In the News Detail

The Right Honourable Brian Mulroney, Derek Burney, Yves Fortier and Norm Steinberg are all featured in Lexpert magazine for their roles as "strategic counsel and Rolodexes of influence." Marzena Czarnecka examines the impact of these positions on law firms across the country.

Excerpt

Need to get a CEO out of a Russian jail? Convince a US minister not to tax foreign mining operators? Sweet-talk someone in Ottawa - or Edmonton - on a thorny regulatory issue?

No problem.

Call a lawyer. But a special kind of lawyer. A lawyer who knows people. Knows the system. Knows who to call - and who to avoid. A lawyer who, in short, knows how to exercise what Joseph S. Nye, Jr., calls soft power.

At Ogilvy Renault, co-chair of the firm Norman Steinberg makes no bones about why the firm was anxious former prime minister Brian Mulroney return to his alma mater in 1993 (he articled at Ogilvy in 1964 and practised with the firm as a labour lawyer until 1976, when he made his interim leap into business as president of Iron Ore Company of Canada).

"When he came back here we realized many of our clients here have the sort of strategic issues someone like Brian can deal with and many of the lawyers at our law firm can't, because they do not have that experience or that network," says Steinberg. "He is able, through his network, to offer a lot of strategic help. Through him, clients get the strategic advice they need and they get the door open."

One of the first Canadian companies to grab - and capitalize on - the miraculous magic of the Mulroney network was Barrick Gold Corp. Chairman Peter Munk recruited Mulroney to the Barrick board almost immediately upon the latter's exit from politics. Shortly thereafter, Mulroney found himself navigating Barrick through a storm in China, hooking Munk up with the head of the Chinese central bank and other politicians whose "goodwill" was essential to a Barrick project. It was the first of many "miracles" Mulroney has performed on Barrick behalf—another one includes recruiting former US president George Bush Sr. to act as Barrick's senior honorary advisor and open some more international doors for the Canadian gold company.

Mulroney's highest profile Barrick miracle is probably the agreement he effected between Chile and Argentina in 1994 around a multibillion Barrick development smack in the middle of the two countries' ever-contentious border.

"Barrick chairman Peter Munk and I saw the president of Chile, we saw the president of Argentina, we met with the appropriate officials in both countries, we went back to Canada, we worked out a strategy, we did the Lord's work on behalf of the Barrick shareholders and now Barrick has what it needs," says Mulroney. (Munk was so impressed, he's still talking about it.)

Mulroney spent August 2007 travelling alongside Barrick CEO Greg Wilkins and hobnobbing with yet another president of a country "where Barrick is looking at the development of a huge resource, very valuable to the shareholders of Barrick and to the people of this country." He expects another round of shuttle diplomacy will be needed to ensure "everything stays on track," but he's sanguine about the result. After all, he knows the people involved.

That is soft power at its best.

"But it is not," stresses Mulroney, "lobbying."

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