On Andrew Cohen's "The Unfinished Canadian"

Well, I guess I should get on with my commentary on Andrew Cohen's The Unfinished Canadian while it's still somewhat fresh in my mind. Let me just say now there is an infinite number of counterpoints to the ones he makes in his book, so I'll grant him that he didn't intend the book to be regarded as hard fact, but rather the educated opinion of one man. But all the same, a lot of the things he says do have weight to them. He has bold opinions about Canada, and a lot of it sounds like he's trying to trash it, but he only criticizes it because he knows we can do better.

Ottawa: he claims that beyond the parliamentary precinct, the city is truly an eyesore. It's poorly planned, and for a capital, it's kind of in the middle of nowhere. His main target however is Ottawa's architecture. He speaks of the "postcard image" of Ottawa, conceived in the last half of the 19th century and the first half of the twentieth century, when "Canada's founders and builders had ambition and taste. They rarely seemed to think that anything was too big or too grand for this land of few people." He speaks of this same vision that inspired the Legislature of Saskatchewan, a "Prairie palace erected in 1905 that rises from the flatlands like a mirage". I'm from Regina. Trust me, it's a marvel. This vision has not survived among architects and city planners, it would seem. People don't think boldly of their capital, and "the reason we don't think boldly about Ottawa is that we are not proud of Ottawa," Cohen says."We have none of the reverence for our capital that the French have for Paris or the British for London or the Italians for Rome." I've never been to Ottawa personally, but now I'd really like to, to connect with my civic roots, and to see what the problem is.


One quote that really stuck out for me was this one, which Cohen quoted from Peter C. Newman: "'This is the only country on Earth whose citizens dream of being Clark Kent, instead of Superman." (Which is kind of funny and ironic since one of Superman's creators is in fact Canadian). What this means is that we are not an ambitious nation. There are numerous arguments against this, but I can't help but feel that there is some truth to this. We have a quieter ambition, not dreaming of changing the world, but perhaps of keeping a good steady job, a nice home, and a happy family. Moderate is us. We are not a country of extremes the way America is. Cohen speaks of the "tall poppy syndrome" we seem to suffer from; that inferiority complex that brings out the worst in us; should anybody rise up with vaulting ambition, we are quick to knock them down out of fear or envy. Cohen remarks that while we have yet to produce a Stalin or a Hitler, we also have yet to produce a Roosevelt or a Churchill, some of the finest statesmen of the 20th century, and this might be due to a lack of big thinking, the kind of risk-taking that would propel us into the next stage in our national evolution. The ancient Greek poets spoke of the virtues of moderation in their comedies and tragedies. Nothing in excess, that is the key to a happy life. Perhaps we have perfected that adage. But I wonder: is it possible to be moderate in excess?

Another quote that I found pretty disquieting was this: "In a sense, our idea of citizenship today is the reverse of John F. Kennedy's ringing appeal of a generation ago: the question is no longer what you can do for your country, but what can your country do for you. As students are no longer really students to universities and patients are no longer really patients to hospitals, citizens are no longer citizens. Today everyone is a client." An exaggeration, yes, but it does make sense. Canadian citizenship is one of the easiest in the world to acquire; it's not uncommon for people from other countries to come here when things are going badly in their homeland, and when they get better they go back home, with Canada acting simply as their back-up plan. Canada doesn't really ask much of us. Pay taxes, vote, obey the law; beyond that, not much else. The downside to the Multicultural mosaic is that there it doesn't require new citizens to be more actively involved in their new home. They remain in their ethnic pockets, segregated from the rest of the community due to cultural and language barriers. So Canada becomes a place to stay, like a hotel room. Not a homeland. To this he says: "We should make citizenship harder to acquire, less a right than a privilege. Extend the waiting period from three to six years; ensure applicants absorb the principles of this country and speak one of the official languages; strengthen the knowledge and language test; rewrite the oath to reflect real obligation. With a Charter of Rights should come a Charter of Responsibilities...much of the challenge here is taking citizenship seriously." Definite food for thought.

