nationalobserver.com/2015/12/10/news/ canada-wins-fossil-day-award-cop21. 63 CTVNews.ca Staff. 2015. “The Price of Paris: Canada Sends More than 300 Delegates to Climate Talks.” CTV News, December 3. https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/the-price-of-paris-canada-sends-more-than-300-delegates-to-climate-talks-1.2686239. 64 Ibid. 65 Environment and Climate Change Canada “United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change and Its Paris Agreement.” 2018. United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change and Its Paris Agreement. Page 1.

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protections and considerations of marginalized groups—Article 7 & 11, respectively66—and Minister McKenna allied with the Small Island Developing States in their quest for more ambitious targets.67 These contributions exhibited the “helpful fixer,” institutionally-invested persona integral to the LI theory. While not uniquely Canadian, committing to Article 2 was, arguably, the most essential aspect of the process. This article exemplifies the fundamental aspects of multilateralism and global cooperation by codifying the international nature of climate change issues and solutions. The article expresses an urgent need to limit temperature rise in order to mitigate the most severe consequences of global warming: “This agreement…aims to strengthen the global response to the threat of climate change by: (a) Holding the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels (b) Increasing the ability to adapt to the adverse impacts of climate change and foster climate resilience and low greenhouse gas emissions development, in a manner that does not threaten food production; and (c) Making finance flows consistent with a pathway towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development. 2. This Agreement will be implemented to reflect equity and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities, in the light of different national circumstances.”68 Canada’s conduct at COP 21 was a master class in liberal internationalism. Recalling the criteria established earlier in this essay, Canada: 1) collaborated multilaterally on an institution-based agreement, 2) exercised its moderate autonomy and influence to fight for its unique concerns surrounding Indigenous peoples and gender equality and 3) leveraged its middle-power, “helpful fixer” persona to promote less significant voices, garnering praise in the process. On a domestic political level, the Liberals assuaged its voter base by playing an active role on climate change while reintegrating with the international community. On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On According to an Abacus Data poll conducted shortly after COP 21, Canada’s impression of PM Trudeau was overwhelmingly “positive” (57 per cent) while the same could not be said for his predecessor (27 per cent

66 United Nations. 2016. 67 Christoff, Peter. 2016. “The Promissory Note: COP 21 and the Paris Climate Agree- ment.” Environmental Politics 25 (5): 765–87. doi:10.1080/09644016.2016.1191818. 776. 68 United Nations. 2016. Article 2.1(a)

86 CanFP, LI, and the Paris Agreement positive”).69 For the Canadian energy sector, the troublesome targets of previous treaties had vanished as the new agreement carried few legally binding requirements, and the document excluded any mention of the words oil, petroleum, or fossil fuel. While the ratifiers were legally bound to the document, the drafters focused on voluntary processes and diffuse goal-setting rather than “creating legal obligations prescribing defined mitigation actions, mandating implementation or ensuring compliance.”70 The negotiation had prioritized “inclusion” over “enforcement” which, according to an optimistic interpretation, would exert “normative power” over the “largest and most recalcitrant emitters.”71 This strategy also aimed at preventing withdrawal from underperformance, allowing greater flexibility for emission behemoths such as Canada. For the Liberals, this was the ideal outcome; the agreement had broadcast Canada’s ability to lead on the world stage while mitigating any potential fallout from overly stringent demands. The agreement would be officially ratified after a 207 to 81 vote of approval in the House.72

Conclusion: Caught Between Pipelines And Paris Between Petroleum and Paris The theory of liberal internationalism offers insight into why and how Canada conducted itself in Paris; however, it is not an inherently normative theory. Liberal internationalism is neither good nor bad, it is merely a tool through which the Canadian government exercises its self- interest. It would be remiss not to acknowledge that Canada—one of the largest per capita polluters in the world73 with the 10th highest GDP74— ratified a“ promissory note”75 that relies on good faith over legal stricture. Oil production and carbon emissions have increased or plateaued in the period of time discussed in this essay, excluding market-based declines

69 “Abacus Data | Popularity & Prime Ministers.” 2016. Abacus Data | Popularity & Prime Ministers. Abacus Data. https://abacusdata.ca/popularity-prime-ministers/. 70 Christoff 2016, 775. 71 Christoff 2016, 781. 72 Harris, Kathleen. 2016. “MPs Vote 207 to 81 to Back Paris Climate Change Agree- ment.” CBC News, October 5. https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/parliament-vote-paris-agreement-climate-change-1.3792313. 73 MacLean 2018, 55. 74 “World Economic Outlook.” 2020. IMF.org. International Monetary Fund. April 8. GDP, current prices. 75 Christoff 2016, 17.

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during the 2008 financial crisis,76 and fossil fuel subsidies reform has stalled.77 This suggests that Canada’s commitment to the Paris Agreement has been conveniently ignored or intentionally contradicted. But does this contravene the liberal internationalist theory of CanFP? The cynical reality is that foreign policy can be ineffective or prioritize form over function while still serving a purpose. The negotiation and ratification of the Paris Agreement, in this regard, was highly favourable to the Liberal party but its general benefit remains unclear. Canada’s nationally determined contributions (NDC) submitted to the UNFCCC were nearly identical to the targets set under the Conservative government—a pledge to “reduce its economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions to 30% below 2005 levels by 2030”78—yet brought acclaim to one government and scorn to the other. Liberal internationalist foreign policy is likely the best framework for future climate negotiations, as the mitigation effort requires a global and multilateral approach, but the internecine determinants of the “staple economy” and the environment must first be resolved. The Canadian government bears that responsibility to Indigenous peoples, the domestic polity, and the world. Only after Canada has decoupled its economy from fossil fuels, “may peace forever be our lot, and plenteous store abound.”79 On Politics Volume 14, Issue 1 Issue 14, Volume Politics On

76 Harrison 2007, 114. 77 “Massive Fossil Fuel Subsidies Continue, but True Costs Are Hidden from Canadians.” 2019. Environmental Defence. July 17. https://environmentaldefence.ca/2018/09/17/ new-report-massive-fossil-fuel-subsidies-continue-true-costs-hidden-canadians/. 78 Environment and Climate Change Canada 2018, 2. 79 Kallmann, Helmut. 2012.

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