Transnational Thursday is a thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or international relations history. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.
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Notes -
I mentioned a while back that when I visited, I was shocked that basically every person I talked to brought up immigration, unprompted. I wouldn't be at all surprised anymore to see that the conversation has developed even further in that direction in the last year.
What kind of hit me yesterday, though, was that these last several years may legitimately change Canada's demographics in a significant way, effectively forever. The shift was so rapid and so significant in numbers in such a short time, partially masked from public scrutiny by COVID, and now the culture may never be the same again. It's hard to describe how I feel about it except to make comparison to an immigration policy version of a coup d'etat. The facts on the ground changed so fast, partially hidden from view, and now the new reality is a fait accompli. It's a weird feeling.
The way you described that mirrors the perception I have had in a number of countries on a number of social / political evolutions. Things that people might not have minded so much in abstract or in small amounts, being suddenly irreversible, with a sense of both lack of control and a lack of prospects of future control. Some conflate that with 'conservative' thinking, but I've seen the same dynamic in different parts of the political spectrum in different parts of the world, whether it's American liberals uncomfortable with the takeover of progressives of once-liberal institutions, European centrists at the post-financial system collapse of the European political center and rise of the right, older Koreans at the generational collapse of pan-Korean identity, and so on. The loss of a feeling of agency / control, of being replaced, and is unsettling, and normal, as is the sort of compensatory movements to try and re-establish a sense of control whether it can be or not.
For Canada specifically, I suspect the demographic transition will lead to a cultural transition with geopolitical ramifications that will be felt in a generation or two away. A significant part of Candian culture and identity was a distinction from, but also kinship with, the US on various historical / cultural grounds, which helped underpin the general stability of the bilateral relationship. If/as Canadian historical identity shifts away from a sense of kindship, it's hardly impossible to see a rise of a Canadian political identity that not only emphasizes the distinction / separation away from the US far more, but also is more willing to entertain geopolitical alignment separation as well, which introduces the possibility of interesting times that would previously have been inconceivable... or the inverse, a destruction of Canadian cultural identity as distinct but separate from the American cultural identity, and thus lead to an even closer alignment / political integration than would have been previously thinkable.
Regardless of what, with cultural change will come the increased potential for divergence from the previously dominant policies. Whether that's bad or good is a matter of viewpoint on the status quo, but as they say the only inevitabilities are death, taxes, and change.
It is the essence of conservatism on a philosophical, meta level, it's just that not all conservatisms align on the object level, considering they have different things they want to conserve. Conservatism can be left wing. In late Cold War Soviet Union, even though the labels were probably different, the conservative old guard was against capitalism. (I tried really, really hard to turn this into a "In Soviet Russia..." joke as it was literally about Soviet Russia and the expectations being reversed, sorry I failed).
It's what conservatives the world keep trying to tell the excited youth: "This might seem like a good idea now, it might feel like it's going well, but one of the most enduring lessons of history is that by the time you find out all the downstream effects of a change it can be too late to stop or reverse it, so take change slowly"
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