Abstract
Although there are facts that describe the waves of immigration from the period of the French régime to the present which populated and brought a variety of ethnic traditions to Canada, few facts are available to assess the influence of immigration on Canada’s development as an industrial society. Uncertainty exists about the number of immigrants Canada has been able to retain, although the net increase from immigration over a long period is evidently small.1 The present Canadian population would not have been appreciably smaller without immigration,2 even though those immigrants who remained in Canada contributed to Canadian population growth through natural increase and by replacing native Canadians who migrated to the United States. The birth-rate rather than immigration has been the main key to Canadian population growth during the past one hundred to one hundred and fifty years.3 In spite of the elu-siveness of the facts, the influence of immigration on Canada’s development as an industrial society may be explored and related to certain social consequences implied in official Canadian policy.
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Notes
Nathan Keyfitz, “Changing Canadian Population”, in S. D. Clark (ed.), Urbanism and the Changing Canadian Society (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1962), pp. 3–19;
also in B. R. Blishen et al. (eds.), Canadian Society (2nd ed.; Toronto: The Macmillan Company of Canada, 1964), pp. 23–37, calculates that the net increase due to migration from 1851 to 1951 is 700,000 persons, not quite 10 per cent of the immigrants who entered Canada during the entire one hundred years. Duncan Mc-Dougall, “Immigration Into Canada, 1851–1920”, Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science, xxvii, pp. 162–75, argues that Keyfitz has overestimated Canadian immigration and emigration. As his criticism is based on Keyfitz’s use of British life tables for 1851–1931 and on the unreliability of government immigration statistics during this period, it may be assumed that he accepts Keyfitz’s estimates for the post-1920 era. If so, McDougall’s estimates up to 1921 added to Keyfitz’s for 1921–1951 indicate that the net increase due to migration was almost 15 per cent of the total number of immigrants entering between 1851 and 1951.
P. Camu et al., Economic Geography of Canada (Toronto: The Macmillan Company of Canada, 1964), pp. 58–9, taking into account both Keyfitz’s and McDougall’s work, estimate the net increase to be 17 per cent of the total number of immigrants entering between 1851 and 1951.
Although Camu et al., op. cit., p. 68, state that immigration accounted for over 35 per cent of population growth during 1951–1961, they also state that 77 per cent of emigrants from Canada during 1951–1961 were non-Canadian-born persons admitted to Canada during that period. Oswald Hall, “Migration to Canada”, in John Kosa (ed.), Immigrants in Canada (Montreal, 1955), states that 75 per cent of the immigrants who arrived in Canada between 1855 and 1955 left within ten years of arrival.
Keyfitz, op. cit.; Norman Ryder, “Components of Canadian Population Growth”, Population Index, 20 (April 1954), pp. 71–9;
also published in B. R. Blishen et al., Canadian Society (1st ed.; Toronto: The Macmillan Company of Canada, 1961), pp. 58–69.
Immigrants did bring technological innovations to Canada even though their contributions may not have transformed the society. For example, the Mormons introduced the cultivation of sugar beets on irrigated land; the Doukhobors introduced the steam plough and steam-driven mills; immigrants from the United States introduced such farming techniques as summer fallow, irrigation, and the use of grain elevators for storage. See David Corbett, Canada’s Immigration Policy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1957), pp. 134–5;
also V. J. Kaye, The Ukrainians in Canada, in J. G. Kosa (ed.), Immigrants in Canada (Montreal, 1955), who asserts that the Ukrainians contributed to farming techniques.
See, for example, Mabel Timlin, Does Canada Need More People? (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1951).
See T. Parsons, Essays in Sociological Theory Pure and Applied (Glencoe, Ill.: The Free Press, 1949).
See, for example, John Kosa, Land of Choice (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1957), chapter 4;
P. Yuzyk, The Ukrainians in Manitoba (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1953).
See W. Petersen, Planned Migration: The Social Determinants of the Dutch-Canadian Movement (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1955), for an excellent discussion of this issue.
See H. B. Hawthorn (ed.), The Doukhobors of British Columbia (Vancouver: University of British Columbia and J. M. Dent and Sons, 1955), chapters 1–3.
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Jones, F.E. (1968). Some Social Consequences of Immigration for Canada. In: Blishen, B.R., Jones, F.E., Naegele, K.D., Porter, J. (eds) Canadian Society. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-81601-9_41
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