Analysing recognition multidirectionally: Canada, United Nations membership, and the Algerian question

Abstract The process of admitting new members to the United Nations has historically been contentious and contradictory. This paper examines new membership through the lens of recognition, focusing on the historical case of Canada’s role in this debate between 1955 and 1962. Canada led the initiative to grant membership to 16 members in 1955 and supported new membership for 17 others (including former French colonies) in 1960. Simultaneously, it opposed resolutions in the UN General Assembly supporting Algerian independence from France . The concept of recognition helps explain this inconsistency, while this case also reveals much about recognition itself. I argue that recognition, both thick and thin, can be multidirectional, in that granting recognition to another state is part of that state’s own struggle for recognition. In 1955 and 1960, Canada granted thin recognition to new members, which had implications for its own struggle for thick recognition. With Algerian independence, this was a debate about thick recognition for Algeria and for France; Canada’s complex struggle for thick recognition also drove its resistance to recognizing Algeria.