Canada's Parliament Hill. [photo: Richard Duguay/ Alamy]
[This is an excerpt from an article in The Round Table: The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs and Policy Studies.]
Canada has long been a beacon of financial and political support for developing countries within the modern Commonwealth. This dates back to the Pearson Report: a new strategy for global development of 1970, and subsequent foundation of the Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation (CFTC) in 1971. Several leading Canadian diplomats acted as Assistant Secretaries General, in charge of CFTC. Furthermore, successive governments in Ottawa have been particularly active in education, hosting the 3rd (Ottawa 1964) and 14th (Halifax 2000) Ministers Conferences, and were historically, until the early 2000s, the second largest donor of Commonwealth Scholarships, giving 500 awards a year after 1984. (The current Prime Minister of Canada and leader of the Liberal Party, Mark Carney is himself a former Commonwealth scholar.) The list of Canadians who have played formidable roles in academic co-operation both at the Association of Commonwealth Universities and at the Secretariat is similarly impressive. Although this has dwindled in recent years, in 2025, Canada still hosts the Commonwealth of Learning in Vancouver. The COL owes much of its modern success to the Anglo-Canadian Sir John Daniel (former Vice-chancellor of the Open University) who served as COL President for eight years from 2008. (It is understood that the Canadian and British Columbia Governments are still among the largest financial contributors to COL).
Yet since the ill-fated decision to host the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Sri Lanka in 2013,Footnote2. Canada has been relatively disengaged from the Commonwealth. Then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper refused to attend the heads’ meeting in protest, and the country has ‘never really returned’. Although in recent years CFTC funds are no longer allocated to separate projects but have been absorbed into general programme spending, Canada remains one of the principal funders for the Secretariat.Footnote3.
Given Canada’s leadership role in the official institutions of the Commonwealth as well as in the ever-expanding voluntary Commonwealth, it is all the more extraordinary that the contemporary Commonwealth has been so subdued in the face of President Donald Trump’s administration’s pressure on the country since Trump’s election in November 2024. In contrast, King Charles III – both in his role as constitutional head of state of Canada and ceremonial head of the Commonwealth – has demonstrated both public support for Canada and indicated a central role which the Commonwealth can play in response to global geopolitical challenges of the 21st century.
A considerable amount of recent literature on the Commonwealth has referred to its soft power, and the enduring value of its networks. However, in the view of long-term supporters of the Commonwealth, to be relevant, the Commonwealth needs to respond to emerging major global challenges posed by the rise of popular nationalism, democratic backsliding and authoritarianism which are fundamentally antithetical to the Commonwealth Charter. Development has also been part of the Commonwealth’s DNA since the establishment of the Secretariat in 1965; this is also under sustained pressure across the globe, as countries in the Global North appear to be shifting from ‘welfare to warfare’ with the contraction of international development assistance and parallel rise in defence spending.
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This mini roundtable on Canada and the Commonwealth points out that American designs on Canadian territory have a long history and that the United States has used economic protectionism and non-tariff barriers against its northern neighbour in the past. But the quiescence of the Commonwealth, as an international organisation in which Canada is a major power with an impressive pedigree of international engagement, and from other individual Commonwealth members, is both striking and very dispiriting. This contrasts sharply with the public response of the Commonwealth in support of the United Kingdom when Argentina invaded the Falklands in April 1982 and the consistent public messages of solidarity to Guyana and Belize, embedded in successive CHOGM communiques. It raises the pertinent question of whether Guyana and Belize should be at the vanguard of Commonwealth support for Canada’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. This might even demonstrate to Canadians that the Commonwealth does have enduring value, in this increasingly fraught and uncertain international system.
The outgoing Secretary General Baroness Patricia Scotland, for whatever reason, failed to issue a statement of solidarity with Canada at a time when King Charles III has made his own support clear by meeting then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and Prime Minister Carney. In the view of contributors to this roundtable, the potential for the Commonwealth to be a leading multilateral instrument to promote Canada’s national interest should be exploited. However seriously or dismissively one might take Trump’s repeated declarations of ‘51st State’ intentions, the tariff onslaught on Canada (and for that matter on other countries) with its serious economic global consequences warrants an expression of Commonwealth concern.
The current US – Canadian crisis provides an opportunity for the Commonwealth – intergovernmental and accredited organisations alike – to re-engage with Canada. Canada is also significant as a bridge between Anglo, French and Indigenous traditions. This is something different from the US and, for the Commonwealth, enables a sympathy with Francophone members and awareness of the claims for Indigenous rights. It explains Carney’s early visit to President Emmanuel Macron, Sir Keir Starmer and Iqaluit (the Nunavut capital) on his return trip to Paris and London, and why the Ottawa government will oppose a US land grab of Greenland as fiercely as any attempted annexation of Canada itself. The potential for the Commonwealth to be a leading multilateral instrument to promote Canada’s national interest should be exploited. With the formidable Carney as Prime Minister (the outcome of the snap Canadian election is of course unknown at the time of writing), it is surely the right time to reach out to Canada to express support and encourage its active re-engagement in all the Commonwealth family.
Sue Onslow is the Editor of the Round Table Journal. The Commonwealth Association is the staff alumni association of the Commonwealth.
