Not too long ago, for a brand-new head of government to be compared to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau would have been a great compliment. It meant you were young, fresh, pluralistic, telegenic the very model of a modern small-l liberal. Plus it would provide a flood of earned media once the two of you were photographed together, with Rolling Stone, GQ, Newsweek, The Today Show, and HuffPost gushing over your bromance to the delight of the Internet.
It wasn't until French President Emmanuel Macron returned from a recent visit to India that the world came to terms with how superficial those earlier compliments were. Both he and Trudeau remain young and handsome. But only one of them has added a much more important adjective to his image: statesmanlike.
It wasn't difficult for Macron to avoid the many blunders Trudeau committed on his own trip. You don't need to be a seasoned emissary to know that a visit to an ally halfway across the world should look more like Thirteen Days than Eat, Pray, Love. Accordingly, Macron dressed for business, his only nod to local fashion a silk scarf over his well-cut dark suit. He and wife Brigitte were photographed in a prayer pose once, offering a tribute at the memorial of Mahatma Gandhi. He did not dance at least not in public. He did not invite any convicted attempted murderers to dinner.
What Macron did is more impressive than what he did not do. He spent his four-day visit signing business contracts to the tune of USD$16 billion, as well as agreements between India and France concerning drug trafficking, migration and mobility, urban infrastructure and transportation, military logistics, climate change, information security, space research, maritime science, and renewable energy. Trudeau, meanwhile, could not even wrangle an exemption for Canada from a minor tariff on lentils. He did, however, manage to extract a promise for $1 billion in investment between the two countries a fraction of Macron's total, and three-fourths of it going from here to there.
Perhaps the biggest difference between Macron and Trudeau's visits is evident in this tweet:
@EmmanuelMacron: I want to double the number of Indian students coming to France. If you choose France you gain access to francophonie, you gain access to Europe. #IndianYouth
In five simple words "you gain access to Europe" Macron reveals what is at the heart of his geopolitical philosophy. Between his politically weakened counterparts in the UK and Germany, he sees a chance to become the new de facto head of Europe, and he is willing to work for it. Presenting himself as such to the world's second-largest economy, especially its youngest and brightest, is a key step. His determination to see to it that "France is back at the core of Europe" guides his most significant decisions.
Trudeau can have no such aspirations. He has no international political union he can hope to lead. Only the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) comes close, both in terms of his opportunity to exercise global clout and the extent to which he almost brought the whole deal down.
After over two years in power, what is the Trudeau Doctrine? Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland described it in June 2017 as "the renewal, indeed the strengthening, of the postwar multilateral order." In other words, maintaining the status quo. But with the mercurial U.S. President Donald Trump making this more difficult than ever, Trudeau has no choice but to build on other alliances. Before his TPP near-miss, this was much easier; he was hailed as a natural spokesperson for international openness. Now Canadians must worry that he will put his foot in his mouth before any effective diplomatic rhetoric has a chance to escape it.
Trudeau must also decide what Canada's place should be within what remains of the postwar multilateral order. Who will we follow if the U.S. under Trump is unwilling to participate? Should our allies follow us? Where? He has little of the tissue that connects Macron's agenda, except to remind the world that he, Justin Pierre James Trudeau, likes other countries and their cultures but not so much that he bothers figuring out how to deal with them without making a fool of himself.
Expect more contrasts than comparisons between Macron and Trudeau going forward. One is a man with a plan. The other is a dunce with a dance.
Written by Jess Morgan
