Synopsis

The Strategic Studies Working Group (SSWG) is a partnership between the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute (CDFAI) and the Canadian International Council (CIC), which incorporates the former Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies.

CDFAI administers the SSWG, which conducts research and produces publications on security and defence issues on behalf of the partnership.

Detailed Overview

The Strategic Studies Working Group (SSWG) is a unique group that is both a working group of the Canadian International Council, headquartered in Toronto with nationwide branches, and a partnership between the Canadian Defence & Foreign Affairs Institute (based in Calgary) and the CIC.  The SSWG was born of the merger in 2007 of the venerable Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies (CISS) and the Canadian International Council that was founded by Jim Balsillie to inject new life and resources into the Canadian Institute of International Affairs (CIIA) and create a national voice for the study of Canadian international issues.
 
CIC was intended to take over the national membership and branch structure of CIIA and add to it a new and more vigorous administrative structure intended to broaden scholarship and public education in the Canadian foreign policy field.  The Strategic Studies Working Group was created as a condition of the merger of the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies and CIC to ensure that the then new CIC would not lose sight of defence and security issues.
 
Shortly after CIC was founded, an arrangement was concluded between it and CDFAI to make the Strategic Studies Working Group a partnership between the two organizations.  In effect, CDFAI undertook to administer the Strategic Studies Working Group and to undertake research and publication on security and defence issues on behalf of the Canadian International Council.  All projects undertaken by the Strategic Studies Working Group are first approved by CIC and are co-published or co e-published according to CIC standards.