Building a Special Relationship offers thoughtful insight into Canadian and American foreign relations during the 1950s, when Canada and the United States found new diplomatic footing as allies in the shadow of the Cold War. This book shows how the Eisenhower years were crucial in forming the bilateral relationship that currently exists between Canada and the United States. Under President Eisenhower and Prime Ministers St. Laurent and Diefenbaker, policy makers on both sides of the border collaborated with an air of “tolerant accommodation” on significant issues of the day. Despite frequent differences, they established frameworks for defence, foreign policy, economic growth, and resource management, many of which endure today. For scholars and readers of political history, international relations, and diplomacy, Building a Special Relationship makes a compelling case that the Eisenhower era is key to understanding the ongoing bond between these two nations.

Asa McKercher is associate professor in the Public Policy and Governance Program at St. Francis Xavier University, a senior fellow of the Bill Graham Centre for Contemporary International History, and a fellow at Queen’s Centre for International and Defence Policy. He is editor-in-chief of International Journal, Canada's journal of global policy analysis. His books include Canada and the World since 1867 and Camelot and Canada: Canadian-American Relations in the Kennedy Era, as well as the edited collections North of America: Canadians and the American Century, 1945–60, Undiplomatic History: Rethinking Canada in the World and Mike's World: Lester B. Pearson and Canadian External Affairs. Michael D. Stevenson is a professor in the Department of History at Lakehead University. He is the author of Canada’s Greatest Wartime Muddle: National Selective Service and the Mobilization of Human Resources during World War II and editor of the 1957–58 volumes of Documents on Canadian External Relations.

"Building a Special Relationship represents a collaborative tour de force."

"… a compelling combination of artful prose and careful research…"