bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Equilibrium and Process Analysis in the Traditional Theory of the Firm
Authors: Dingwall James
Published: June 2006

At an early point in the Economics of Imperfect Competition Mrs. Robinson assures us that her attention is to be confined to equilibrium analysis only and that she proposes to make no study of the process of inter-equilibrium adjustment. “The technique set out in this book is a technique for studying equilibrium positions. No reference is made to the effects of the passage of time. Short-period and long-period equilibria are introduced into the argument to illustrate various technical devices, but no study is made of the process of moving from one position of equilibrium to another ….” There are two alternatives open to the theorist who has adopted a methodological precept involving the complete separation of equilibrium and process analysis. It is possible, on the one hand, to follow the precept with the utmost rigour, in which case the equilibrium theory will be almost purely formal and hardly constitute an explanation of the equilibrium. Or the theorist can in practice relax his rule and introduce process propositions into the equilibrium theory. Few writers have been able fully to resign themselves to the first alternative and most have in greater or less degree followed the second. Thus there has been elaborated, largely unconsciously, a theory of the process of interequilibrium adjustment which forms an integral part of the accepted theory of the equilibrium of the firm in its usual form. It is the purpose of this paper to bring this adjustment theory explicitly to view and to determine the degree to which the validity of the equilibrium propositions is dependent upon it. It is emphasized that the discussion is restricted to the questions of internal logical consistency and formal generality of the theory.
The Development of Government Expenditure Control: The Issue and Audit Phases
Authors: Balls Herbert R.
Published: June 2006

The Consolidated Revenue and Audit Act of 1931 is the statutory embodiment of the principles underlying the control which the Parliament of Canada exercises over the receipt and issue of moneys from the Consolidated Revenue Fund. It is the most recent of the legislative milestones which mark the evolution of systematic control from the plodding simplicity of the methods of 1855, when the first Audit Act was passed, to the mechanized organization of the present day.

Legislative financial power had been firmly established in 1878 with the appointment of an Auditor General as an officer of Parliament, to regulate the issue of moneys from the treasury and to examine and report upon the public expenditures. With wide powers of inquiry and examination, the Auditor General possessed the means to learn if legislative directions were being obeyed. Control of the issue gave him the means to deal with the misapplication of appropriations by refusing to sanction further issue. This ever-present threat, hovering as the sword of Damocles over the heads of the spending departments, was ready at the word of the Auditor to cut off the flow of money from the treasury. For fifty-three years, legislative regulation of the issue served as a more or less effective restraint on executive disobedience to parliamentary directions.
Sanctions under the Charter of the United Nations
Authors: Kelsen Hans
Published: June 2006

The failure of the League of Nations is due to many causes. One of them is that the Covenant of the League did not establish an adequate system of effective sanctions. Sanctions are coercive measures provided for by a legal order as reactions against violations of this order. The coercive measures consist in a forcible deprivation of certain possessions, such as life, freedom, property, or other rights. The measure we call a sanction is coercive in so far as it is to be carried out even against the will of the subject against whom it is directed, by the employment of force, if necessary. The Covenant of the League, in its Article 16, provided two kinds of sanctions: a general sanction for any violation of the Covenant, expulsion from the League, and special sanctions for the violation of the Covenant which was constituted by illegally resorting to war. The sanctions for this delict were: either economic reprisals, or action taken by armed forces against the member-state responsible for the violation of the Covenant.

The Charter of the United Nations follows the Covenant, in principle at least, in establishing the same kinds of sanctions as the Covenant. Article 6 of the Charter stipulates: “A Member of the United Nations which has persistently violated the Principles contained in the present Charter may be expelled from the Organization by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council.” It may be doubtful whether expulsion from an organization whose purpose is the maintenance of peace is an adequate sanction at all. This is certainly not the case, if by expulsion the member gets rid of the obligations which it has violated and thus has shown that it considers these obligations as an unwelcome burden. Expulsion has the effect of a sanction, that is, to be felt as an evil, only in so far as it deprives the state of its rights as a member. This effect, however, can be realized without releasing the guilty member from its obligations.

