Global Affairs Canada (GAC; French: Affaires mondiales Canada; AMC)[NB 1] is the department of the Government of Canada that manages Canada's diplomatic and consular relations, promotes Canadian international trade, and leads Canada's international development and humanitarian assistance. It is also responsible for maintaining Canadian government offices abroad with diplomatic and consular status on behalf of all government departments.
According to the OECD, Canada’s total official development assistance (ODA) (USD 7.8 billion, preliminary data) increased in 2022 due to exceptional support to Ukraine and its pandemic response in developing countries, increased costs for in-donor refugees as well as higher contributions to international organizations, representing 0.37% of gross national income (GNI).[4]
History
The department has undergone numerous name changes and re-organizations since its founding in 1909. Originally established as the "Department of External Affairs", GAC has been known by a variety of names throughout its lifetime. Its current legal name is the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development, but its "applied" name used within government is Global Affairs Canada[5] often shorted in the Canadian media to simply "Global Affairs".
Origins (early 20th century)
GAC was first founded as the Department of External Affairs on 1 June 1909.[6]
During and after World War I, Canada assumed greater control over its foreign relations, with its full autonomy in this field confirmed by the Statute of Westminster in 1931. For historical reasons, the name External Affairs was retained.[7]
The Department of Trade and Commerce, which included the Trade Commissioner Service, had been created in 1892. In 1969, it was combined with the Department of Industry to form the Department of Industry Trade and Commerce (ITC).[8] Both External Affairs and ITC maintained networks of offices abroad, with varying degrees of coordination among them. The Department of Citizenship and Immigration also had offices abroad, in some cases dating back to Confederation.
Reorganization (1970s–80s)
In the 1970s and early 1980s, there were growing efforts to ensure coordination among all Canadian government offices outside Canada and to strengthen the leadership role and authority of heads of post (ambassadors, high commissioners, and consuls general) over all Canadian government staff in their areas of accreditation. This led to a 1979 decision by Prime MinisterJoe Clark to consolidate the various streams of the Canadian Foreign Service, including the "political" (traditional diplomatic) stream, the Trade Commissioner Service, and the Immigration Foreign Service.
This was followed in 1982 by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau's decision to combine External Affairs and International Trade into a single department. It initially retained the name of Department of External Affairs, but was subsequently renamed External Affairs and International Trade.[9] The change was reflected in a new Department of External Affairs Act passed in 1983.[10] The 1982 merger was part of larger reorganization of government that also combined the Industry component of ITC with the Department of Regional Economic Expansion.
Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (1993–95)
CIDA had been formally established in 1968, although a preceding External Aid Office was created as a branch of the External Affairs Department in 1960,[13] building on roots that go back to the Colombo Plan in the early 1950s.
Recent developments (21st century)
Through an administrative separation of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, two separate departments named Foreign Affairs Canada (FAC) and International Trade Canada (ITCan) were created in December 2003. However, legislation to formally abolish DFAIT and provide a statutory basis for the separate departments failed to pass a first vote in the House of Commons on 15 February 2005. The government, nonetheless, maintained the administrative separation of the two departments despite neither having been established through an Act of Parliament.
In early 2006, under the new government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper,[14] Foreign Affairs Canada and International Trade Canada were re-joined to again form a single department known as Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada.
In 2013, included within the Conservative government's omnibus budget bill, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 21, 2013 and other measures (Bill C-60), was a section that would fold CIDA into the department, creating the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (DFATD). The bill received royal assent on 26 June 2013.[15]
On 4 November 2015, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's new Liberal government again modified the name of the department.[16] While its legal name remains the Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development, its public designation (applied title) under the Federal Identity Program is Global Affairs Canada (GAC).[17] Despite the change to the applied title of the department, the senior minister responsible is still called the Minister of Foreign Affairs, rather than "Minister of Global Affairs", in line with the terminology used in other jurisdictions and in international law.
