Strengthening Canada’s Hybrid Resilience: Lessons Learned from Norway
McKayla Wolfer
Summary
· Increasing hybrid activities in the international system expose Canada’s vulnerabilities in federal response, coordination, and cohesion in relation to evolving security threats and targets in the 21st century.
· Norway’s Total Defence model demonstrates how incorporating a “whole-of-society” approach can enhance resilience against hybrid threats.
· Canada should implement elements from the Norwegian model during a period of heightened hybrid operations.
Increase in Hybrid Activities
Hybrid threats have expanded since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Advancements in technology, drones and artificial intelligence (AI) have created cheaper alternatives for weakening and destabilising opponents without declaring war. These activities—with Russia as a main perpetrator— include espionage, cyberattacks, critical infrastructure sabotage, disinformation campaigns, and covert operations aimed at undermining democratic institutions and creating intrastate division. NATO member states, including Poland, Estonia, and Romania, have each experienced drone incursions, cyber disruptions, and other hybrid operations linked to Russia that target critical infrastructure and European civil society more broadly.
Within this hybrid threat environment, the Arctic has also become a principal arena for activities aimed at testing NATO and its ability to respond to hybrid threats. As its polar ice melts 13% per decade, states are “scrapping for a piece of the region”; the economic frontier in particular holds 30% of its undiscovered natural gas and nearly one trillion dollars of critical minerals. As such, the Arctic has become a key region in the security space due to its economic and security value; it is in Canada’s national interest to continue securing its Northern territories, safeguard its economic interests and relationships in this region, and overall strengthen societal resilience, as these factors remain paramount to combatting hybrid threats.
Canada’s National Security Strategy
Canada has technically not released a national security strategy since April 2004. The four defence policies it has released following the initial framework outline the distribution of military resources and emphasize the geopolitical importance of the Arctic. National security strategies outline the principles and priorities that guide governments in developing and implement security policy, and while Canada has released a National Cyber Security Strategy in February 2025, it merely mentions strategy, lacking detail or clarification on how the government intends to apply the standards.
This stands in contrast to the Norway, which released its first National Security Strategy in 2025. Norway’s National Security Strategy emphasises a “whole-of-society” approach; it highlights the increasing role of hybrid tactics and prioritises societal resilience as a tool to reduce vulnerabilities, as discussed below. Furthermore, there are plans to revise the strategy in 2027, to meet the demands and changing international conditions. By drawing on the cohesive and coordinated Norwegian model, Canada could model its own security policy measures and responses in a way that increases societal resilience while defending against hybrid threats. It presents an opportunity for collaboration in a region increasingly being characterized as important yet vulnerable with trusted allies, thereby also serving as a coordinated response across two key Arctic states.
Infrastructure Gaps
A key source of strength and vulnerability in Canada is its vast geography and regional differences, particularly as it relates to critical infrastructure capability. The Arctic holds forty percent of Canada’s landmass but hosts less than 1% of Canada’s total population. Infrastructure in the Canadian Arctic is lacking and is more prone to environmental stress and damage. With Canada’s historical neglect of the Arctic and its ongoing settler colonial rule over the region, adversaries have begun to mobilise hybrid operations in the region aimed at targeting public trust and democratic institutions. These efforts jeopardise national security and the resilience of communities across Canada; however, the Canadian government also has the opportunity to further expand its coordination with Indigenous communities.
The Canadian Rangers are a key example of Indigenous knowledge in action in the Arctic; Rangers guide and train Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) members in the Arctic, their knowledge invaluable for survival and success in the region. As mentioned in other analyses conducted by EETN, the Rangers work alongside the military and other government entities to ensure that operations and conditions are reflective of the realities of the region. Continuing to utilise and expand relationships related to their knowledge as Indigenous to Turtle Island will assist in many different facets. The expansion of relationships also creates an important opportunity to reconcile and develop a renewed sense of collaboration rather than one of dependency and colonial hierarchy. This process will assist in increasing resilience across communities while building sustainably, and work to break down information siloes while developing a holistic, “whole-of-society” security model.
Institutional Coordination
The current Norwegian strategy, which integrates civilian and military components under a single framework, is a whole-of-society approach. A key pillar in their strategy is the concept of “Total Defence”; that is, “the sum of the country’s civilian and military resources which works together to prevent and manage crises, armed conflicts and war.” With a Total Defence model, Norway places resilience in the hands of the Norwegian collective, rather than one single entity, to address 21st-century threats. In 2021, the government formalised collaboration and involvement with the private sector, which would see private actors represented and involved at all levels of society, including local, regional and national areas. This led to greater information sharing and increased dialogue, laying a foundation for better coordination.
The current Canadian model demonstrates an overarching lack of coordination, as the responsibility to respond to hybrid threats implicates a network of federal agencies, including Public Safety Canada, Communications Security Establishment (CSE), Canadian Security Intelligence (CSIS), the RCMP and the Department of National Defence. While each agency’s mandate targets a specific area of Canada’s security, overarching coordination between the network remains limited and complex.
The 2025 Auditor General Report on Cyber Security of Government Network and Systems stated that while agencies have the tools to respond to cyber-attacks, there are still major gaps and vulnerabilities that remain. Recent cyber-attacks against Global Affairs Canada (GAC) and Financial Transactions and Report Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC) demonstrated issues in information sharing and coordination. As a result of incomplete procedures and protocols, it took seven days to request and receive the proper information, which delayed the response to the cyber-attack.
This lack of coordination across government agencies has resulted in information siloes, which have subsequently led to redundancies and inefficiencies in addressing hybrid threats. This translates to public-private cooperation as information-sharing remains voluntary, with 85% of critical infrastructure being owned and operated in the private sector; nonetheless, the federal government has struggled to maintain consistency in information-sharing, leading to coverage gaps in Canadian hybrid response models. In contrast, the Norwegian model has three integrated Joint Coordination Centers which predominately focus on national cyber security, national intelligence, and joint cyber coordination. This model has allowed for a co-located, collaborative governance model with a few members, enhancing coordination and response to hybrid threats. Norway has developed a system which utilises the Joint Coordination Centres to clearly define roles, and ensures that institutional siloes are minimized, as each Centre has a clear mandate of membership and information sharing, which must be further addressed in the Canadian context.
Conclusion
Canadian exposure to hybrid threats is increasing. There remains a lack of coordination in how Canada aims to address and respond to such threats, leaving the country vulnerable to the actions undertaken by adversaries by virtue of relying on outdated frameworks of national security. The Norwegians’ Total Defence model demonstrates that while a whole-of-society approach is challenging; proper coordination, ongoing communication, and public-private partnerships are key to building longstanding societal and national resilience. By taking the steps to update our national security strategy, improving interagency coordination, and minimising gaps in Northern community infrastructure, Canada could better address and be proactive in responding to the hybrid threats of the 21st century.
Policy Recommendations
· Redevelop and update a National Security Strategy featuring a National Hybrid Resilience Framework.
· Continue partnering with Inuit, Indigenous, and Northern communities to close infrastructure gaps; look for new opportunities to build security relationships with Indigenous communities in Canada and across the Northern European continent.
· Develop a working group built of regionally-balanced, public-private stakeholders for information-sharing and threat management.
· Conduct intersecting reviews of the CSIS Act and the RCMP Act to minimise institutional silos that prevent effective and coordinated response management to hybrid threats.