The Charter provides for such a possibility in Article S, which runs as follows: “A Member of the United Nations against which preventive or enforcement action has been taken by the Security Council may be suspended from the exercise of the rights and privileges of membership by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council. The exercise of these rights and privileges may be restored by the Security Council.” This Article introduces, as a valuable innovation, suspension from the exercise of the rights of membership.
International Monetary Control
Authors: MacGibbon D. A.
Published: June 2006

The signing by forty-four nations at Bretton Woods, N.H., on July 22, 1944, of articles of agreement for the establishment of an International Monetary Fund marks the third stage in the process of setting up an organization which is intended to control international exchange operations after the war. The first stage was initiated by the publication by the British Treasury of Baron Keynes's scheme for an International Clearing Union concurrently with the publication by the United States Treasury of the draft outline of a plan for a United and Associated Nations Stabilization Fund prepared by Dr. Harry White. These were made available to the public on April 8, 1943. Subsequently in June of 1943 experts of the Canadian Government issued a third plan for an International Exchange Union. A revised edition of the American plan appeared July 10, 1943. As collateral to these proposals in October, 1943, the United States Treasury released a text entitled, “Guiding Principles for a Proposed United Nations Bank for Reconstruction and Development.”

All these schemes were at once subject to a critical examination by monetary experts in the United States, Great Britain, and Canada. Meanwhile negotiations were being carried on in Washington with a view to ironing out the differences revealed between the British and American point of view. Experts from other countries in time entered into these discussions. In the end by mutual concessions substantial agreement was reached upon the main points under consideration. With the putting forward in Washington on April 21, 1944, by the monetary experts and treasury technicians of thirty-four governments of a plan covering their tentative conclusions, the second stage was reached and the way cleared for a definite step forward to be attempted.
Stabilization of the Income of the Primary Producer
Authors: Stewart Andrew
Published: June 2006

The large part of Canadian experience with controls affecting primary products has been acquired under the peculiar conditions of war. With expanding income in the hands of consumers, prices generally rose rapidly during 1941, and the general price ceiling was established in December of that year. Since then the incomes of consumers have continued to expand, and the general ceiling has been supported by taxation, borrowing, and informal and formal rationing. However, given the ceiling and the level of spendable incomes on the one hand, and the supplies of labour and equipment available to producers on the other, producers' prices were frequently too low to induce sufficient production to prevent the necessity of more extended formal rationing; to provide for desired expansion in domestic consumption, and to meet the urgent need for food for export. Producers' prices have therefore been supported; the object of the supports being primarily to direct production in line with the national policy, and only incidentally to raise producers' incomes. In a few cases, notably, wheat and apples, supported prices have been applied to maintain incomes against a decline in demand. The price of wheat has been supported by stock accumulation, quotas, and acreage reduction. Apples have been purchased and diverted to alternative markets.

In 1942, wheat, dairy products, hogs, cattle, and poultry products together provided more than 70 per cent of the gross, cash income from the sale of farm products in Canada. Wheat has been purchased by the Canadian Wheat Board at a fixed statutory price. Minimum prices have been established for beef and butter, which are sold mainly on the domestic market; export contracts assisting in clearing the Canadian market of surpluses. Prices of hogs, cheese, and eggs have been supported by contract prices agreed upon by the British Ministry of Food, and financed largely under the provisions of Mutual Aid.
The Sampling Approach to Economic Data
Authors: Keyfitz Nathan
Published: June 2006

Statistics provide data for action. A statistic which will not be used was not worth the trouble of collecting. I consider this a part of the definition of the subject and will not undertake to support it here. The action of course need not follow immediately; it may not be taken until the results of many other observations are available.

Specifically, statistics deal with random variation. In any practical situation, after we have accounted for every variable which can be brought under control, we still cannot say exactly what will happen. In manufacturing a coil spring, we may use metal of fixed chemical specification, even from the same heat, have a fixed setting on the machine which coils the spring, the same time and the same temperatures in tempering it, and still the tensions of the successive springs which are produced will vary. Given a variety of wheat whose seed is the purest strain we can procure, we plant a number of plots in soil of the same chemical composition, apply the same manurial treatment, see to it that the slopes and the irrigation are the same, plant the seed and cultivate the grain in the same way, and yet we find that the yields vary. In no practical case can theory provide an exhaustive account of the relevant variables, our physical control of real situations is never perfect, and consequently we are never in a position where the result will come out exactly to order.
The Party System and the New Economic Policies
Authors: Dessauer F. E.
Published: June 2006

It is inevitable that, in time of war, the greater concentration of power necessary for the efficient prosecution of the war should lead to the abandonment of certain of the constitutional rules and traditional practices of popular government. It is possible that the new measures introduced under the cover of war, the new methods of social and economic policy which are now coming into use, not only serve the special requirements of a war-time economy but correspond as well to the lasting needs of a changed society. It is not the purpose of this inquiry to say whether these new methods are good or bad in themselves, permanent or temporary, nor am I concerned here with the conflict between them and individual liberties; I wish to discuss only how far they are compatible with popular government and how far it may be necessary to adapt its system to changed conditions. For though established institutions have a way of making their own adaptations to circumstances in the course of time, some conscious and considered human guidance may aid in the progress.

