The Politics of War: Canada’s Afghanistan Mission, 2001–14
About this ebook
Through historical analysis of the public record and interviews with officials, Jean-Christophe Boucher and Kim Richard Nossal show how the Canadian government sought to frame the engagement in Afghanistan as a “mission” rather than what it was – a war. They examine the efforts of successive governments to convince Canadians of the rightness of Canada’s engagement, the parliamentary politics that resulted from the increasing politicization of the mission, and the impact of public opinion on Canada’s involvement.
This contribution to the field of Canadian foreign policy demonstrates how much of Canada’s war in Afghanistan was shaped by the vagaries of domestic politics and political gamesmanship.
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About the author
Jean-Christophe Boucher is an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science at MacEwan University. He is a fellow at the Canadian Global Affairs Institute, a research fellow at the Centre for the Study of Security and Development at Dalhousie University, and a senior fellow at the Centre interuniversitaire de recherche sur les relations internationales du Canada et du Québec. He specializes in international relations, with an emphasis on peace and security issues, Canadian foreign and defence policies, and methodology.
Kim Richard Nossal is a professor in the Department of Political Studies and the Centre for International and Defence Policy at Queen’s University. He is a former editor of International Journal, a former president of the Canadian Political Science Association, and the author of a number of works on Canadian foreign and defence policy. From 2006 to 2012, he chaired the academic selection committee of the Security and Defence Forum of the Department of National Defence.
