St. Francis Xavier University

ST. FRANCIS XAVIER UNIVERSITY

ECONOMICS 342

THE MARITIME ECONOMY

Winter 2004

SYLLABUS

Instructor: Marilyn Gerriets,

304 Nicholson Hall,

8673848

mgerriet@.stfx.ca

Course requirements:

Presentations, participation

and assignments 10%

Essay 20%

Mid-term 25%

Final examination 45%

100%

The primary goal of this course is to enable students to gain an understanding of the structure of the Maritime economy and the nature and the origins of the economic challenges the region faces. Economic concepts developed in Economics 100 will be applied to this task, improving students’ understanding of the workings of economies in general. Students will also improve their skills in reading critically, in analyzing complex arguments and in expressing themselves in writing.

I. Structure of the economy in 1870

A. Primary production and the rural economy

Kris Inwood and James Irwin, 'Canadian Regional Commodity Income Differences at Confederation', in Farm Factory and Fortune, edited by Kris Inwood, pp. 93-120.

Rusty Bittermann, ‘Farm Households and Wage Labour in the Northeastern Maritimes in the Early 19th Century’, Contested Countryside: Rural Workers and Modern Society in Atlantic Canada, 1800-1950, edited by Daniel Samson.

B. Manufacturing: rural and urban

M. Gerriets and K. Inwood, 'Comparison of the Relative Efficiency of Industry in the Provinces of Canada in 1871', Acadiensis, 26, 1 (Autumn, 1996), pp. 32-51.

C. Commerce

Eric W. Sager and Lewis R. Fischer, ‘Atlantic Canada and the Age of Sail Revisited’, Canadian Historical Review 63:2 (1982), pp. 125-50.

II. Evolution of the Manufacturing Sector

A. Expansion of manufacturing

T. W. Acheson, ‘The Maritimes and “Empire Canada”, Canada and the Burden of Unity, edited by David Jay Bercuson, Toronto : Macmillan of Canada, c1977, pp. 87-114.

B. Centralization of Manufacturing in Central Canada

P. J. Wylie, 'When Markets Fail: Electrification and the Maritime Industrial Decline in the 1920s', Acadiensis, 17 (1987), pp. 74-96.

III. Evolution of the Post War Economy (5 weeks)

A. Relative well-being of the Maritimes (and Convergence)

Derek Johnson, ‘Merchants, the State and the Household: Continuity and Change in a 20th-Century Acadian Fishing Village’, Acadiensis, 29, 1 (Autumn 1999), pp. 57-75.

B. Government’s role in development

Ernest Forbes, ‘Looking Backward: Reflections on the Maritime Experience in an Evolving Canadian constitution’, The Maritime Provinces: Looking to the Future, The Canadian Institute for Research on Regional Development, Moncton, 1993.

C. The Economic Structure Today.

Anthony Myatt, David Murrell and William Milne, ‘Atlantic Canada: Performance and Prospects’ Canadian Business Economics, Spring 1995, pp. 29-41. A link to a PDF file will be available on my web site.

Donald J. Savoie, Maurice Beaudin, ‘Public Sector Adjustments and the Maritime Provinces’, Shock Waves, edited by G. J. De Benedetti and R. H. Lamarche, The Canadian institute for Research on Regional Development, Moncton, 1994.