ASIA
21 February 2026
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney at Davos 2026
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney stole the show at this year’s Davos meeting.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney stole the show at this year’s Davos meeting.
Here are the main points of his speech:
We are in the midst of a rupture of the “rules-based international order” – an order under which Canada prospered.
Canada knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false – the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, trade rules were enforced asymmetrically, and international law was applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
This fiction was useful, and American hegemony, in particular, helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.
Canada participated in the rituals, and largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality.
But today, we are in the midst of a rupture. Over the past two decades, a series of crises in finance, health, energy and geopolitics have laid bare the risks of extreme global integration.
More recently, great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons, tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited.
You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration, when integration becomes the source of your subordination.
The multilateral institutions on which the middle powers have relied – the WTO, the UN, the COP – the architecture, the very architecture of collective problem solving are under threat.
And as a result, many countries are drawing the same conclusions that they must develop greater strategic autonomy, in energy, food, critical minerals, in finance and supply chains.
And this impulse is understandable. A country that can't feed itself, fuel itself or defend itself, has few options. When the rules no longer protect you, you must protect yourself.
Middle powers are faced with classic risk management challenges.
Canada is building that strength at home, and is rapidly diversifying abroad. It has agreed a comprehensive strategic partnership with the EU, including joining SAFE, the European defence procurement arrangements, and is signing trade and security deals with other countries.
To help solve global problems, it is pursuing variable geometry, in other words, different coalitions for different issues based on common values and interests.
So, on Ukraine, it is a core member of the Coalition of the Willing and one of the largest per capita contributors to its defence and security.
On Arctic sovereignty, it stands firmly with Greenland and Denmark, and fully supports their unique right to determine Greenland's future.
Its commitment to NATO's Article 5 is unwavering, so we're working with NATO allies, including the Nordic Baltic Gate, to further secure the alliance's northern and western flanks, including through Canada's unprecedented investments in over-the-horizon radar, in submarines, in aircraft and boots on the ground, boots on the ice.
On plurilateral trade, it is championing efforts to build a bridge between the Trans Pacific Partnership and the European Union, which would create a new trading bloc of 1.5 billion people. On critical minerals, we're forming buyers’ clubs anchored in the G7 so the world can diversify away from concentrated supply. And on AI, we're cooperating with like-minded democracies to ensure that we won't ultimately be forced to choose between hegemons and hyper-scalers.
What it's doing is creating a dense web of connections across trade, investment, culture, on which we can draw for future challenges and opportunities.
In sum, middle powers must act together, because if they are not at the table, they’re on the menu.
Here are the main points of his speech:
We are in the midst of a rupture of the “rules-based international order” – an order under which Canada prospered.
Canada knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false – the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, trade rules were enforced asymmetrically, and international law was applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
This fiction was useful, and American hegemony, in particular, helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.
Canada participated in the rituals, and largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality.
But today, we are in the midst of a rupture. Over the past two decades, a series of crises in finance, health, energy and geopolitics have laid bare the risks of extreme global integration.
More recently, great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons, tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited.
You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration, when integration becomes the source of your subordination.
The multilateral institutions on which the middle powers have relied – the WTO, the UN, the COP – the architecture, the very architecture of collective problem solving are under threat.
And as a result, many countries are drawing the same conclusions that they must develop greater strategic autonomy, in energy, food, critical minerals, in finance and supply chains.
And this impulse is understandable. A country that can't feed itself, fuel itself or defend itself, has few options. When the rules no longer protect you, you must protect yourself.
Middle powers are faced with classic risk management challenges.
Canada is building that strength at home, and is rapidly diversifying abroad. It has agreed a comprehensive strategic partnership with the EU, including joining SAFE, the European defence procurement arrangements, and is signing trade and security deals with other countries.
To help solve global problems, it is pursuing variable geometry, in other words, different coalitions for different issues based on common values and interests.
So, on Ukraine, it is a core member of the Coalition of the Willing and one of the largest per capita contributors to its defence and security.
On Arctic sovereignty, it stands firmly with Greenland and Denmark, and fully supports their unique right to determine Greenland's future.
Its commitment to NATO's Article 5 is unwavering, so we're working with NATO allies, including the Nordic Baltic Gate, to further secure the alliance's northern and western flanks, including through Canada's unprecedented investments in over-the-horizon radar, in submarines, in aircraft and boots on the ground, boots on the ice.
On plurilateral trade, it is championing efforts to build a bridge between the Trans Pacific Partnership and the European Union, which would create a new trading bloc of 1.5 billion people. On critical minerals, we're forming buyers’ clubs anchored in the G7 so the world can diversify away from concentrated supply. And on AI, we're cooperating with like-minded democracies to ensure that we won't ultimately be forced to choose between hegemons and hyper-scalers.
What it's doing is creating a dense web of connections across trade, investment, culture, on which we can draw for future challenges and opportunities.
In sum, middle powers must act together, because if they are not at the table, they’re on the menu.