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Article Excerpt
Canada's response to the 1956-1957 Hungarian refugee crisis has generally been treated by scholars as a highpoint in Canadian immigration history. In late October 1956, pro-democracy, anti-Soviet demonstrations directed at the Soviet-backed government of Erno Gero broke out in Budapest. Fearing that its control of the Warsaw Pact was unraveling, the Kremlin ordered the Red Army to put down the revolution. On 4 November, events turned violent. Soviet forces clashed with protestors, prompting hundreds of thousands of Hungarians to flee across the border into Austria and Yugoslavia. (2) For its part, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was unprepared to intervene militarily for fear of provoking a conflict with the USSR. (3) NATO members were, however, able to relieve the pressure placed on Austria. In the days and weeks after the invasion, Canadian immigration officials reinforced the number of immigration officers at the Canadian Embassy in Vienna, loosened the normal requirements concerning proper travel documentation, medical exams, and security clearances, and enlisted commercial airplanes to transport the refugees out of Austria. These initiatives produced impressive results: by the end of 1957 more than 37,000 Hungarians had been accepted into Canada. But government actors were not solely responsible for this shift in policy; indeed, the response was truly a national one and would not have been possible without the support and assistance of a whole host of voluntary organizations from a wide range of sectors of Canadian society, all of which contributed greatly to the resettlement effort. (4)
Most scholars of immigration, such as Gerald Dirks and Robert Key-serlingk, underline the importance of the reception of Hungarian refugees as having a liberalizing impact in the immigration policy arena in Canada, serving as a useful precedent for other refugee migrations during times of crisis. (5) The Hungarian situation also had an immediate impact on the operation of Canada's refugee program, as Freda Hawkins notes: ''Briefly, during the Hungarian crisis and refugee movement, there was a glimpse of what better leadership and a much more co-operative approach to immigration in Canada might achieve." (6) N. F. Dreisziger makes a crucial distinction, however, by detailing not only the cooperative efforts between the Canadian government and welfare agencies, but also the role of the Hungarian Canadian community in refugee reception. (7) Forgetting Canadian contributions to the resettlement of the displaced persons in Europe following the Second World War, Michael Lanphier describes the Canadian response to the Hungarian refugee crisis as "the first ever crisis to demand Canada's participation in the international resettlement effort." (8) It is also interesting to note that while some of the above-mentioned scholars claim that the decision to accept a significant number of refugees was reached only after pressure was exerted on policymakers from within and beyond the federal government, they do not indicate either the methods by which such pressure was applied or the international characteristics of the pressure itself
The Canadian Council of Churches (CCC) was one of a number of voluntary organizations in Canada that offered assistance to the refugees during the Hungarian refugee crisis. (9) Like other domestic groups, it both assisted with the material needs of the Hungarians once they arrived in Canada, and lobbied Ottawa to include not just the most able in its selection of refugees. But what separates the CCC from other groups in Canada is the larger transnational context in which that agency advocated on behalf of the Hungarian refugees. Throughout the period from 1956 to 1958, it worked closely with its sister council in Europe, the World Council of Churches (WCC), which had direct contact with the Hungarians. The WCC worked on an international level to achieve a more efficient and judicious handling of the refugee crisis by lobbying governments, non-governmental organizations, and particularly its member groups, such as the CCC. In turn, the CCC served in an important informational role, providing an alternate source of information for both the federal government and the WCC. This involvement made the CCC a legitimate--and highly valued -player on both the domestic and international scenes.
