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The relation between the concepts of sovereignty and citizenship are currently being rearticulated through what is popularly referred to as Fortress North America. The War on Terror has amplified previously emerging shifts in governance, control and surveillance. One significant consequence is the development of increasing border harmonization schemes between the United States of America and Canada. This development has led to newly emerging categories of citizenship in both Canada and the USA. This paper seeks to provide a comparative analysis of this regime shift by investigating the modes of citizenship discourse that are articulated through the American Department of Homeland Security and specifically Operation Liberty Shield, and the shifts in citizenship that are currently being articulated by Bill C-18 amendments to the Citizenship Act of Canada. This investigation will pay particular attention to the shifts that are taking place with regards to the revocation of citizenship, the creation of new categories of citizenship through programs such as Nexus and the proposed introduction of bio-metric ID cards in Canada and the introduction of the discourse of the new normal. Through new border harmonization programs such as the Nexus Project citizens in both Canada and America will be organized, controlled and subjected to new forms of state surveillance. Increasingly, the necessity of new categories of citizenship, which are created through programs such as Nexus coupled with a generalized discourse of security at the border, are being contextualized within the new normal way of life in a post- September 11, 2001 North America. The discourse of the new normal is meant to signal a shift in our expectations of daily life. Whether we are experiencing the new normal due to disease, fear, risk, loss of faith or security, we are being called into place as subjects of this discourse. The new normal is used in reference to the need for greater control, the expectation of greater security and surveillance of cells, microbes, bodies and society. This paper will explore the logic that is embedded within the discourse of the new normal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change is causing rapid loss in Arctic seaice, raising the prospect of international shipping through the Northwest Passage within decades, perhaps even years. This poses serious security and environmental risks to both Canada and the United States, and yet the two countries are locked in a diplomatic dispute with respect to the legal status of the waterway. In this presentation, a Canadian expert on the law of the sea of the Arctic will argue that the Canadian position--that the Northwest passage constitutes Canadian internal waters subject to the full force of Canadian domestic law--serves the national interests of the United States far better than reliance on lax international legal regimes. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With climate change and massive ice melt, renewed political interest in the Arctic has (re) introduced the question of Canadian sovereignty over the waters of the Arctic Archipelago, particularly the Northwest Passage. For more than thirty years now, the US and Canada have « agreed to disagree » on Canadian sovereignty over the northern arctic waters. But times are changing, and climate too. And the question of sovereignty might soon need greater attention from both Washington and Ottawa. Already, scientific evidence indicating rapid ice melt has renewed speculations concerning the opening of the Northwest Passage as a lucrative commercial shipping lane. Tourism has also been flourishing in many regions of the North, drawing attention to the social and ecological effects of an increasing unfamiliar human presence in a fragile and nearly untouched ecosystem. Even natural resource discoveries ? like the hydrocarbons prospected in the Beaufort Sea and in the channels of the Queen Elizabeth Islands ? have drawn great attention to the richness of this Northern region as the world faces more and more energy setbacks. In this perspective, growing American interest in a changing Arctic region could therefore be seen as a threat factor to Canadian sovereignty. For Washington, freedom of navigation applies in this region, therefore recognizing the international status of the Northwest Passage. But for Ottawa, these waters are nothing less than the extension of Canada's full sovereignty over its Canadian Arctic. Our discussion will focus on the role of the U.S. government in the enduring status quo over the question of sovereignty. Our task will be to verify if the U.S. has intentionally set this frozen state of relations and also evaluate if it is in Washington?s national interests to reassess its position vis-à-vis Canadian sovereignty over the waters of the Arctic Archipelago. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]