Leadership Quote by Brian Mulroney

Mulroney’s line is the sound of a country trying to talk itself into adulthood. The hook isn’t the environment; it’s Maurice Strong. By foregrounding a Canadian running a major global file, Mulroney turns climate governance into a matter of national pride and, just as crucially, national embarrassment if Canada fails to show up. “Pull up our socks” is deliberately folksy, the kind of kitchen-table idiom that smuggles ambition in under the radar. It frames leadership not as ideological virtue-signaling but as basic self-respect.

The subtext is competitive: if one of “ours” is setting the agenda internationally, Canada has no excuse for being a cautious, second-tier player. Mulroney is also doing a classic statesman’s pivot: he rebrands a potentially divisive policy arena as a consensus project. “Of course” and “important for us” assume agreement in advance, crowding out dissent by presenting leadership as the obvious, patriotic default.

Context matters. Strong was a central architect of modern environmental diplomacy, tied to the UN’s big convenings and the institutional scaffolding that would shape climate policy for decades. Mulroney is signaling that Canada can profit from being early: reputational capital, influence over rules, and a moral halo that plays well with allies. It’s an argument for being at the table before the menu is written.

There’s a faint anxiety under the pep talk, too: Canada’s identity is often reactive, defined by proximity to larger powers. Here, Mulroney grabs a moment when Canadian expertise could set terms globally and tries to make leadership feel not aspirational, but mandatory.