In this way, the CCC's handling of the Hungarian refugee crisis can be considered part of a transnational advocacy network, as proffered by Margaret E. Keck and Kathryn Sikkink. Transnational advocacy networks are those networks of activists that coalesce and operate across national boundaries and whose members are motivated by values rather than by material concerns or professional norms and engage in the "voluntary, reciprocal, and horizontal exchange of information and services." (10) Keek and Sikkink note that "when a state recognizes the legitimacy of international interventions and changes its domestic behavior in response to international pressure, it reconstitutes the relationship between the state, its citizens, and international actors."" The purpose of this article is to analyze the relationship between the CCC, the WCC, and the Canadian government by focusing on the reciprocal information exchange between the CCC and the WCC and the strategic use of this information to bring about a significant change in Canadian immigration and refugee policies. Motivated by a deeply held belief in Christian charity, the CCC, through its contributions, was able to cement its reputation with the federal government as a reliable partner in the Canadian immigration determination system. But more than this, its contributions to the relief efforts were, in many respects, a manifestation of the member churches' larger disillusionment with the post-World War Two international order, and a longing for a system in which "universal" values--in this case, values inspired by transnational ecumenism--came first, and national interests and state sovereignty second.
Transnational Ecumenism, the Founding of the Canadian Council of Churches, and Refugee Resettlement
Founded in the early 1940s, the Canadian Council of Churches was the response of the Protestant churches of Canada to the destruction and instability caused by the Second World War. The campaign to form a council originated, for all intents and purposes, with the Reverend Dr. W.J. Gallagher of Toronto, a former Presbyterian minister who had joined the United Church of Canada when it was first established in 1925. Gallagher was an ecumenist through and through. For him, God the Father was the common denominator among all beings, transcending all racial, national, and denominational divides, and Christ was "the secret of unity for the world." (12) By the late 1930s, Gallagher had come to the conclusion that the purpose of the Protestant churches was to show the world the way to salvation. But this, he believed, could be accomplished only if the church bodies presented a unified voice on the pressing problems of the day and not a series of independent and autonomous pronouncements. Granted, establishing a council of Protestant churches was not an entirely new idea. For much of the twentieth century, various denominations had been organizing coordinating bodies, such as the Christian Social Council of Canada, which was the domestic umbrella organization through which Protestant churches made representations to the federal government on issues relating to social welfare and other societal ills associated with the process of industrialization in Canada. (13) But these joint initiatives had tended to be ad hoc, episodic, and focused on a relatively narrow range of issues. In 1938, discussions around the need for greater "unity of ecclesiastical action" were initiated, but little had ever come of them. It was the war that finally galvanized the resolve of Gallagher and his colleagues. On 11 November 1942, like-minded delegates from a number of Protestant denominations and organizations, including the World Council of Churches Canadian Committee and the Christian Social Council of Canada, met in Gallagher's Toronto office to discuss the possibility of forming a council modeled on similar bodies that had been created in the United States and Britain. Its two principal purposes would be to facilitate joint initiatives on issues of common concern, and to serve as the "Canadian arm" of the global ecumenical movement. (14) Events moved rapidly from there. Six months after the initial meeting, the members agreed on a draft constitution for the new organization, and in September 1944, the CCC held its inaugural annual general meeting at Yorkminster Baptist Church in Toronto. (15) Dr. R. A. Hiltz of the Anglican Church of Canada was named chairman, Gallagher the secretary. From that point on, the CCC became the official link in Canada to the World Council of Churches in Geneva, Switzerland, its primary mandate being to express the "fundamental unity of the Christian Communions." (16) For supporters of the CCC, the world was in need of spiritual and moral healing and ecumenism, and the new organization--based on "the recognition of common origin, mutual inter-dependence, common major objectives, and common dependence upon the same great Lord of the universal Church who desired passionately that his followers might be one"--provided such a cure. (17) Perhaps not unexpectedly, many believed that the establishment of the CCC was nothing less than a divine act of God. In their minds, it was no coincidence that as Europe was "falling apart," the churches were coming together. (18)
Many of the CCC's initial activities during the mid-1940s were focused on peace and reconstruction efforts in Europe, both material and spiritual. There was a strong pacifist strain guiding much of the organization's work; many, including Gallagher, felt that the duty of the CCC and its member churches was to "condition the mind of the world for peace." (19) This meant speaking out against such issues as social and economic injustice, the inequitable treatment of minority groups, and religious persecution--problems that, if left unattended, could potentially lead nations down the path to war.
Church leaders were also deeply suspicious of the...
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