Traveling Canadians in Britain and the USA Research Paper

Traveling Canadians in Britain and the USA - Research Paper Example As part of the British Commonwealth, Canada followed the passport regulations introduced by Britain and has enjoyed many of the privileges of British international connections throughout the twentieth century. As part of the network of Commonwealth countries, Canadians have been able to visit most countries throughout the world with no problems. Canada’s own decision to include both French and English languages means also that the passport is easily understood throughout Africa and other areas where both English and French are commonly spoken.  From the middle of the twentieth century onwards there has been a greater emphasis on security between different countries. The two world wars of 1914-1918 and 1939-1945 created mistrust between nations, and a renewed concern to be aware of possible harm that can come from people outside each sovereign nation. In the post-war period, Canada stayed largely outside major conflicts like the Vietnam War in South East Asia from 1955-1975. This meant that Canada has avoided the criticisms that were leveled against imperialist countries like the United States: â€Å"Anti Americanism increased tenfold by 1969 as a result of the war in Vietnam.†Ã‚  Canadians have a similar culture, language and general outlook to American, but the reputation of the two countries is very different. Canada promotes an image of peace and contentment within its own vast boundaries and does not seek a dominant presence on the world stage. This cannot be said of the likes of the United States, which repeatedly gets involved in contentious world events.   In the latter half of the twentieth century and again in the  new millennium, international criticism of American, and to a lesser extent also British and European, involvement in hostilities in the Middle East and Afghanistan has increased still further. In Arab countries, there is an understandable suspicion of American and British passports because of a long history of invasions and military actions. However justified these actions may seem to Western countries, they will still cause a negative reaction in the places where they occur. When terrorist capture westerners, for example, they are much more likely to focus on American or British passport holders for acts of retribution because they hold such resentment about past actions undertaken by these countries. An objective measure for checking how welcome a Canadian passport is can be found in the Henley Visa restrictions index, which measures how many countries a person with a particular passport can enter, without having to apply for a special visa: â€Å"This is the first time that a global ranking shows the international travel freedom of citizens of the various countries as well as the international relations and status of individual countries relative to others.†3 In a list of 98 countries, Canada is ranked in 9th place, allowing access to 157 countries, and this is the same as Australia and N ew Zealand. The United Kingdom and some Scandinavian countries have higher scores around 162-166, and the United States has a slightly higher score of 159. This compares very favorably with countries such as South Africa (88), India (57) China (38) and Afghanistan (26).