Defending the Homeland

Canadians are all too aware of the events of September 11th, 2001. What is far less evident is whether we have yet fully appreciated their implications for national defence. Those few hours of explosive activity in Manhattan and Washington highlighted the new challenges of what Elinor Sloan calls our “terrorist era,” one defined by itinerant actors with an unprecedented global reach and destructive capability that leave the state and its citizens facing danger from both within and without.

Does Sloan’s book provide new insights and understandings about what this means for Canada? If we are to ponder the full meaning of her book’s title— Security and Defence in the Terrorist Era—our reading of her work should offer us a compelling understanding of how the new era she describes has altered the security and defence of Canada and North America. Moreover, her work should allow us better insight into the policy decisions that must be considered and the consequences of...