Economics 421/422, Special Studies, Canadian Economic History

Instructor: Professor Robin Neill

If you have any questions or comments,
Email: rneill@upei.ca

Topics

These courses are accounts of the rise and fall of National Policy from the Age of Sail, through the Canal Era, and the Railway Epoch, to the Time of Telematics at the end of the Internal Combustion and Electric Dynamo Period. Focusing on the Canadian case, they present a chronicle of National Economic Policy, in its historical context, beginning with the rise of the European mercantilist nation state, and ending with the submergence of the transcontinental nation state in multi-national trading blocks and global markets. The question asked is, What have been the very long run economic factors in the integration and disintegration of Canada as we have known it?

Economics 421

Part One

The Age of Sail: 1460--1860

1. The emergence of national policy: Europe to the mercantilist era

2. Agriculture and economic development: Europe to the demise of feudalism

3. Feudalism in America: to the American Revolution

4. Feudalism in America: to the American Civil War

5. Mercantilism and settlement in America: Newfoundland
and the fisheries

6. Mercantilism and settlement in America: agriculture
and the fur trade in New France

7. The Legacy of the Age of Sail

Part Two

The Canal Era: 1750--1850

The Building of the Canals: Some Dates

8. Industrialization and Canals: Britain

9. Industrialization and Canals: Russia and U.S.A.

10. The Canal Era in the Canadian Maritimes

11. Quebec, from the Conquest to the Abolition of Feudal Tenure

12. Upper Canada from the Constitution Act to the
Reciprocity Treaty

13. The West Coast to Confederation

Economics 422

Part Three

The Railway Epoch

14. The First National Policy

15. The Second National Policy

16. National Monetary Policy under Laissez-faire

17. Canadian Commercial Policy under Laissez-faire

18. The Substance of Economic Development: 1870--1920

19. Disintegration of Institutions and Policy: 1870--1920

Part Four

Internal Combustion and the Electric Dynamo

20. Remaking National Policy: Russia and the United States, 1900--1940

21. Remaking National Policy: Canada, 1900-1929

22. The Third National Policy

23. Cold War and Continentalization:
U.S.A. and U.S.S.R, 1946--1970

24. The Canadian Quandary:
Regionalization and Continentalization

25. Telematics, Globalization,
and the End of National Policy

Reading List

Required Reading

(available on line under `Course Outline and Content)

Neill, R.F.,
THE END OF NATIONAL POLICY: VERY LONG RUN ECONOMIC FACTORS
IN CANADIAN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Recommended Reading

Norrie, K. and Owram, D.
A HISTORY OF THE CANADIAN ECONOMY
Second Edition, 1996.

McCalla, D., and Huberman, M.,
PERSPECTIVES ON CANADIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY
Revised Edition, 1994.

Easterbrook, W.T. and Aitken, H.G.J.,
CANADIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY.

Easterbrook, W.T. and Watkins, M.H.,
APPROACHES TO CANADIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY.

Watkins, M.H. and Grant, H.,
CANADIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY, 1994.

Innis, H.A.,
ESSAYS IN CANADIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY.

Marr, W.L. and Paterson, D.G.,
CANADA: AN ECONOMIC HISTORY.

Taylor, G.D. and Baskerville, P.A.,
A CONCISE BUSINESS HISTORY OF CANADA .

Falkner, H.U.,
AMERICAN ECONOMIC HISTORY.

Clough, S.B.,
EUROPEAN ECONOMIC HISTORY