Paradiplomatic policing and relocating Canadian foreign policy

Abstract

Even though they claim to recognize that the boundaries between domestic and international security have eroded, scholars of Canadian paradiplomacy have tended to ignore the security-oriented paradiplomatic activities undertaken by sub-national actors in Canada. However, policing paradiplomacy is, in our view, a perfect case for understanding how paradiplomacy in security can change the relationship between the state and its citizens. Through an examination of the paradiplomatic activities of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the Sûreté du Québec, and the Vancouver Police, we show how the role of the informal, the danger of mission creep, and the shaping of foreign policy from the margins work to shift how we think about where foreign policy happens.