Fearful Times, and Canada

On Tuesday last I had an email from the Chancellor of UMass Lowell, where I sometimes teach:

“I am sorry to let you know that this changed over the weekend. As part of the university’s proactive effort to support and inform our international students, the International Students & Scholars Office (ISSO) has been regularly monitoring the federal database used to monitor and track international students. On Saturday, the university discovered that federal authorities had revoked the visa and terminated the immigration status of a UMass Lowell undergraduate student.”

It seems U.S. politics are circling the drain. The U.S. Constitution, I had thought, was designed to prevent the ‘Mad King’ phenomenon, but it turns out that that depended on everyone–executive, legislators, judiciary–playing by rules which, it seems, aren’t rules after all, only habits and customs.

The U.S. has done irreparable harm to its power in the world.

Some Canadians are inclined to jeer at the U.S. and its embarrassment on the world stage. That could become a dangerous habit. Instead let’s be honest and clear-sighted on the strengths and vulnerabilities within our own system of government and our own societal & cultural norms. We need to support leaders who understand Canada’s position within the world and have strategies to strengthen it as the rules of global trade are rewritten. Alliances, military and (is in trade agreements) economic, are not love-fests, but strategic partnerships.

I am uncomfortable when some Canadians get all teary–the other side of jeering–about how much and how blindly they have ‘loved’ the U.S.. The goal of any Canadian government must be to strengthen Canada’s position in the world, with the understanding that no economy or society in a smart, fluid, and connected world is or should be “independent”, and that a system that works to benefit of all players is best for us. (The devil is in the details, of course.)

I admire Prime Minister Mark Carney–the little I know of him– (three Co. Mayo grandparents!)–but he is a new type of Canadian PM: an internationally-minded elitist technocrat. Effective leadership in our decentralized democratic confederation will also demand other, quite different skills. PM Carney is the man of the hour now, though, which is his good fortune and, I hope, Canada’s. Like WSC in 1940, the man is meeting the moment, perhaps.

I respect the measured, sensible language that Prime Minister Carney and Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly use.  They accept that the U.S. “Administration” (I think “Régime”, with its suggestion of autocracy, ossification, and damage, is a better noun) can cause immense trouble. They accept the necessity of accommodation, but in their speeches and interviews they have maintained a firm tone and offered clear warnings that somethings are not negotiable.

A good relationship with the U.S. will always be in Canada’s interest. At certain times such may not be possible, but we should work to keep those breaks as short as possible, while maintaining a clear awareness of our own interests, and being willing to sometimes pay a price for standing firm…

Right now, many smart people in the U.S. – undergraduates on student visas, scientists and researchers working at the highest levels – are feeling vulnerable. Canada ought to be reaching out to these victimized people with offers not just of asylum, but of freedom–to study, learn, research, contribute (and freedom to protest Israel’s project in Gaza, though that might be as career-threatening in Canada as in U.S.). Intellectual immigrants would give an invaluable, game-changing boost to the knowledge base and skill set of the nation. Just like the thousands of émigré Hungarians who sparked up Montreal and Toronto starting in the 1950s, and other waves of immigrants before and after that…

To offer people in flight from the U.S. educational and research ecosystems place to land, Canada needs to commit to developing the quality, scale, and scope of research in Canadian universities, which have been, for most of our history, second-rate.  It will be hard to beat the Chinese in this area, but we can try. (The multitude of Chinese students and graduate students I’ve encountered as Harvard and UCLA this year–suggests that U.S. schools are still a powerful draw globally … up until January 2025, anyway). Many faculty, researchers and students in U.S. schools and institutions feel furious, scared, and – rightly – vulnerable. Canadian schools and institutions should be making offers, backed with serious support for studies and research. As an editor and writing coach, I work with tenured faculty in the highest reaches of Ivy League acclaim and renown who feel censored, threatened, and sickened by the atmosphere. Their world-renowned institutions are poisoned by fear.

Can Canada make an all-out effort to scoop international research and teaching talent from U.S. universities? That will require the federal govt stepping in and up. Canada’s universities are for the most part significantly underfunded. And there are aspects of the U.S. university system, particularly the great public schools like U of Michigan, UTA, UCLA, UC Berkeley, UC Riverside, UMass, U of Wisconsin, UVA, OSU, etc. that Canadians ought to take a closer look at. (Beyond the NCAA football and basketball seasons!) These are large public research institutions with global reach. Asking Canadian undergraduates to pay more, while offering them ready access to scholarships and loans might be step one in improving the landscape for scholarship and research in Canada. I can’t think it’s a bad thing to ask people to invest more deeply in their own education. And I’ll shut up now.

Feature Image: Thomas K.