Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Foreign Affairs and International Trade
Issue No. 36 - Evidence - Meeting of December 13, 2017
OTTAWA, Wednesday, December 13, 2017
The Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade met this day at 4:18 p.m. to study the impact and utilization of Canadian culture and arts in Canadian foreign policy and diplomacy, and other related matters.
Senator A. Raynell Andreychuk (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: I will call the meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade to order. I’m Senator Andreychuk, the chair of the committee. I will ask the members present — some are still coming in — to identify yourselves.
Senator Ataullahjan: Senator Salma Ataullahjan from Ontario.
Senator Greene: Stephen Greene, Nova Scotia.
Senator Ngo: Senator Ngo from Ontario.
[Translation]
Senator Cormier: René Cormier from New Brunswick.
[English]
The Chair: I will introduce Senator Dawson from Quebec, who is on our steering committee, as he enters the room. Other committee members will be joining us shortly.
The committee has been authorized by the Senate to study the impact and utilization of Canadian culture and arts in Canadian foreign policy and diplomacy, and other related matters. Under this mandate, the committee will hear today from Mr. Jeremy Kinsman, a former ambassador of Canada, amongst many other portfolios that he has held throughout his long and distinguished career.
Mr. Kinsman served for over 40 years with the Canadian Foreign Service. His ambassadorial posts were in Moscow and Rome, as High Commissioner in London, and as Ambassador to the European Union in Brussels. He is also a distinguished visiting diplomat at the Ryerson University since 2010.
Mr. Kinsman is appearing by video conference from San Francisco. I presume there isn’t the snow that there is in Ottawa.
Mr. Kinsman, can you hear me?
Jeremy Kinsman, Former Ambassador of Canada, as an individual: I can hear you perfectly, senator, and it’s very nice to see you again. I don’t know if such personal familiarities are permitted in this formal setting, but I send you my wishes.
The Chair: Thank you very much. I’m pleased that you’re appearing before us.
You know our topic. We are looking for advice and experiences on cultural diplomacy, how it has been utilized in the past within the foreign service and elsewhere and any recommendations for the future with respect to an ever-evolving Canada and an ever-evolving world.
Your expertise and advice is being called on. The floor is yours to make opening statements and then we can proceed to questions. Welcome to the committee.
Mr. Kinsman: Thank you very much, senator.
[Translation]
I will not speak French, but since I am from Montreal I will answer questions in French.
[English]
I am at the Canadian Consulate in San Francisco. I thank them for enabling me to do this because I have duties at the University of California tonight.
I am not here because of what I do now. I imagine, as you said, I’m here because of what I used to do, what I have done. I’m happy to try to satisfy your question and give you modest, humble advice from my experience.
My experience includes having been five years the Assistant Deputy Minister for Culture and Broadcasting at the Department of Communications, the predecessor of the Department of Canadian Heritage. In fact, our sector became Canadian Heritage with the addition of citizenship things from Secretary of State.
So I have a point of view of both the user as an ambassador to G8 countries, where we have had our largest cultural and arts programs, and also as having been in charge of the sector at the department which is best able to resource the creative skills of Canadians to send them abroad. I’ve also been at two American universities for the last 10 years, and I can speak to you of that experience with respect to support for Canadian studies. So let’s get started.
Personally, I have to tell you that I can’t think of a more important topic for your committee. Foreign policy focuses on crises of the day, whether it’s North Korea or Venezuela or the Rohingya, because we care and because it’s important. But we’re not going to be decisive in those things. This topic and how we project ourselves in the world is about us. It’s not about somebody else, and we can be decisive.
We need to do it as Canadians, Madam Chair, precisely because though we’re a vast country in demography and cultural impact, we’re still relatively modest. We can’t depend, as the United States does, on the market to do our job in projecting Canadian reality.
The other reason we have to do it strenuously is something that you said, as I did see your hearings last week by video. You pointed out that very often the view of Canada that others have no longer corresponds to our realities. I think you used the word “myth.” That is absolutely true. It’s an uphill climb, and I can give you examples about that.
