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Recently, the idea of the green state has emerged as a way of understanding the state in the context of the international relations of the environment. By assuming the role of a public environmental trustee and responsible global environmental citizen, states can achieve changes at the international and domestic levels. However, for changes to be sustained and deep, policy needs to challenge rather than support the logic of ecologically destructive competitive capitalism and hierarchical globalization. This paper argues that Canada's historical commitment to green multilateralism makes it well-positioned to move toward the role of a green state, but that a major barrier remains Canada's continuing support of inequitable and unsustainable global relations of economic exchange based on competitiveness. Rather than forming a single coherent strategy on climate change, for example, two distinct and competing principles vie for dominance in Canadian international environmental policy: competitiveness and protection. As a result, Canada's climate change policies have been irregular and inconsistent. For example, Canada has recently departed from multilateral commitments agreed at Kyoto, while simultaneously claiming to take decisive action to reduce overall greenhouse gas emissions. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]