First, both the traditional forms of popular government and the new policies, which constitute its novel activities, need some defining. Popular government, in the English-speaking world, rests on the two-party system by which one party is in power and the other in opposition. Although the two-party system is not the only form of democracy, it is the one that has shown itself on the whole to be the most stable, lasting, and extensive.
Income and Food Consumption
Authors: Hopper W. C.
Published: June 2006

In recent years in many countries of the world a great deal of attention has been directed toward the need for more nutritious diets. The term “protective” foods has become established in the literature on nutrition. While there may be some differences of opinion as to what constitutes protective foods, practically all the lists of such foods which have been prepared by nutritionists include milk, meat, eggs, cheese, and fruits and vegetables.

The first studies of consumption of agricultural products in Canada were made by the Economics Division of the Dominion Department of Agriculture in 1930 when by the use of mail questionnaires a survey was made of the purchases of apples by consumers in Toronto and Montreal. A year later the first study of milk consumption in Canada was made by the Economics Division in the Sydney-Glace Bay area of Nova Scotia and in 1935 a more comprehensive study of milk consumption was undertaken in a number of urban and rural areas. Since 1935 additional studies of consumption of foods of various kinds have been made by the Economics Division as well as by other agencies. Most of these studies have been in relation to protective foods which in the main are the more expensive kinds of foods. These studies have been largely confined to city people although information has been gathered on the use of certain commodities in rural Canadian homes.
Fiscal Policy and Tariffs in Post-war International Trade
Authors: Marsh Donald B.
Published: June 2006

Recent developments in economic theory are especially rich in policy implications for a single country seeking to maximize its welfare through international trade. They make necessary a restatement of certain parts of the ancient controversy over free trade and protection; namely, those affected by the theory of employment and the theory of imperfect competition.

There is little to add to the broader classical conclusions on the maximization of welfare in the world economy, or to the general, if cautious, acceptance of the infant industries argument. However, the former must be qualified in the light of the theory of imperfect competition, particularly the theory of monopsony, and the implications of decreasing costs; while the latter depends on technological considerations normally impounded in ceteris paribus even in modern value theory.

The special relevance of any of these universes of discourse in terms of which international trade policy may be discussed and evaluated is itself a controversial point. If, for example, a reasonable and steady approximation to full employment is considered of paramount importance, the practical alternatives of fiscal and international policy are considerably narrowed. The most efficient allocation of resources among alternative uses may have to wait on policies for getting all available human resources into some use. At another level, the optimum allocation of resources for one country may be defined for a national real income made possible by exploiting its neighbours. It is the duty of the economist, not to ignore or to condemn these judgments, but to show how the desired ends may be achieved in practice, and to point out any inconsistencies among ends of policy simultaneously desired.
The Problem of Price Level in Canada
Authors: MacGregor D. C.
Published: June 2006

About eighteen months ago I had begun to fear that Canada might come out of the war with too low rather than too high a price level. I felt that if production and employment averaged little or no higher after the war than before it, and if prices were no higher than in 1944, the national money income would sink to the point where federal revenues would develop an enormous chronic deficit of, say, 30 to 50 per cent of current expenditures. Such might be the outcome, no matter how high the rates of taxation employed. Ultimately deficits of so great a size would lead to an expansion of bank credit and hence to a higher price level, but in the meantime the country would experience a demoralizing series of political and financial crises resembling those in France between 1920 and 1927. In the design of high policy I felt that care should be taken to avoid such an outcome, which would leave our political system and our social structure greatly weakened.
Means of Payment and Prices in Canada, 1900-46
Authors: Buck Hart
Published: June 2006

