Sacrificing Multilateralism for Cooperation? Reading the Ottawa–Brussels Convergence Through "European" Discourse

A Relationship in Motion
Over the past year, the EU–Canada relationship has moved with unusual speed. What was already a close political and economic partnership has gradually acquired a much stronger security and geopolitical dimension. Canada has expanded its participation in European defence initiatives, particularly through an agreement allowing Canadian entities to participate in procurement under the EU’s SAFE defence instrument. Thus, bilateral relations have been moved closer to European security structures. In June 2025, the EU and Canada had already signed a Security and Defence Partnership, covering areas ranging from crisis management and military mobility to cyber security, critical infrastructure and economic security.

The political language surrounding these developments has evolved just as quickly. In March 2026, the European Parliament adopted a report calling for a "deeper Euro-Canadian alliance", with rapporteur Tobias Cremer describing Canada as "perhaps the most European country outside Europe" and "more European than ever". In September, Ursula von der Leyen went further and proposed that Canada become the EU’s "first associate member", presenting the relationship as an "Alliance for the Future" and linking it to a shared set of values and a shared understanding of the world. As of 1 October, the European Commission was still using the term "associate membership" and indicated that discussions with Canada were continuing ahead of the EU–Canada summit scheduled for later this month.

Canada has not rejected the substance of this closer relationship. Mark Carney has welcomed the ambition behind this closer relationship while making clear that Canada is not seeking full EU membership and that the substance of the relationship matters more than its formal label. That makes the story more interesting, not less. The question is no longer whether Brussels is simply projecting a European identity onto Canada. It is how Brussels and Ottawa are collectively constructing a new narrative of political proximity, and what that narrative tells us about the EU’s own understanding of cooperation and multilateralism.

From Cooperation to Kinship
From a constructivist perspective, political actors do not merely describe developments. They give them meaning, and those meanings can in turn shape what becomes politically possible. Therefore, there is an important difference between describing convergence and producing it discursively. The material convergence between Canada and the EU is real. Defence cooperation has expanded, critical minerals and energy have become more prominent areas of coordination, and both sides clearly see greater cooperation as useful in a period of growing geopolitical uncertainty. There is nothing particularly surprising about any of this.

What I find more revealing is the vocabulary increasingly used to explain it. Cremer’s description of Canada as "the most European country outside Europe" does more than identify a strategic partner. It places Canada inside a hierarchy of Europeanness. Von der Leyen’s later language goes further still: "one set of values", "one way of seeing the world", and finally the prospect of associate membership. Taken together, these expressions do something that the language of strategic partnership alone does not. They turn cooperation into something resembling kinship.

That distinction matters because multilateralism is not built on sameness. Its central attraction lies in the possibility of cooperation among actors with different histories, political systems, interests and geographical positions. States do not have to become versions of one another before they can work together. They can cooperate because their interests overlap, because their commitments are compatible, or simply because particular problems require coordination.

The question, then, is not whether the EU and Canada are too similar, or whether shared values should have any role in their relationship. Of course they do. The more interesting question is whether like-mindedness is becoming the implicit criterion through which the EU defines desirable cooperation. When successful partnerships are repeatedly narrated as evidence that another actor is becoming more European, cooperation begins to acquire a different meaning. The partner is no longer simply someone with whom the EU can work; it becomes someone who can be incorporated, at least rhetorically, into an existing European political self-image.

Canada is particularly convenient for this kind of narrative. It is geographically outside Europe, but it is easily presented as culturally and politically familiar: a liberal democracy, a NATO member, a close historical partner and an actor whose strategic outlook overlaps with that of many European governments. In that sense, Canada is not being Europeanised institutionally, but it is increasingly being Europeanised rhetorically. And that may matter more than it first appears.

When Like-Mindedness Narrows Multilateralism
This is where the Canada case becomes relevant beyond the bilateral relationship itself. The EU has long presented itself as a defender of multilateralism, and its own documents explicitly link the partnership with Canada to the defence of the rules-based international order. At the same time, the language now surrounding Canada points towards a somewhat different logic. Rather than simply defending multilateral institutions, the EU increasingly appears to organise international cooperation through a community of actors it considers like-minded.

There is nothing inherently contradictory about states with similar values working together. Multilateral institutions have always contained coalitions based on shared principles and interests. The problem arises when likeness itself becomes the main vocabulary through which cooperation is legitimised. At that point, multilateralism can begin to look less like a framework for accommodating differences and more like a framework for assembling blocs of presumed political affinity. The Canada case makes this tension unusually visible because the political rhetoric is so explicit. Canada does not need to be “European” for cooperation on Arctic security and defence. Nor does it need to share a European political identity for the relationship to become deeper and more institutionalised. The substance of the cooperation already provides enough of a reason. So why is the language of belonging so readily available?

Part of the answer is that it performs a political function. Describing Canada as “European” makes the relationship easier to narrate as something more durable than a collection of transactional agreements. It creates the image of a broader political community and gives the partnership a degree of emotional and normative coherence. In that sense, discourse is not simply decoration around policy. It helps construct the meaning of the policy itself.

