Annexing and dissolving countries with documents: comparing and analysing the accession of East Germany into Germany and potential annexation of Canada into the USA

Purpose By centring documentality as an essential part of state-building and state-demolishing, this article offers the start of an overview and analysis of the significance of documentation in the complex processes of dissolving and annexing states. It employs a comparative case study of the former East Germany (GDR) and contemporary Canada to illuminate this significance. Although vastly different circumstances and contexts, there are/would be, perhaps unexpectedly, documentary parallels between how the GDR was abolished and absorbed into its western neighbour and how Canada could be transformed and annexed into its southern neighbour. Design/methodology/approach A material-documentary perspective is adopted by situating documentation at the centre of observation, study and analysis to reveal its centrality in the dissolution and annexation of states. Specifically, it offers a comparative case study and documentary analysis of the former East Germany and contemporary Canada since the former state’s dissolution and accession into its western neighbour occurred, not by military force or invasion, but in a peaceable fashion with documentation. Presumably, the annexation of Canada would also unfold in an unwarlike fashion with documents. Findings The dissolution of former East Germany, and its accession/absorption into Germany, serves as a mirror of how a parallel process could/would unfold for American annexation of Canada. Notwithstanding their disparateness and dissimilarities, the documentary parallels of dissolution and annexation between these two countries are striking. Their comparison might be unexpected, yet nevertheless incisive insofar as the disappearance and supplantation of states by documentation are concerned. Research limitations/implications This comparative case study and documentary analysis between East Germany and Canada can serve as a departure point for other possible current and historical cases in which countries, or other political entities, institutions or organizations, whether national, regional or supranational, have desired and/or been threatened with disestablishment and expropriated or occupied by other states or similar bodies. Practical implications Some of the fundamental documentation that would be necessary for a potential annexation of Canada by/into the USA is illuminated and unpacked. Social implications In these cases, two countries effectively vanish and two others enlarge by, with and through documentation. Admittedly, a state can be erased through violent means including attacks, wars and cleansing. Disestablishing a state with documentation, however, is a more orderly and peaceful option, as was the case in the former East Germany. Presumably, American annexation of Canada could/would also be conducted conciliatorily through documentation. Originality/value This article intervenes in the rich scholarship on documentation’s importance for state, governmental and institutional structures, purposes and effects by reversing the focus on ways in which documentation dismantles, not creates or sustains, these entities. The comparative case study of former East Germany and contemporary Canada, despite their remoteness from each other, provides insights on the significance of documentation in peaceably dissolving and annexing states.