That the quantity of money in use by the community tends to rise and fall as the level of prices does, is (I believe) universally admitted. “The Quantity Theory of Money,” said J. M. Keynes in his Tract on Monetary Reform, “states that the amount of cash which the community requires, assuming certain habits of business and of banking to be established, and assuming also a given level and distribution of wealth, depends on the level of prices.” He might perhaps have added, as a summary of the discussion which with these words he introduces, “and vice versa.” Lord Keynes's own formulation of the dependence, n = p(k + rk′), expresses by way of a snapshot what Fisher's celebrated equation, MV + M′V’ = PT, expresses by way of a moving picture; that, the community's business and banking habits being assumed on the one hand, and on the other, the extent and distribution of its wealth, the quantity of money and the level of prices are proportional to one another. Open to argument remain such details as: how to define the quantity of money; and, whereby to measure the level of prices; and, how to judge of such changes in business and banking habits, or in the extent and distribution of wealth, as may change the quantity of money though prices were to stay constant, or raise or lower the price level though the quantity of money were kept unchanged.
Social Security: An Administrative Solution to the Dominion-Provincial Problem
Authors: Tuck Raphael
Published: June 2006

This article is an attempt to evolve an administrative technique for Dominion-provincial co-operation in the social services—with particular reference to public health—within the framework or confines of the existing British North America Act of 1867.

The recent war has brought the need for social services into sharp relief. The realization has finally dawned that in the complex society in which we live, a comprehensive programme of social progress is now essential, but such a programme must necessarily be nation-wide, since we can no longer afford disparities in the social services on account of the serious reactions such disparities have on the general welfare and national unity of the country. To develop such a national system of public welfare services, it is vitally necessary that the Dominion should extend its influence, leadership, and activity, but here we are at once confronted with the vexed—and, as yet, unsolved—problem of Dominion-provincial relations. Valiant attempts have been made to solve this problem, but two main obstacles still obstruct all efforts.
Two Conditions Necessary for Economic Progress in Agriculture
Authors: Schultz Theodore W.
Published: June 2006

In a consideration of the economic problems that confront agriculture there is much wisdom in a return to the classical tradition of treating these problems within the context of the political economy. In our division of labour in professional effort we have departed from this tradition; and our work has been weakened as a consequence. The Older Economists were deeply concerned about agriculture. They did not, however, make the mistake of treating agriculture in isolation, as if it belonged in another category to be studied, one might be led to suppose, by a different set of analytical models and presumably, largely by surveys and statistics. Such procedures certainly are not in keeping with what the Older Economists did as they put together an engine for economic analysis and laid down a roadbed for policy. On the contrary, their major premises and the basic policies that emerged were heavily weighted with agricultural affairs. This is evident when we consider the attention they gave to the production of food, the distribution of rewards to factors, particularly to rent and land. Whether our analysis pertains to labour, finance, trade, agriculture, or any other problem sphere, we will do well to formulate our approach in terms of the economy as a whole. We need especially to view agriculture as an integral part of the political economy and not as a series of particular farm problems treated as if they were self-contained.
Some Aspects of Canada's Post-War Export Problem
Authors: Knox F. A.
Published: June 2006

Two features of Canada's international economic position stand out so conspicuously that everyone is familiar with them. We are dependent upon foreign markets almost as completely as a country could be; and we depend upon an export surplus in markets overseas to pay for an import surplus from the United States. Our interest, therefore, lies in the freest possible access to the markets of other countries and in the unrestricted convertibility of world currencies at stable rates of exchange. During the inter-war years the attempt to secure stable exchange rates under the gold standard system failed, and thereafter restrictions upon international trade multiplied. The fact that the system broke down during a very severe depression has associated the gold standard with deflationary tendencies so strongly in the popular mind that, apart from any question of its merits, it is now impracticable to suggest its general restoration. Government experts have therefore been at work on a series of related plans for a new and improved international economic framework. By setting up an international monetary system which will not periodically collapse they hope to create an atmosphere in which nations will be willing to remove barriers to trade and in which international investment may revive. They design an international economic order within which nations may strive for a high level of employment and national income without being thwarted at once by the international consequences of expansion.
Some Aspects of the Problem of Fulll Employment
Authors: Beattie J. R.
Published: June 2006

The purpose of this paper is to raise issues and provoke discussion, not to present a blue print. Although war-time experience has contributed much to the education of economists, I suspect there are few who would be dogmatic about whether, or how, full employment can be maintained after the war. The problem is not entirely and indeed may not even be mainly one of economic analysis. The most important question may be a social or political one, viz. whether the desire for full employment is so compelling that people will be willing to subordinate personal and group interests sufficiently to achieve it.

