The Techno-politics of Canada’s First Internet

Background: Internet scholars are uncovering and connecting histories of early internets across the globe, but the Canadian context remains underexplored. Drawing on unpublished and declassified documents of the Canadian Armed Forces at Ottawa’s Directorate of History and Heritage, this article investigates the history and significance of SAMSON (Strategic Automatic Message Switching Operational Network), an early Canadian internet that experienced a series of setbacks beginning almost immediately at its advent in 1965, until the project was completed in 1984. Analysis: Canada’s internet infrastructural techno-politics are examined through Brian Larkin’s framework of examining technical ways through which the political is constituted. Conclusions and implications: This paper shows how this early internet was a techno-political system that shaped and was shaped by Canada’s pursuit of its national identity amid fears of U.S. influence and rising demands for self-determination within the Québécois and Indigenous nations.