We shouldn’t have myths about ourselves. There is a set of rankings in international diplomacy called the Good Country rankings. The Good Country rankings don’t show us off to be exactly the stars in the world we think we are. We’re well liked, and I think that now most people understand the virtues, values and relevance of Canada’s management of pluralism and diversity. But on the things that we’re talking about, for example, in culture we rank, in the opinion of others, twenty-fifth in the world; in science and technology, twenty-ninth. And this will break your hearts. Our DNA is supposed to be international peace and security, and we rank forty-first. My point is that we have a job to do.
When I was doing it as ambassador, it was the golden age. In 1995, culture, cultural policy and public diplomacy were identified as being the third pillar of Canadian foreign policy. During those years we were actually very effective, and I will describe how it worked.
Unfortunately, in the last decade that was stripped away. Funding and support for the projection of Canadian culture and even to a large extent public diplomacy was removed. We can look at that.
One of the things I’d like to address, Madam Chair, is I also noticed that you asked a very pertinent question last week. You said that it seems to different people it means different things. You’re absolutely right. It generally means what they do, but the fact is that culture and public diplomacy are completely inseparable. We support our trade goals through projecting our reality on our values. It’s a search for influence on behalf of our interests and nothing could be more important. We can’t achieve our goals internationally unless we have influence. Let me underline that soft power is not a substitute for hard power; it’s a complement. You can’t do one without having a certain amount of the other to have credibility.
Lastly — my last few caveats — it is not about what the government does; it’s what Canadian people do. Diplomacy is public because its characteristic is that it is people to people. What we are doing with public diplomacy and with cultural policy abroad and arts policy abroad, we are projecting the best that Canadians can show. It has to be authentic to work and it always is.
Moreover, it is not always elitist; it’s not always lofty. You mentioned, as I recall, what would happen if a choir from a high school in Saskatchewan showed up. Well, they would show up and they would be showcased. They would be showcased because what they show is sincerity, energy and a Canadian approach towards the future.
Let me try and tell you how interactive this is. Our realities, our values, our creativity, our sense of capacity for innovation are all bound up together. When I was Ambassador to Italy, the large Italian telecommunications sphere was being privatized. Canadian companies of excellence and significant size — then Nortel, Research in Motion, BCEInternational — were bidding to be participants in that process, but the Italian audience did not associate Canada with technology.
How did we get it across? We got it across with the help of Robert Lepage, Rhombus Media’s movies about Glenn Gould. Pinchas Zukerman, the conductor of the National Arts Centre Orchestra, was in Florence. We got it across by doing high-speed Internet master classes with him back to North America. We showcased those things and demonstrated that when it came to technology and creativity, Canada was innovative, was forward-looking and that we had solutions. Again, I can’t think of anything more important that we can do.
What is the instrument of delivery? It is through our missions and consulates abroad.
Britain, which does soft power probably better than anybody, has the invaluable asset of BBC World Service. We used to have CBC International Service, but it, alas, was closed.
I listened to the presentations by the good officers of Global Affairs and Heritage the other day, and I had a lot of empathy for them. I worked at Heritage, or its predecessor, for several years, and I know that they feel a sense of real belief about what we’re talking about. They have been given money now, funds to replace the scorched-earth landscape that they came in on, that this government came in on. And I’m not being political; I’m just being historical. But their problem is that they don’t, obviously, have the network. They can’t deliver abroad.
They have the contacts with the associations, with what I used to call “the community.” All of the companies, the arts companies, they have that, but they have to connect that to the network to radiate it abroad.
So does the Canada Council for the Arts. The Canada Council has the contacts that are inimitable with the artists themselves. They send artists abroad on residencies, but they send them abroad with priorities and mandates that are somewhat different than what we’re talking about, which is projecting Canadian creativity and capacity to gain influence.
Who is responsible for that? That’s Global Affairs Canada. Global Affairs Canada controls the missions. However, as the spokesman — a fine fellow — mentioned last week, they don’t have any contacts in the artistic community. You have to put those things together.