War-time developments have emphasized how far Canada was from full utilization of its resources during the thirties. In August, 1939, after nearly a decade of struggle against mass unemployment, we now know there were still more than half a million Canadians who were unemployed. In addition, many were working on short time, or were being supported in concealed unemployment on farms, and many farmers were on relief. Since then, the gainfully occupied have increased from about 3.7 million to about 5.1 million, including the armed forces. In addition, our capital equipment has been increased, new skills have been developed, and new production techniques have been worked out under the forced draught of war. The indications are that full employment of all who really want to work after the war will probably involve jobs for about 4.7 million people, or one million more than in 1939, and a volume of production perhaps 50 per cent greater than the pre-war level.
French Canada and Social Security
Authors: Angers François-Albert
Published: June 2006

Social security is a rather new concept on which ideas have not yet really crystallized anywhere. And this is, of course, true of French Canada as well as of English Canada, or England, or the United States. For the present, the initiators of social-security plans have had the best of it, because their proposals have awakened sympathies everywhere in the people in general. As to the élites, they have not yet had much time to turn around, analyse the idea in depth, and pronounce a definitive judgment, the less so because it is considered good propaganda for the time being not to cool the hopes which it may have raised among the common people.

Social security, then, is a new idea in its presentation, which has just been launched and is still taking profit of the smooth seas on which one can almost always count when one is still manoeuvring along the drydocks. Later it will have to meet rough seas, it will have to meet the inquisitive eye of scholars, dissecting it in the light of their philosophy of life, of society, it will have to meet the acid test of experience. When this time comes, and it is coming rapidly, what opinion will definitively take shape in French Canada? French Canadians being what they are, i.e. Gallic-minded and imbued with a Catholic conception of life, what can one expect to meet on that subject in Quebec, if not as a unanimous opinion, at all events as a current of thought more pronounced there than anywhere else? What course can one expect French Canada to take if it is to remain faithful to the essentials of its culture? That is what I shall try to explain, putting before you, first, the essentials which have a direct bearing on the concept of social security. Then I shall proceed, in the second' place, to draw your attention to certain practical points which will show that the views coming out of that process are not at all devoid of factual value.
Rate Control of Public Utilities in british Columbia
Authors: Currie A. W.
Published: June 2006

The report of the provincial Public Utilities Commission into the rates and services of the British Columbia Electric Railway Company Limited and its affiliates breaks new ground as far as rate control in Canada is concerned. Because of the war, the Commission did not consider it opportune to make a complete review of the rate structure. Nevertheless it laid the basis for such a review when normal conditions return and dealt realistically with many problems which have not heretofore been carefully considered in Canada.

In the process of regulation the first task of any Commission is to arrive at a rate base, that is, the amount on which the Company is entitled to a fair return. The Commission emphasized that such a base is for rate-making purposes only and has no necessary relation to value for any other purpose such as sale, taxation, or judicial condemnation (10).
International Investment: Some Post-War Problems and Issues
Authors: Buchanan Norman S.
Published: June 2006

No one can delineate the precise state of affairs likely to prevail at the conclusion of the present world conflict. The drama is too kaleidoscopic, too much is hidden in the wings, and the number of acts is uncertain. The best that one can hope for is to distinguish the main threads of the unfolding mystery and to guess the probable position of the dramatis personae at the final curtain. Yet a few things are becoming increasingly apparent.

From facts already before our eyes it is clear that economic rehabilitation and reconstruction on a grand scale will be necessary before life can begin to function again in many parts of the world. Moreover economic reconstruction will be something more than the distribution of “K” rations and bowls of soup to the undernourished peoples of Europe and Asia. The physical destruction of factories, industrial plants, railways, harbours, gas and electric works, and all the rest of the means of production by which civilized peoples provide themselves a living, of course will have to be made good. Yet this is not all. Much of the world's population—in south-eastern Europe, in China, in India—subsisted at an almost unbelievably low standard of living even before the war began. To tender these peoples no better prospect than a return to the miserable pittance that was theirs before the war would not augur well for world peace and order, nor make more than a hollow mockery of the solemn promises of the United Nations. Their standards of living cannot be raised by driblets of charity and pious good wishes, but only by making available to them the capital instruments by which they themselves can raise their per capita productivity and hence their material welfare. The task of relief, rehabilitation, reconstruction, and development that will confront the world at the war's end promises to exceed anything of a similar nature that has ever been undertaken. Yet it is a task which lies inevitably before the world and one for which the penalties of inept handling are certainly severe and possibly disastrous.
Imperfect Competition in Agricultural Processing and Distributing Industries
Authors: Nicholls William H.
Published: June 2006

Among persons unfamiliar with agricultural markets, it is not uncommonly assumed that here, if in no other area of economic activity, prices are established through the free play of competitive forces in an environment at least approaching the perfect market. To be sure, agricultural production is carried on by atomistic units and, at least prior to the inauguration of government crop-control programmes, there have been few limitations upon competition among farmers for the use of productive resources. And, in the processing and distribution of farm products, the illusion of pure competition has been strengthened by the relatively large number of firms and the fact that they frequently do not have direct control of the short-run supply of their raw material.

