After the Pandemic

To prepare for it, policy-makers in Canada and elsewhere need to understand the interaction between current political, strategic, and military trends and the consequences of the pandemic. [...] In short, international relations have become less stable and predictable, exacerbated by changes in the military balance and due to the growing re- 4 AFTER THE PANDEMIC: CONFRONTING A NEW GEO-STRATEGIC ENVIRONMENT IN THE POST-COVID-19 ERA assertion of national interests in the international system. [...] In the case of the INF Treaty, the United States withdrew from the treaty, citing bpth Russian violation of its terms as well as a desire to develop systems to counter Chinese missile capabilities, the latter not being a party to the treaty (Sanger and Wong 2019). [...] Examples include establishing the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (a counterweight to the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank) and such groups as the Boao Forum for Asia and the Beijing Xiangshan Forum (counterweights to the Davos Forum and the Shangri-La Dialogue, respectively), as well as its increasingly dominant role in the International Civil Aviation Organization, the World Health [...] The Consequences of the Pandemic Of its many effects, the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic for foreign relations will be far reaching, but will not necessarily undermine the existing trajectory.