The standard way Ottawa works is that you create working groups of the different departments. That works only to a point.
Other solutions have been proposed. I refer you a long way back to the Applebaum-Hébert report of 1982, which was an extremely important report on the foundations of Canadian culture, the first since the Massey commission. In order to deal with the task that you have, which you’ve identified — those challenges — they recommended the creation of an independent, stand-alone agency that would bring together the relevant parts of those three partners the way the British Council does to operate effectively.
I can talk about that with you, if that is of interest. If that doesn’t work — the Applebaum-Hébert recommendation wasn’t accepted back then because departments ferociously resisted the loss of turf, in a sense, and there was not strenuous leadership from the government to make it happen — then you can work the present system, but it has to be done from the top.
The notion that culture is the third pillar of foreign policy fell away in 2005. It wasn’t actually the Harper government that wrote it out of foreign policy; it was the Martin government, to tell you the truth. What the Harper government did was completely strip culture abroad of any funding; and Foreign Affairs — DFAIT, as it was called — lost its programs.
May I mention one program that was lost? I find that, working at universities in the United States, I can see the negative effects. We had a wonderful program that some of you have probably heard about, which was support for Canadian studies abroad. In 2005, the year before it was eliminated by removal of the $12 million from DFAIT’s budget to support it, that program was present in 50 countries in the world and was reaching 5,000 scholars.
Along with it, there was a faculty enrichment program. What was it doing? It was supporting Canadian studies, especially in the United States where, God knows, we have a challenge today in communicating to people about the benefits of North America and of NAFTA. It enabled scholars to take a Canadian experience — public health care, environmental issues, immigration, diversity, oil and gas — whatever the issue is, and to develop a Canadian module for insertion when teaching a course on these functional topics. It was absolutely invaluable.
These Canadian studies programs in many universities were not wholly dependent on the Canadian government for funding, but they were substantively dependent. The removal of that funding, unfortunately, wrecked several programs that I could mention to you.
I do not know why it has not been restored. The Minister of Heritage has been given a significant amount of money to deploy, perhaps because the word “education” is in it; I am not sure. But I would recommend this to you as a very specific topic to bring up.
You asked for advice. The best advice I can give you is that this will only work if it comes from the top, if it comes from the top of the public service, if deputy ministers identify this as a priority and if they make this happen.
Right now in Global Affairs, I think the amount of money identified last week for missions is $1.7 million for 175 missions. If you do the math, you can see that is a pathetic amount.
If you compare the amount of funds that we are placing at the disposal of our missions and departments in our interests to those that Britain, France, Germany, Italy or Spain spend with their institutes and mechanisms, in multiples of 12 and 15 more than us — even after the infusion of new funding whose effects we haven’t seen — you’ll see that we are behind the game.
Diplomacy isn’t what it used to be. It has changed absolutely irrevocably. It is now public. What does “public” mean? It means transparent. It means people to people. It means it’s open and competitive, and we have to compete.
The most important thing that I can remind you of — though I’m sure you don’t need it — is that public diplomacy speaks about our values. Back in the 1990s and the decade afterward, we gave countless seminars on diversity in Canada to countries that were looking for answers. That kind of advice is of enormous profile and it assists our reputation and credibility for a whole scope of other interests, including promoting our innovative, technologically advanced cultural industries. The arts directly support industry in people’s minds, but the most important thing is that the people who do it are Canadians. We deploy Canadians out there — in panels, in festivals. We showcase their talents. And we present to countries — some of which are stressed, some of which are tired — the kind of optimism, energy and innovation that should make our reputation for decades to come.
I can answer questions on any of this. I’m sorry to be so general, but time is short. Thank you very much.
The Chair: Thank you. You’ve covered a lot of ground — I’m thankful for that — and put it into some historical context of the department.
[Translation]
Senator Cormier: Thank you very much. I will ask my question in French, Mr. Kinsman. First of all, thank you for your very eloquent remarks.
