Every July 1, fireworks illuminate the skies across Canada. This year, however, the country marks Canada Day with a revitalized sense of pride. Prime Minister Mark Carney has restored a measure of dignity, intellectual seriousness and technocratic competence to the nation’s highest office.

After years in which foreign policy often appeared driven by social media trends rather than the realities of statecraft, there is a growing sense that the adults are back in the room.

Yet as the celebratory smoke clears, sobering challenges remain. A sluggish domestic economy, a fractured political landscape and the constraints of middle-power diplomacy threaten to complicate the early promise of the Carney era.

The defining moment of Carney’s 15-month tenure came at the World Economic Forum in Davos this January. His keynote address described a fundamental rupture in the international order and called for middle powers to unite. The speech struck an emotional chord at home and abroad. Many Canadians, like others around the world, have grown weary of U.S. President Donald Trump’s abrasive tone, his public criticism of allies and his repeated provocations — including referring to Canada as a potential “51st state” and reviving talk of acquiring Greenland.

Carney’s remarks seemed to channel that frustration. In tone, they echoed the defiance shown by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in a widely circulated video after the Group of Seven summit in which she rebuked the U.S. president for suggesting she had sought a photo opportunity. In Davos, Carney appeared to stand up to Washington and gesture toward a new architecture of middle-power cooperation.

But policymakers in allied capitals saw the speech differently. The idea that middle powers — especially those deeply tied to the United States through trade and security — would unite to counterbalance Washington struck many as unrealistic.

More concerning was the perception that Carney’s framing implied a moral equivalence between the United States and China.

For all........

© The Japan Times