The establishment of the Foreign Investment Review Agency can be explained on the basis that such a screening instrument was the most efficient instrument to deal with the problem of foreign direct investment in Canada. However, Jacques Pauwels argues that FIRA was created not for the efficient regulation of foreign direct investment but for political purposes; that is, FIRA provided the Trudeau government with considerable vote-maximizing possibilities. Moreover, Pauwels suggests that Mulroney\u27s introduction of the Investment Canada Act, replacing FIRA with Investment Canada, can similarly be explained
