Year: 1990
Type: article
Abstract: Events in Eastern Europe are forcing the West to rethink a whole range of policies.The Cold War froze into a fixed configuration a wide panorama of Western policiesnot just in defense and international affairs, not just in economics, but in immigration as well.Now that the Cold War has thawed, that Eastern Europe is drawing aside the Iron Curtain, that the Berlin wall has ceased to be a barrier, the West has to re-examine the policies that were generated by the Cold War.The West has been slow to react to what is going on in Eastern Europe, and, within the West, Canada has been one of the slowest.Though the underlying facts that led to current policies have changed, the policies continue.Some of this continuation may simply be caution because of uncertainty of the lasting nature of the changes.However, where caution is the explanation, that caution is misplaced.We in the West cannot remain indifferent to what is happening in Eastern Europe.The changes are positive changes.The developments are ones we in the West would want to encourage.By remaining fixed in old policy stands waiting to see if the changes will last, we are doing nothing to help the changes last.If we really want to see the East change, the West must change itself.Another explanation is bureaucratic inertia, the comfort of old ways.Once a policy is in place, laws are passed, officers are appointed to administer it, forms are printed, instructions are issued, the path of least resistance is just to carry on.The people who administer a policy may have fogotten why it was instituted.They may have never known in the first place.The options that were canvassed and rejected at the time a policy decision was made drop from sight.Laws and policies do not come with explanations.
Author: David Matas
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W1757324839