But there is a cost to this approach. The more the EU defines successful cooperation through common identity, the harder it becomes to explain cooperation with actors who do not fit that identity in equally positive terms. A foreign policy organised increasingly around "those who share our values" and "those who do not" can gradually turn a language intended to express solidarity into a language that sorts the international system into competing political camps.

This matters because the EU is already operating in an environment where alignments have consequences beyond the relationship that produced them. European support for Ukraine exists within an increasingly adversarial relationship with Russia. EU positions in the Western Balkans and South Caucasus are often interpreted through long-standing regional disputes, including the tensions surrounding Kosovo–Serbia and Armenia–Azerbaijan. The growing relationship with Canada, meanwhile, is unfolding at a time when the transatlantic relationship is itself under significant strain. This does not mean that the EU should avoid cooperation whenever another actor might dislike it. A foreign policy that constantly defers to Moscow, Belgrade, Baku or Washington would leave the EU with very little room for manoeuvre. The point is way narrower: alignment can produce counter-alignment, and discourse can intensify that process.

The Canada case illustrates this particularly well because the partnership is a response to an existing transatlantic rupture. Ottawa is diversifying its economic and strategic relationships in response to growing uncertainty around Washington, while Brussels is likewise confronting a more unpredictable United States. The resulting convergence is therefore understandable. But being a response to an existing crisis does not make it politically neutral, and the way that convergence is narrated can influence how others understand it.

If cooperation with Canada is framed primarily as practical diversification, it can remain just that. If it is framed as evidence that Canada and Europe share "one way of seeing the world", the relationship begins to acquire a different geopolitical meaning. That meaning is not simply determined by European intentions. Donald Trump has already described the possibility of Canadian associate membership as potentially a "hostile act" and threatened further economic retaliation against Europe, while the European Commission has insisted that closer ties with Canada are not directed against anyone else. The important point here is not to decide whose interpretation is correct. It is to recognise that political meanings do not depend entirely on political intentions. A discourse designed to consolidate cooperation can reinforce the perception that cooperation is taking place through competing blocs.

Australian Case: Cooperation Without Europeanisation
The comparison with Australia is precisely useful because it shows that there are other ways of constructing a very close strategic relationship. EU–Australia ties have also deepened considerably in the recent years through a Security and Defence Partnership, the conclusion of negotiations on a free-trade agreement and closer cooperation in research and technology. The EU describes Australia as one of its closest partners and emphasises shared values, international law and the rules-based international order.

Yet, the language surrounding this convergence is noticeably different. Australia is presented primarily as a trusted strategic partner. The relationship can be described as ambitious, values-based and increasingly institutionalised without requiring Australia to be rhetorically absorbed into a European identity. This contrast is worth paying attention to. Deep strategic convergence does not necessarily require discursive Europeanisation. The Canadian case therefore raises a more specific question: why has this particular relationship generated a vocabulary of belonging that goes substantially beyond the language usually used for strategic partnership?

Perhaps Canada occupies a particularly convenient place in the European imagination. Perhaps the growing US–Canada–EU tensions have created an incentive to describe the relationship in stronger political terms. Or perhaps the emergence of "associate membership" is itself the beginning of a new model of external partnership that the EU may eventually try to apply more broadly. It is too early to know. But the distinction between partnership and belonging is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore.

Beyond Sentimental Multilateralism
None of previous statements is an argument against closer and prospective EU–Canada cooperation. Nor is it an argument for the EU to step back from partnerships simply because they might irritate another power. The Union has clear interests in strengthening its defence capabilities, economic resilience, critical-minerals supply chains, Arctic presence and international network of partners. And, Canada is an important political actor in all of these areas.

The more interesting question is whether the EU can pursue those objectives without turning every successful partnership into evidence of expanding political community of the like-minded. In other words, does strategic autonomy necessarily have to be accompanied by a more bloc-oriented understanding of international cooperation?

This is where I think the Canada case raises a broader issue for the EU’s approach to multilateralism. There is a difference between saying that a partner shares particular interests or values with Europe and suggesting that those similarities make that partner, in some sense, part of Europe. The first leaves room for difference. The second begins to redefine cooperation through belonging.

In the current geopolitical environment, that distinction may be more important than it appears. The EU is already surrounded by overlapping conflicts, rival alignments and unresolved tensions. In such a setting, there is a strategic value in being able to cooperate closely with one actor without turning the relationship into a statement about another. Canada does not need to become “more European than ever” for Arctic cooperation to matter. Nor does European–Canadian cooperation need to be presented as the emergence of a new political camp in order to be strategically significant.

These developments are therefore not necessarily the problem. What deserves more scrutiny is the vocabulary placed around them. If cooperation is increasingly narrated as convergence, convergence as kinship, and kinship as belonging, the EU may gradually narrow the meaning of the multilateralism it claims to defend. The challenge is not to choose between cooperation and multilateralism. It is to ensure that cooperation remains broad enough to include difference — rather than quietly becoming a reward for resemblance.