The challenge for national security agencies in a democracy is that of balance and of choosing the right approaches in their fight with terror and the appropriate level of intensity. The main purpose of terrorists, whether homegrown but externally inspired or externally sourced, is the manifest and literal explosion of fear, beyond whatever death and destruction their initiatives produce; meanwhile, the legitimate forces of a democratic state have a duty to protect national security. They have a series of tools at their disposal; these vary from country to country but cluster around some common elements. Police intelligence networks, electronic intelligence shared between allies, Interpol, undercover security operatives, and terrorist units of the kind one can now find in major cities such as New York, London, Montreal, or Paris all enhance a democracy’s capacity to protect its citizens from attacks on the freedom from fear. The caveat, of course, is that in democratic societies the reduction of overall freedom or legitimate privacy so as to protect the “freedom from fear” can become, in extremis, counterproductive. Finding the right balance between security and freedom, and maintaining legitimate and democratic oversight over security operations is all part of the architecture of the threshold freedom, freedom from fear. Pre- and post-9/11 realities in North America, pre- and post-Madrid, London, and Paris realities in Europe, and pre- and post-Sinai and Beirut realities on the issue of freedom and security are not only instructive but also indicative of the balances to be addressed and calibrated.
A central question emerges: Against what standard will national security practices be judged? If there is a legal framework for that assessment, what is the instrument by which discretionary judgments are made? Why does any of this matter? Because for citizens to be free from fear in their day-to-day lives, in their workplace, in their neighbourhood, in the cafés or concert halls they frequent, or in their places of worship, they must be confident that the law applies to everyone and is broadly applied in the same way. They must be certain that all have access to due process before open and uncorrupted and unintimidated courts. This is fundamental. Citizens must be certain that those who protect the peace and order of a society, who work against the purveyors of fear, be they criminal gangs, terrorist networks, or violent racists, are governed by laws and procedures that underline the fact that the security forces are not in business for themselves but are agents of a democratic society. And, further, they must be sure that this society has norms, rules, laws, and legitimate expectations of appropriate standards of behaviour — standards for which security forces have been trained and to which they are accountable.
One Canadian example that makes this point is the 2001 Summit of the Americas in Quebec City, where police and security forces anticipated serious though largely peaceful demonstrations. There was an expectation, however, that there was an unavoidable risk that some “black ops” or “direct action” vandals would seek to infiltrate the legitimate demonstrators. In the lead-up to and training for the summit, the various police forces in charge of the planning for an event that would bring most hemispheric heads of government to Quebec City were, much to the surprise of the demonstrators and even the media, given detailed briefings on the content, purport, and interpretation of both the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The briefings on these, and on the Royal Canadian Mounted Police Act and the Criminal Code provisions that applied to mass dissent, were an integral part of the preparation for the multi-day event. There were still demonstrators who got out of hand and not every police officer was beyond criticism, but the broad framework of rights, i.e., the right to lawfully demonstrate one’s opposition and the right of the public to law enforcement and maintenance of the peace, were kept in balance — as both are essential parts of the freedom from fear.
A few years ago, I recall my wife Donna and I visiting Newfoundland for a brief summer holiday during the celebration of their “400th” Anniversary of Discovery. The province was alive with countless artistic, cultural, and music events. Newfoundlanders are unfailingly friendly and deeply hospitable. We enjoyed our trip very much. One day we drove out from St. John’s, the capital, to Trinity, along the eastern coast, where we spent a wonderful day visiting galleries, having a relaxed lunch of cod cheeks, and doing some afternoon whale watching. In the evening, Trinity featured a summer stock company with local folklore — light but enchanting fun. At about 10 p.m. we headed onto the Trans-Canada Highway for a three-hour drive back to St. John’s. That night was very dark and on a very isolated patch of road we were pulled over by an RCMP police cruiser. An extremely tall RCMP officer approached our vehicle. He pointed out that we had been driving about fourteen kilometres per hour over the local speed limit. We acknowledged that that was probably true. He then asked if either of us had been consuming alcohol. Donna indicated she had not — that is why she was driving. I confessed to local draught beer that had been consumed with dinner about two hours earlier — that was why I was not driving. He was friendly, asked to see our licenses and insurance, and inquired if he might inspect our trunk “just to make the stop worthwhile.” He did so and then returned to our driver’s window to thank us, indicating that ten kilometres or so over the limit was not serious, warned us about dark roads and the genuine hazard of moose, and wished us well.
The next morning, chatting with Donna over breakfast, I wondered about how many countries in the world there are where one could be stopped by a police car late at night, on an isolated highway, and be unafraid of a very tall officer, fully armed, approaching one’s vehicle. You might worry about a speeding fine, about the results of a breathalyzer because of when you had your last tipple, but you would not worry about being mugged, raped, robbed, or murdered. While the RCMP would be the first to accept evidence that they are by no means perfect, the core integrity, discipline, and public purpose of the force, indeed of all other Canadian police forces, are not in question. Freedom from fear requires a context where the police are, by and large, trustworthy and respected. A “peace officer” cannot and must not be an agent of fear.
Belief in the legitimacy and honourable purpose of the state, in its democracy-based right to govern a society of many diverse individuals, is tethered to trust in the way the state seeks to operate, however imperfectly. What a police officer may have done, what a border security officer sought to do may not have been perfect; what they failed to do may be a problem too — human beings make mistakes — but the motivation for, the intent of their actions cannot be in dispute. When they are in dispute, or are found to be in bad faith or outside the framework of freedom and order by which a democratic society abides, disciplinary or criminal pursuit by authorities must be followed. Failure to do so creates those dark spaces where the public purpose of an officer of the law or peace officer becomes grey. And when that problem permeates society, the sense that there exists a “state within a state,” or a separate, self-directed, and self-reverential security establishment disconnected from the balance of public values and broad standards can emerge and weaken the public’s sense of freedom from fear. There is no greater threat to that freedom than impunity of those in authority. Where police brutality and other criminal actions by agents of the state go unpunished, where there is state protection that affords impunity for some, freedom from fear is most likely to erode.
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Freedom from fear is intimately connected with freedom of expression. Public discourse can, at times, become strained, as different elements within a society, such as its political, business, and labour leaders, and those representing its various religious and minority groups, seek do defend their interests. However, this kind of debate does not weaken freedom from fear. The intensity of that debate, the openness of the disagreements, the variety of forums that hold them, their amplification by the media, may in fact strengthen freedom from fear. The intensity of the debate is a reflection of an absence of fear. The absence of fear enriches the debate, a climate that sustains freedom itself.
When, after the collapse of the Soviet Union and Ukraine’s success in securing its independence from Russia, the Ukrainian government sought to strengthen the democratic capacity of the country, outside groups (for example, the Building Democracy Project in the School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University, which was aided by CIDA — the Canadian International Development Agency