Last Call for Canada: Sovereign Nation or Vassal State by Peter McFarlane

I’m writing this review days after Prime Minister Carney withdrew Canada’s officials from trade negotiations with the United States. In a nationally-broadcast press conference the next day, he stated plainly, “They asked for too much and offered too little.”

In response to a reporter’s question, he said, “We were attacked.” He said the American’s wanted Canada to give away elements of its sovereignty and drew a hard line. “We would never do that.”

And yet, as Peter McFarlane aptly illustrates in this thin new book, Canada has been watering down its sovereignty for decades. Building on analysis in the 1960s by George Grant, published as Lament for a Nation, McFarlane charts how economic and military integration between Canada and the United States has been Plan A for economic elites for a long time.

Canada has been watering down its sovereignty for decades…McFarlane charts how economic and military integration between Canada and the United States has been Plan A for economic elites for a long time.

Even PM Carney said a new trade deal was possible, including new tariffs demanded by the Americans. But the US wasn’t satisfied with minor grovelling. They wanted full submission.

For now, it seems, Canada is staking its claim to Sovereign Nation, but we’ve also agreed to increase our military spending to 5% of GDP, an unheard-of level in recent decades, not because the Canadian people have pushed for it. No. Because the Americans demanded it of all NATO partners.

McFarlane presents a well-documented narrative of the state of the world today, up to and beyond PM Carney’s now-infamous Davos speech, where he declared the rules-based world order dead. In fact, he said it may never have existed.

This little book explains that the idealism of the post-WWII idealism, such that it was, is gone, and even the so-called realists (Henry Kissinger et al.) have lost sway. He lays out the rise of China and the decline of America in stark metrics. He contemplates if Canada should be better friends with Russia. He tracks how Carney has bounced between talking tough and submission. It’s tricky, sure, when the US manages its foreign policy through the 24-hour news cycle and viral Tik-Toks.

What is going on in the world? And what can we do about it? Last Call for Canada is a fine primer, but don’t expect to find much comfort. You’ll end up wiser, but also maybe more afraid.

Peter McFarlane is a Canadian author, journalist and editor. His published works include Northern Shadows: Canadians and Central America; From Brotherhood to Nationhood: George Manuel and Making of the Modern Indian Movement; and Ancient Land, Ancient Sky which he co-authored with Wayne Haimila. He has edited a number of award-winning books including Unsettling Canada, Reconciliation Manifesto, In the Black, Fight and Submit and Whose Land Is It Anyway? In 2024, he published Family Ties: How a Ukrainian Nazi and a Living Witness Link Canada to Ukraine Today. He served as Chair of the Writers Union of Canada in 1998-99 and lives in the Laurentians north of Montreal.

Publisher: Baraka Books (June 1, 2026)
Paperback: 6″ x 9″ | 100 pages
ISBN: 9781771864299

Michael Bryson

Michael Bryson has been reviewing books since the 1990s in publications such as The Kitchener-Waterloo Record, Paragraph Magazine, Id Magazine, and Quill & Quire. His short story collections include Thirteen Shades of Black and White (1999) and The Lizard and Other Stories (2009). His fiction has appeared in Best Canadian Stories and other anthologies. His story Survival is available as a Kindle single. From 1999-2018, he oversaw 78 issues of fiction, poetry, reviews, author interviews, essays, and other features at The Danforth Review. He lives in Scarborough, Ontario, and blogs at Art/Life: Scribblings.