Lesson Five: Promoting and Defending Against Ideologies

2. Lesson 4.5.1 How Nations Interact

When Canada acts on a belief, it engages in direct and indirect action to promote and defend against ideologies. Canada's actions are motivated by ideologies.

Interactions among nations are often driven by ideology. Separating the promotion of one's own ideology from defence against the ideologies of others is difficult.

If a nation believes in freedom of speech, it promotes this belief by expressing its opinions. To do so is a way of defending against those who oppose free speech. Thus, nations often promote their own ideologies and defend against opposing ideologies at the same time.

Ideologies motivate nations to interact in various ways. The importance of ideologies to nations makes their promotion and defense against other ideologies vital to the existence of the nation. The methods used to promote or defend against ideologies bring various consequences. These consequences, however, all involve changes in relations among nations.

Nations must consider three basic types of interaction:

cooperation
conflict
competition

Go through this powerpoint to learn more about how nations interact.