But those who are familiar with actual conditions in these markets know how unrealistic it may be to proceed on the assumption of pure competition. It has become increasingly evident to the agricultural economist, for example, that typically—even where the number of processing firms is large—a few firms dominate a given industry, often aided and abetted by active trade associations. Again, in the local market, where assembling and processing is done by a relatively large number of small independent agencies, differentiation of services—including that of location—may lead to non-aggressive buying policies. Finally, the fact that processor-distributors do not control the short-run supply of farm products does not preclude monopoly elements. For imperfect competition in a processing-distributing industry implies control of the supply of processing-distributing services, hence the price of these services (the margin or spread).
The Courts and the Sovereignty of the Canadian Parliament
Authors: Mallory J. R.
Published: June 2006

One of the great elements of stability in the British constitution has been the sovereignty of parliament. The fact of parliamentary sovereignty has given the British constitution a flexibility which has enabled it to serve the changing needs of different periods by modifying the inflexibility of the common law by direct changes in positive law. Even before the period of deliberately created law the fiction of the king's conscience enabled the courts of equity to introduce an element of peaceful change into the legal structure of England.

The supremacy of the will of parliament involved in the notion of parliamentary sovereignty presupposes two things. Firstly, it assumes a single supreme legislature, and secondly it assumes the superiority of legislation over the will of the courts. If, as Walter Bagehot contended, the efficient secret of the British constitution lay in the almost complete fusion of the executive and legislative functions, it equally depended upon the supremacy of the legislative branch over the judiciary. It was no abrogation of that theory that it was the business of the courts to determine whether the subject was bound by the words of a particular expression of the will of the legislature. That was merely a protective device against an administrative abuse of power. What that theory cannot logically contain is the notion that the courts could say that the legislature was or was not exceeding its powers in legislating. For by definition those powers are unlimited.
Dominion Nationalism and the Commonwealth
Authors: Brady A.
Published: June 2006

The life of the overseas Dominions in the past generation has been dominated by the related movements of democracy and nationalism. Here my concern is with a general and comparative treatment of the nature of Dominion nationalism and its influence on the relations of the Dominions to the outer world.

In some important and obvious respects nationality within all the Dominions has common features: it is a growth among immigrant peoples not politically severed entirely from the parent state, and not devoid of loyalty to the parent stock; it is mainly rooted in a culture derived from an older land, and draws inspiration from no wells of a past distinctive only to itself; it cannot in the nature of things nurture the sentiment of “we alone,” and it has not attempted to do so; it is expressed principally in a language common to two powerful world states, one of which has had a great literature for many centuries, and hence it has to be content only with such idioms of speech as local environment slowly brings. In all cases this Dominion nationality has a short history with the emotional shallowness of such. Its spirit is not steeped in the legendary glories of country and town. Unlike the small and intense nationalities of Europe, including the Irish, it rests its claims upon present achievements and future hopes rather than on reference to an epic past, or the tale of oppression suffered at the hands of another. In every Dominion it was both inspired by and expressed in the struggle of people for self-government and democracy, and the political institutions arid ideologies to which it is wedded have a common ancestry. It has arisen within Communities which grew big and prosperous quickly, thanks to a conjuncture of highly favourable world circumstances, notably the rapid industrialization which brought speedy benefit to frontier countries with rich natural resources and abundant land, countries linked to the heart of industrialism and world trade in the period, the British Islands. Related intimately to this circumstance was the Pax Britannica, or long era of relative peace secured by British sea power, which controlled the exits and entrances to the strategic seas and enabled the flow of people and capital, the unhampered occupation of wide territories, and the pursuit of the arts of peace to absorb these frontier communities, and thus achieve that sense of community expressed in their nationality.
Medieval Unity and the Economic Conditions for an International Civilization
Authors: Deutsch Karl W.
Published: June 2006

In a world torn with nationalistic conflicts, men's minds are naturally turning to projects of international government and to hopes for a wider acceptance of international loyalties, language, and civilization. One of the last epochs in which a measure of such international unity can be said to have actually existed was the European Middle Ages. The following study of the conditions underlying medieval unity, therefore, may offer some information on a topic of present interest.

