The Nature of the Relationship: US-Canadian Environmental Diplomacy in the Early Cold War

• In Event: Environmental Diplomacy during the Cold War

Abstract

The Canadian-American relationship is predicated on border environments. That is particularly true during the early Cold War period when both countries sought to mobilize their shared natural resources on an unprecedented scale. With a particular emphasis on water, this paper will examine the “nature” of the Canadian-American bilateral relationship in the decades after World War II. The point will be to demonstrate that environmental factors have been largely ignored by bilateral historians, and make the case that environmental considerations (uranium, St. Lawrence Seaway and Power Project, Columbia River treaty, oil and gas, wood, etc.) are central to understanding the transnational northern North American relationship in the early Cold War. In doing so, this paper will also serve as a sort of reconnaissance for a more general 20th century history of Canadian-American relations predicated on environmental diplomacy. Moreover, I will delve into conceptions of what counts as “environmental diplomacy.” Political scientists have contended that only relations with a strong environmental protection aspect (i.e., post-1965) can be considered “environmental diplomacy”; however, drawing upon my own work and that of other environmental historians, I will make the case for conceiving of environmental diplomacy as any sort of foreign affairs that has a significant impact on the environment.

Author

• Daniel Macfarlane, Western Michigan University