Cohen is very passionate about Canadians knowing their history. It may seem cliche, but we really can't know who we are if we don't know where we came from. Cohen demands more robust measure to teaching history in school, not to mention in our day-to-day lives. It's not right that we should know more American presidents than Canadian prime ministers. And while Canadian history is taught in our schools (much to the annoyance of a lot of students, at least that I've known), it isn't necessarily mandatory across the country. The education is a provincial jurisdiction. What Cohen is suggesting is that we make it a mandatory course, from elementary to secondary, and that it be a federal matter."We can no longer afford to be ahistorical. It is time for the serious country to get serious about teaching its history" he says."We should have national standards for teaching history across the country--a clear expression of what any student, anywhere, should know by the time he or she graduates from high school...introducing national standards in history should be part of transferring education to federal jurisdiction, as it is in other leading industrialized states." Outside of school, he says we need to show more respect and reverence for national museums, that we need "to abolish admission fees for all our major museums, especially those in the national capital. (In Britain, attendance at national museums has risen an average of 83 per cent since fees were lifted in 2001. In Washington, none of the museums and galleries of the Smithsonian charge admission.)" Quite a big leap, just because of free admission. "We often forget that Canada isn't a young country, as our untutored leaders tend to call it. In fact, as a constitutional entity, we are old; few nations have been around in their present form as long as Canada." This is a very interesting claim, and an oft overlooked fact. A lot of the nation-states of the world are products of the twentieth century. Look at India and Pakistan. Montenegro. Taiwan. As a modern state, we are among the older ones. And if you look beyond out official birthdate, our history goes back several hundreds of years, if you include the many waves of settlers, all the way back to the Vikings, thousands if you include the rich heritage of our aboriginal people, who've occupied this huge land longer than any of us. Like I said before, I don't think we are a nation of orphans, but we're certainly estranged from our national parents. I know I am.

Cohen goes on to submit a plethora of ideas for improving our sense of self, in the form of:

Mandatory public service. "Sometime in their adult lives, Canadians should serve in the military of in the Canada Corps...or they should work in a hospital, a hospice, a women's or homeless shelter. The point is to serve the country and understand the country."

National Holidays: "Make July 1 Dominion Day again and to declare a national holiday on February 15, the day the Maple Leaf flag was first flown in 1965."

Honouring our own: "It is time that we inscribe the names of the greatest of our men and women in the Hall of Honour of Parliament, distinguishing between the bona fide Canadian hero and the ersatz Canadian Idol. After all, that was its purpose."

Respecting our politicians: "Politicians can be shown more respect, particularly when it comes to their salaries and their expense accounts, which they should not have to post on the Web... [politicians] do not have to insult each other in the House of Commons and they shuold learn to apologize. There are civilized ways of doing things. We are a rich country. We can afford generosity."

He has a grievance against our lackluster efforts on the international arena. "While we are increasing international assistance at 8 per cent a year, we have set no target for reaching 0.7 per cent of gross domestic product, the international standard. It is unconscionable--immoral really--that we have not. We are a trillion-dollar economy, wealthier than we have ever been. Before we erase the budgetary surplus through lower taxes, let us remember our obligations to others." It is very hypocritical of us to boast our compassion and generosity when we can't even commit to a target as small as that. Not to mention our lack of commitment to the Kyoto protocol as well.

Cohen spends a chapter on debunking the myth that we are becoming more and more different from Americans as time goes on. He claims this isn't true, though it may be what we want to hear, and that it's not necessarily a bad thing."In our distaste for the misadventures in Iraq and the ineptitude of the president," he says, "Canadians forget the America of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman, who introduced the Marshall Plan and helped create the institutional architecture of the post-war era, in which Canada played a part. We forget that Eleanor Roosevelt chaired the committee at the United Nations that crafted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...Canada is blessed to have America as a neighbour. And in many ways it is our model. We can learn much from its ambition, its genius, its enterprise and its excellence, some of which is now demonstrating in innovative ways on the environment. The challenge is knowing what to take and what to leave, recognizing that the bed we share with the Americans is the one we ourselves have made....a self-aware people understands that no two peoples in the world are as alike as Canadians and Americans and says of their insecurity: get over it." That sums it up pretty well, I think. I'm tired of defining myself by what I am not. If all a Canadian is is Not-American, I don't want to have anything to do with it. An identity of negatives isn't much of an identity at all.

Those are some of the main points in his book. There are others on top of this, and I could go further in detail, but I think it would be best to read the book. I don't agree with ALL of the things he says, but I have to admire his daring for saying them. Nobody else seems to be putting forth any ideas. This quote pretty much sums up his views: "No law decrees that we ignore our past, devalue our citizenship, begrudge success, or accept mediocrity. Nowhere is it written that commercial Ottawa must look like the Valley of Ashes or that citizens must denigrate their politicians. There is nothing in our genetic code that says Canada's wealthy must be miserly or that we must abjure heroes or thrive on schadenfreude." We've grown attached to the pettier side of ourselves, confusing it with a quintessential Canadian identity. On the other hand, I like the fact that Canada is so hard to pin down. That complexity is something to be proud of. It's not a simple thing that you can define and categorize and bundle up in a pretty little box. It's a multifaceted organism, ever changing, ever eluding definition. We might be one of the most existentially concerned people on the planet. Then again, perhaps we shouldn't flatter ourselves by believing we are the only ones who have an identity crisis. All the same, that quest for a soul is certainly appealing, isn't it? I do think though, that we should be more actively involved in that search. After all, nobody's going to tell us who we are but us. It's entirely within our power.