To put my question into context, I am a new senator from the arts and culture sector, and I have extensive experience as an artist in theatre and music internationally. I have taken part in international public diplomacy missions and have worked with embassies to serve our country by presenting works.
You said that diplomacy and the culture sector have changed tremendously today. There are multiple networks at various levels as regards government decisions. So we have broad cultural policies, and there are many parallel networks that give our country an international presence.
I would like to hear your thoughts on the issue of cooperation among embassies and the challenges that embassies currently face in being aware of these networks and using them wisely to have greatest impact possible in cultural diplomacy.
Mr. Kinsman: Thank you, Senator Cormier. You are getting to the technical heart of the issue.
I am a bit distracted because I am hearing the interpretation into English at the same time. It is distracting. May I answer your question in English?
[English]
Senator Cormier: Absolutely.
Mr. Kinsman: Do not underestimate the curiosity and the dedication of the people who work in our embassies. They’re not in contact with your community day to day, but they’re aware.
Most of the great things we do, senator, emerge because opportunities arise. For example, we used to, in Italy, use a technique called Giornate Canadese, Canada Days. We would bring people, like the arts companies you have been involved with, together with Canadian high-tech companies, together with other potential showcase Canadian personnel from universities, and we would do two or three or four days in a given city.
How did we get the companies? We got the companies because Robert Lepage was in Sicily, or the National Arts Centre was in Florence when we were doing these things.
Somebody knew a wonderful woman, Almeta Speaks, a beautiful blues singer who sang at the bar in the Ritz Hotel in Paris, and we got her in.
Canadian Brass was on a tour. When we brought in technical companies, we brought in the companies that could bring something to an audience of real interest to them.
For example, the Duomo in Siena was at the point of self-destruction because of the water in the sandstone walls. Canadians had just been through that at the monument in Vimy. So we were able to bring in that expertise in imaging that was entirely novel to the people responsible for those things.
You do what you can. We didn’t have a whole lot of money, but we found that our host cities — because Italy is a country of cities — was thrilled to give us locales. The Ferrari company gave us Jacques Villeneuve’s old Ferrari to display. Our RCMP officer, whose day job was dealing with organized crime, got out of his closet his red tunic, and we rented a black horse and put him out there in front of the people.
You bring together what you can to show off Canada. How does this happen? It happens because people are energized, they’re committed and they care. If you did have such an independent agency and you had officers from Canada Council or from Heritage Canada who would be posted to our embassies, those who have the contacts with your milieu, then you can see that it could work even more effectively.
The Chair: We have a problem. It’s the end of the season. Mr. Kinsman, you know the problems in Parliament; at the end of a session we get a lot of legislation that comes in in a haphazard way, whenever the house brings it to us. The bells are ringing, so I’m obliged to stop the meeting. However, I think it’s an appropriate time. You got your presentation in, you’ve given us some new avenues to think about and you’ve set the stage. So I think what we will do is reserve —
Senator Dawson: Madam chair, I’m told that it’s a one-hour bell.
The Chair: Yes, but there are caucuses being called, so I’ve been advised that we have to terminate, and I think it’s appropriate. We have the presentation.
We’re probably going to call on you again, Mr. Kinsman, once we get into the study. I think it would be unfair to try to get a few more questions in and not everybody. We will have to determine how we handle this.
The bells are for one hour and the vote is then, so I don’t want to keep you. You said you had another engagement.
On behalf of the committee, I thank you for being available on short notice. I think you’ve opened up new avenues that we need to explore. I think maybe I’m the only other person who remembers the Applebaum-Hébert report, and we haven’t touched on that one, so that would be good.
If you have any other suggestions, it would be helpful. In the meantime, we will continue our study when Parliament reconvenes at the end of January. Perhaps we’ll find a time that is suitable to you — whether you’re in San Francisco or back in Canada somewhere — to continue the dialogue. Perhaps we will be further on in the study, so your expertise will be called on again. Thank you very much for coming.
(The committee adjourned.)