Accounts of the rise of modern nationalism frequently begin with a picture of the spiritual, linguistic, and cultural unity of medieval Christendom. Mr. Carlton Hayes speaks of “the traditional internationalism of civilized Europe” before the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; other authors similarly use the Middle Ages as a point of departure. New forces are then pointed out, which in their rise toward the end of the Middle Ages broke up that unity into the present multitude of nations and sovereign states. This useful method of exposition, however, suggests further questions. How did that “traditional internationalism” of medieval Europe come to exist? What were the conditions favouring its spread, and how durable was it likely to be under the law of its own growth? Can the medieval vision of cultural unity again be recreated on similar foundations?
Wars and the Rise of Industrial Civilization, 1640–1740
Authors: Nef John U.
Published: June 2006

Economic historians are faced with the task of reconsidering modern European history as a whole. No age is more in need of reinterpretation than the hundred years or so which began in England with the outbreak of the Civil War and in France with the accession of the infant Louis xiv. Tawney, his associates, and pupils have revealed the main features of English agrarian, industrial, commercial, and financial development in early modern times. With the copious data provided in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Clapham, his associates, and pupils have built recent English economic history into a solid edifice on massive and precise statistical foundations. But Continental and British economic history have still to be brought into appropriate relationship to each other. And even in modern English economic history, an unfilled gap of more than a century remains. The materials that have been thrown into it are inadequate from about 1640 down to 1740, the year in which the war of the Austrian Succession broke out. The task of arranging such materials as are available into a durable pattern has not been seriously faced. So our knowledge of the place of these hundred years in the rise of industrialism both in Great Britain and on the Continent is vague.
Arctic Survey Part VI. The New North-West
Authors: Dawson C. A.
Published: June 2006

My research interest in the settlement of the new North-West dates back to the summer of 1929 when I was asked to make a preliminary study of the Peace River Country which was one of the “Frontiers of Settlement” studies published during the first half of the nineteen-thirties. During the following summer the field study was completed and the Settlement of the Peace River Country was published in 1934. This study made familiar to the author the Alberta and British Columbia divisions of the Peace River region from Notikewin, seventy-five miles north of Grimshaw through the settlements of the Peace as far west as Fort St. John. Among many communities studied in this survey were Notikewin on the north-east fringe of settlement and Dawson Creek which forms the southern anchor of the Alaska Highway. The opening of the Alaska Highway, built between 1942 and 1944, together with the oil developments along the MacKenzie River and the mineral production of the Precambrian area just east of it, focused attention on this new North-West. The possibilities of settlement in this far north-western territory have received wide publicity. Among others, I spent the summer of 1944 in this great stretch of territory, which lies north of the Peace River and extends from a line drawn from Waterways to Coronation Gulf on the east, (approximately the western boundary of the Precambrian Shield), to the Alaska Highway on the west. The northern boundary of the territory studied is the Arctic Ocean. My own part of this survey included also that part of Alaska served by the Alaska railroad and the highway network which lies between Fairbanks and Anchorage.
The Edict of Diocletian: A Study of Price Fixing in the Roman Empire
Authors: Michell H.
Published: June 2006

In 301 A.D. the Emperor Diocletian, with whom were associated his three co-rulers, promulgated an edict which fixed for the whole Roman Empire maximum prices for commodities, freight rates, and wages. According to the evidence available, and it is certain that the whole edict has not been recovered, price “ceilings” for over 900 commodities, 130 different grades of labour, and a considerable number of freight rates, were fixed and severe punishment promised to all “black market” operators who dared to buy or sell above the maximum. So elaborate a scheme of price control was not tried again until 1,600 years had passed. The reasons that led to this drastic interference in the economic life of the Empire and the success it attained, or rather did not attain, in regulating prices, provide a study for the historian which is well worth while.

