Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney¡¯s ¡°rupture¡± is forcing regional governments, U.S. allies in particular, into some very uncomfortable places.
I argued last week that rethinking or redesigning trade architectures is the easy task for ¡°middle powers.¡± In many cases, they have been the moving forces behind regional economic institutions. In fact, those initiatives were typically created to blunt the power of big countries and check their ability to coerce smaller trade partners.
Security relationships are another matter. Collective action in the security domain entails completely different risks for both the country directly threatened and those that pledge to come to its defense. Those uncertainties ¡ª along with the fear of antagonizing adversaries (a bizarre logic, but go figure) ¡ª have encouraged regional governments to shy away from considering, much less exploring, alternatives.
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