Rediscovering Patriotism-Canada Is Not "Post-National"

In 2004, American political scientist Samuel Huntington wrote an essay titled “Dead Souls: The Denationalization Of The American Elite.” In it, Huntington described the trend among many elites to identify more with the cosmopolitan world than with their individual countries. Huntington also described how much the elites’ views were differing from those of the rest of the public who still identified with their countries.

Eleven years later, Justin Trudeau told the New York Times that Canada was the world’s first “post-national” state, one without a “mainstream” or a core identity.

Over the next two years, the world saw everything from Donald Trump’s election as U.S. President to the United Kingdom supporting Brexit to a backlash against international agreements like NAFTA. But there were signs earlier than that. In 2014, Forbes Magazine noted that NAFTA was widely loathed by the American public. Journalist Paul Wells noted how similar Rob Ford’s election in Toronto was to Brexit and Trump’s election, being a backlash against elites the public didn’t agree with. American liberal Anthony Bourdain laid much of the blame for Trump’s win on arrogant elites who looked down on people living in the American “red states” as stupid and ignorant, a point repeated by conservative William McGurn.

Why is there such a backlash now?

Part of the problem is that both cosmopolitan liberals (as noted by American commentator Stephen Walt) and cosmopolitan conservatives (as noted by British journalist Nikil Saval) underestimated the broader public’s attachment to local identities and countries, and the public’s reaction to the disruptions the elites’ policy changes would cause. The elites showed the disconnect Huntington warned about in 2004, and actions such as the Brexit vote, the election of Trump and the backlash against NAFTA are in many ways a public reaction to the elite disconnect.

What does this mean for Canada?

As political blogger Matt Burgess noted, progressives might benefit from rediscovering their patriotism. Christian Larsen wrote in Policy Options magazine that it’s important not to confuse ethnic nationalism with civic nationalism, which is based on local patriotism rather than ethnic identity. McGill history student Luke Devine, writing about the emptiness of “post-national” values, stated that the values Trudeau described ought to be framed within Canada’s national story.

This is what cosmopolitan elites have forgotten, whether they be activists who want everyone to be “citizens of the world”, or businesspeople who don’t want national governments getting in their way. It’s human nature to want to belong to specific groupings, from countries to cities, that include some people and exclude others. People can move between different groups, and those groups will have disagreements among themselves, but they also have their own specific histories and values that distinguish them from each other.

Contrary to what Trudeau believes, Canada is not post-national. Like all countries, we have our own distinct history and identity, which play a critical role in informing our lives.

If there is a backlash against “elite wisdom”, it’s because the advocates of a borderless world forgot this.

As we are told daily, we live in a deeply interconnected world, one that we are poorly equipped to manage. Our natural tendency as hominids is to see things through the prism of the daily challenges of the extended family which does not prepare us well for the larger problems of, for example, globalization, automation, outsourcing, climate change, migration and the mass extinction of species. That does not mean the end of nation-states. People from all over the world want to move here, as I did, because of our distinct identity. We must cherish and maintain Canada in something like its present form in order to to make a small but significant contribution to sorting out these problems. Facebook, Google and the like have tremendous wealth and influence but their primary focus is not on saving the world, despite what they may say. We will still need governments to get to grips with the details. Bono ain't going to do it all by himself; the 'anywheres' and the 'somewheres' will have to work together.

As one who's fallen between the cracks I'd suggest that what Canada needs to do (but of course won't) is do a better job of addressing those who no longer fit in to the national dream, those who find themselves having been disposed of and those who were never included in the first place. This country can slap itself on the back about how "good" it is, in a way so repetitive that it becomes sickly-syrupy nauseating, for so long before the self-righteous propaganda just doesn't work anymore. I have no interest in hearing this country tell itself over and over and over again about how "nice" we are when it fails to follow up on its claims about itself. Patriotism dies when that happens and what replaces it is merely ennui.