The Chaos of the Third Century. In order to understand the circumstances that led to the issuing of this edict, it is necessary to envisage the appalling state of affairs which marked the third century of the Christian era. Utter anarchy engulfed the Roman world; emperors and pretenders to the imperial throne struggled for the great prizes of power. Armies marched and remarched over every province, plundering the wretched inhabitants. In 193 the Empire was put up for sale by auction by the Praetorians, the imperial guards, and bought by Didius Julianus. It is interesting to note that he enjoyed his bargain for exactly sixty-six days. Such cynical disregard for the glory of the imperial purple was too much even for those days and he was murdered. As each claimant reached the goal of his ambition, the first thing he had to do was to pay the soldiery that backed him. The imperial treasury was looted and empty, and the enormous sums necessary to satisfy the army could only be met by piling tax on tax, by confiscating the wealth of opponents and, worst of all, by debasing a currency that already was fast approaching the point when it was next to worthless. In 260, there came the last and most shocking degradation when the Emperor Valerian, who was trying to defend the eastern frontier, was captured by the Persians and held for six years in captivity until his death. The Empire was clearly breaking up in misery and confusion, bankruptcy and anarchy.
Canadian War-Time Fiscal Policy, 1939–45
Authors: McIvor R. Craig
Published: June 2006

Modern war has frequently been described as “total” war. While such a description may not be precisely meaningful, it serves to emphasize the magnitude of the social changes which are now inevitably associated with a major war effort. Modern war has been well described as an industrial art, whose effective prosecution necessitates fundamental alterations in the manner of operation of the democratic peace-time economy.

The basic problems which confront a country in time of war may be classified as follows: (1) producing the goods and services necessary for carrying on the war; (2) paying for the goods and services used for war purposes; (3) supplying the everyday needs of the civilian population. While it is with the second problem, that of financing the war effort, that we shall be directly concerned in this paper, the fundamental and most immediate problem is that of production, to which all others must always be subordinated. Because of the enormous technological advances in the methods of modern warfare, World War II presented all of these problems on a scale vastly greater than ever before.

In time of war there occurs a revaluation of social ends, and maintenance of the state itself becomes the supreme social objective. To accomplish this objective under conditions of modern warfare, it is essential that, the organization and expansion of war production be accomplished with the utmost, possible speed. This point was well illustrated by the experience in World War II, where the problem of mobilizing the required quantities of productive resources was extremely complex, and where various nations with superior economic war potentials found themselves in imminent danger of suffering defeat before their full economic strength could be directed effectively against the enemy. Under these circumstances, where speed is the essence of effective economic mobilization, the sudden demand for an ever-increasing quantity and variety of war goods and services is likely to be highly inelastic, since the needs must be satisfied, if at all possible, regardless of price. But in the short run, supply is also relatively inelastic, and the government consequently finds itself confronted with immediate problems of procurement.
Municipal Finance and Provincial-Federal Relations
Authors: Curtis C. A.
Published: June 2006

I have taken as the basis of my presidential address the subject of Municipal Finance and its significance for provincial-federal relations. This is a subject of deep interest to me, and one which I think has not been given the consideration it warrants. It is an aspect of public finance which is of real importance, particularly in a federal state.

I do not propose to spend any time discussing the importance of local government. I know some authorities question the future place and use of local government so I shall simply state that I regard it as having a permanent and significant place in our structure of government. It is valuable for the training and interest which it gives to a large number of citizens, making them sources of information and political experience within the community. It serves a useful purpose by keeping many local and controversial issues out of the range of provincial and federal decision. That is, when problems can be settled locally, it means less detail and argument in the administrative and political fields of provincial and federal governments. It also permits, within its scope, a closer approximation to government by the people than is possible at any other level.
The Early Fabians—Economists and Reformers
Authors: Fox Paul W. , Gordon H. Scott
Published: June 2006

The socialist movement in Great Britain has been characterized by a combination of dynamic reformism and liberal reasonableness which is all too frequently lacking in the histories of left-wing movements in other parts of the world. While this may be explained to some extent by the traditional character of English habits of thought and political institutions, one organization is, more than others, responsible for the preservation of the liberal philosophy in an age of great social change. The Fabian Society came upon the scene when the economic foundations of that change were already well established. The development of the new industrialism had shown inequities and injustices which called for radical measures of economic reform. Yet while this economic change had been taking place, political institutions had undergone a considerable measure of liberalization. The latter was a development highly valued by the economic revolutionaries, and the Fabian Society was, from the very first, an effort to combine the two desiderata—to change the economic structure of society while preserving the democratic political achievements so newly gained and so highly prized.

The important early Fabian writings which dealt with matters of abstract economic theory were motivated by the belief that the great unsolved questions of the day were the economic. During the latter part of the nineteenth century, from 1870 on, the economic world was stricken with controversy. The placid perfection of the Ricardian classicism had been shattered by the frontal attack of the marginalists and the usurpation of Marx.