Canadian Political Economy and the Transnational Character of Canada’s Cannabis Industry

There is a continuing debate in Canadian political economy as to whether Canada is better understood as a dependency of the US empire or a secondary imperialist power. Drawing inspiration from middle-ground overviews, this paper questions one of the debate’s central premises: that nationally identifiable capital exists, and that Canadian capital is identifiably Canadian. Through an analysis of the ownership and operations of the seven largest Canadian-based cannabis firms, I argue that what might be labeled as Canadian capital is better understood as a highly financialized and globalizing form of capital whose shift to a asset-light model of production is likely to further the transnational character of this industry, and reproduce historical regional economic stagnation.