Deputy ministers are senior public servants who take political direction from ministers and are responsible for the day-to-day operations of the department.
The current departmental structure, and corresponding executives, are as follows:[18][19]
The change of terminology from external affairs to foreign affairs recognized, albeit belatedly, a shift that had occurred many years before.
At the time that the external affairs portfolio was created in 1909, Canada was a self-governing dominion in the British Empire and did not have an independent foreign policy. The term external affairs avoided the question of whether a colony or dominion—self-governing and hence sovereign in some respects—could, by definition, have foreign affairs. Implicitly, since the department was responsible for affairs with both Commonwealth and non-Commonwealth countries, all external relations were of a type, even when the head of state was shared with other nations.[citation needed]
Under section 132 of the British North America Act, 1867, the federal government had authority to conduct and implement relations with other parts of the British Empire, which were not considered foreign lands. The United Kingdom and other colonial powers still routinely divided their conduct of overseas policy into foreign affairs (e.g. the Foreign Office) and domestic or colonial affairs (the Colonial Office or Dominion Office, which were later reorganized and combined into one department: the Foreign and Commonwealth Office). Canadian interests outside the empire (e.g. between Canada and its non-empire neighbours, the United States, Russia, St. Pierre and Miquelon, and Greenland) were under the purview of the UK Foreign Office. Informally, however, Canada had had relations with the United States in particular, with trade and other relationships pre-dating Confederation.[26]
The Statute of Westminster clarified that Canada (and certain other dominions, such as Australia and New Zealand) were primarily responsible for, among other things, the conduct of their own foreign affairs. After World War II, Canada was a founding member of the United Nations and participant in its own right in post-war settlement talks and other international fora, and in most respects the conduct of foreign affairs was no longer colonial.
Over the years after the Second World War, a number of other historical traditions were slowly abolished or brought into accordance with reality, such as the practice of Canadian ambassadors presenting diplomatic credentials signed by the monarch of Canada (including, on occasion, credentials written in French as an official language of Canada); Canadian ambassadors now present credentials signed by the governor general of Canada as representative of the Canadian monarch. Other traditions remain, such as the exchange of high commissioners, instead of ambassadors, between Commonwealth countries. (High commissioners present credentials from the head of government [the prime minister], as the head of state was historically shared, and would not accredit a representative to one's self.) Nonetheless, by the time the change in terminology was effected in 1993, Canada's foreign affairs had been conducted separately from the United Kingdom in most significant respects for the entire post-war period, or over 60 years since the Statute of Westminster.
John G. Diefenbaker Building, 111 Sussex Avenue, is home to most of the employees working on international trade. It also hosts a number of secondary and support offices
In September 2012, the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs and the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office signed a memorandum of understanding on diplomatic cooperation, which promotes the co-location of embassies, the joint provision of consular services, and common crisis response. The project has been criticized by leading Canadian foreign affairs scholars for undermining Ottawa's foreign policy independence.[28]
International Development and Humanitarian Assistance
Global Affairs Canada funds humanitarian projects, contributes to the United Nations Central Emergency Response Fund, makes smaller emergency contributions through the Canadian Red Cross and Canadian Foodgrains Bank and funds Canadian humanitarian organisations via the Humanitarian Coalition.[29]
Support is guided by Canada's Feminist International Assistance Policy.[30]
^Eary, James. 1982. "The Department of External Affairs." In The Times Survey of Foreign Ministries of the World, edited by Z. Stein. London: Times Books. p. 96.
^Osbaldeston, Gordon. 1992. Organizing to Govern, vol. II. Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson. pp. 454–7.
^Office, Government of Canada, Privy Council Office, Prime Minister's. "Machinery of Government Changes". www.pco-bcp.gc.ca. Archived from the original on 2 July 2017. Retrieved 11 June 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^Global Affairs Canada is the applied title under the Federal Identity Program; the legal title is Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development (French: Ministère des Affaires étrangères, du Commerce et du Développement).
