“The central symbol for Canada – and this is based on numerous instances of its occurrence in both English and French Canadian literature – is undoubtedly Survival, la Survivance. What it means is that Canada is a collective victim of a vast, unorganised conspiracy to make it die of boredom.”
— Margaret Atwood, Survival: A Thematic Guide to Canadian Literature (1972)
Two balloons float in the air: ‘Canada as 51st American state’ or ‘Canada should join the European Union (EU)’. On the surface, it sounds like the geopolitical equivalent of auctioning off the family canoe, but such thought experiments aren’t entirely frivolous. They hint at a more profound unease: How did the land of polite diplomacy and unassuming charm come to resemble a nation in search of a chaperone?
Behind these propositions lies an uncomfortable truth. Canada, once a quiet model of pluralism and pragmatism, now seems less a sovereign power and more a drifting entity needing adoption papers.
There was once a mythic resonance to the idea of Canada, a whisper of frostbitten vastness where pluralism wasn’t just a slogan but a quietly lived reality. Its promise was not a utopia but a model: a liberal democracy tempered by humility, civility and a sense of common good. It was an experiment in human coexistence, framed against an infinite horizon of wilderness – a place where rugged individualism found its complement in a shared ethos of care. Yet, over time, this vision has been drowned in the melee of the empire’s exigencies and the Cold War’s distortions, leaving behind a paltry residue: a politics of decadence, jostling diasporas, and a nation haunted by its lost potential.
Canada’s story was never one of grandeur, but therein lay its peculiar power. It was a modest, almost self-effacing nation. For decades, this identity allowed it to position itself as a ‘middle power’, a bridge-builder in a fractious world. But the Cold War, as much a psychological campaign as a geopolitical one, ensnared Canada in the American orbit, thrusting it into a precarious role as a junior partner in a global hegemonic order.
Canada’s gradual loss of identity
Under the guise of peacekeeping – a mythos Canada has long clung to – it became an accomplice in the projection of Western power, less a mediator between empires than a quiet adherent to the logic of containment. What was marketed as the middle-power ideal – a Canada standing above the fray – was a chimera. Instead, the nation became entangled in the machinery of NATO, the sinews of American imperialism, and the gradual erasure of its own distinct identity.
This loss of identity is most acutely felt in Canada’s domestic sphere. The idea of Canada as a mosaic – multiculturalism institutionalised as state policy – seemed to promise an alternative to the melting pot of its southern neighbour. It was a vision of a nation where diversity would be celebrated, not subsumed. But this ideal has curdled into a fragmented politics of competing diasporas, where identity is leveraged for influence and grievance is commodified for capital.
Also read: What US’ Claim of ‘First Among Equals’ Reveals About the India-Canada Row
The promise of multiculturalism has mutated into an endless balancing act in which the nation’s coherence is sacrificed on the altar of representation. What remains is not a harmonious mosaic but a fractured mirror, reflecting a Canada no longer recognisable to itself.
This fractured identity has given rise to a decadence – not of opulence, but of inertia. Contemporary Canadian politics is marked by a lack of imagination, a listless drift from one patchwork initiative to the next. Once an aspirational entity, Canada now operates as an assemblage of interests: corporate, ethnic, regional and ideological.
The grand narrative of a nation united by shared purpose has been replaced by the rhetoric of progress unmoored from action. From climate policy to Indigenous reconciliation, the promises of a brighter future are undermined by the absence of a coherent framework for achieving it. Instead of vision, there is a kind of moral lethargy, an inability or unwillingness, to reckon with the contradictions at the heart of the nation.
The shadow of colonialism
Empire, too, exacted its toll. The British imperial legacy, long a shadow over Canada’s self-conception, offered the illusion of belonging to a grand tradition while fostering a perennial identity crisis. Even as Canada ostensibly outgrew its colonial tether, it internalised the imperial logic of hierarchy and exploitation. Nowhere is this more glaring than in its ongoing treatment of Indigenous peoples.
The settler-colonial framework, with its violent dispossession and cultural erasure, was never fully dismantled but merely rebranded under the veneer of liberal democracy. The Cold War’s ideological binaries only deepened this erasure, relegating Indigenous sovereignty to a peripheral concern in the global struggle for dominance. In this unhealed wound, Canada’s actual failure lies here: a nation that cannot reconcile with its past cannot hope to chart a meaningful future.
And so, we arrive at the present moment, where Canada’s fragility is laid bare. The casual propositions for Canada to either join the EU or become the 51st American state are not simply geopolitical thought experiments; they are reflections of a deeper anxiety about Canada’s place in the world. These ideas, absurd on their surface, tap into a fundamental perception that Canada lacks the heft to stand on its own. These proposals speak more to others’ ambitions than Canada’s reality, but they also expose the uneasy truth that Canada’s sovereignty, for all its symbolism, often feels conditional.
Canada’s place in the world
The notion of Canada as the 51st state is a perennial jab rooted in the asymmetry of the Canada-US relationship. Despite its vast natural resources and strategic importance, Canada is often seen as a satellite state – essential to American interests yet subordinate to them.
President-elect Donald Trump crystallised this dynamic with his characteristic brazenness when he referred to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as “Governor Trudeau” and joked about using economic force to bend Canada to his will. The idea of annexation, though fantastical, underscores the perception of Canada as a country whose sovereignty is largely performative, tethered to the whims of its southern neighbour.
Across the Atlantic, the proposition of Canada joining the EU has a different flavour – less derision, more desperation. Stanley Pignal of The Economist remarked that “Europe needs space and resources; Canada needs people. Let’s deal.” At first glance, the match seems improbable, but the deeper logic is clear. Canada’s values – multilateralism, environmental stewardship, human rights – align more closely with those of Europe than with the increasingly insular nationalism of the US. Joining the EU could allow Canada to recalibrate its alliances, trading dependence on Washington for integration with like-minded nations. Yet, this, too, comes at a cost. Would such a move bolster Canada’s sovereignty or merely replace one form of subservience with another? The question lingers, unresolved.
An opportunity in this loss
What is left of Canada today is a palimpsest of these histories: a nation defined more by what it has lost than by what it has preserved. The very idea of Canada – the vision of a nation capable of transcending its colonial past, asserting its independence from imperial overlords, and embodying a pluralistic future – has been eroded. In its place is a politics of Survival, a scrambling for relevance in a world where Canada’s identity is less a beacon than a brand.
And yet, in this loss, there is an opportunity. The decadence of Canadian politics, the fragmentation of its social fabric, and the disillusionment with its institutions may create the conditions for reinvention. The idea of Canada was never a fixed truth but an ongoing experiment. Its apparent failure may hold the seeds of its renewal. To recover the promise of Canada is not to return to some mythic past but to reimagine its future – not as a subordinate in the shadow of empires but as a nation capable of genuine independence, solidarity and vision.
Canada, as it stands, is a cautionary tale. But the dregs of empire and Cold War decadence may yield something unexpected – a chance to rediscover the courage to dream anew. The question is whether Canada will rise to the occasion or remain content with mediocrity as it so often has.
Narendra Pachkhédé is a critic, essayist and writer who splits his time between Toronto, London and Geneva.
