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Abstract
Although the welfare state has been widely theorized as a mechanism for the management of capitalist crisis, these analyses have often pivoted on the problem of social regulation. Drawing on the case of Canadian resource extraction, this article builds on these theories by interrogating the geography of welfare state regulation. Analyzing the history of the Canadian welfare state in relation to specific historical geographies of extraction, I argue that Canadian welfare policy has been a powerful tool in state efforts to make and regulate labor markets for resource extraction. The postwar period in Canada marked not only the heyday of welfare state expansion but also the intensification of industrial resource extraction and an overarching state anxiety about national productivity and waste. During this time, poverty policy emerged as a key mechanism for the state coordination of surplus: on the one hand, surplus labor; on the other, surplus land and production capacity. Drawing on interviews and government archives, I illustrate how planners and bureaucrats drew on welfare state capacity to produce, manage, and mobilize peripheral and surplus populations in relation to dispersed and crisis-ridden geographies of resource extraction. In helping to manage unemployment and poverty in relation to staples production, Canadian welfare policy has served as a tool for expanding extraction, deepening the colonial resource frontier, and consolidating territorial control. In this sense, my argument underscores the role of the welfare state in regulating not only labor but also, and inseparably, land. Key Words: labor, labor markets, resource extraction, uneven development, welfare state.
尽管福利国家被广泛理论化为管理资本主义危机的机制, 这些分析却经常以社会调节问题为核心。本文运用加拿大资源搾取的案例, 建立在这些理论之上, 探讨福利国家的调节地理。我分析加拿大福利国家的历史之于资源搾取的特定历史地理, 主张加拿大的福利政策, 是国家致力于为资源搾取创造并调节劳动市场的有力工具。战后的加拿大, 不仅达到了福利国家扩张的巅峰, 同时也是工业资源搾取的密集化, 以及国家对全国生产力与浪费的全面性焦虑。于此时期, 贫穷政策浮现作为国家调控剩馀的机制：一方面是剩馀劳动力, 另一方面则是剩馀土地和生产力。我运用访谈和政府档案, 阐明规划者和官僚如何运用福利国家的能力, 生产、管理并动员与分散且危机导向的资源搾取地理有关的边陲及剩馀人口。在协助管理有关日常用品生产的失业与贫穷中, 加拿大的福利政策提供作为扩大搾取、深化殖民资源前线、以及巩固领土控制之工具。就此意义而言, 我的主张强调福利国家在调节不仅是劳工、同时也是与其不可分割的土地中的角色。关键词：劳工, 劳动市场, 资源搾取, 不均发展, 福利国家。
Aunque el estado benefactor ha sido ampliamente teorizado como mecanismo para el manejo de la crisis capitalista, estos análisis a menudo han girado alrededor del problema de la regulación social. Con base en el caso de la extracción de recursos canadienses, este artículo elabora sobre estas teorías interrogando la geografía de la regulación del estado benefactor. Analizando la historia del estado benefactor canadiense en relación con las geografías históricas específicamente aplicadas a la extracción, sostengo que la política canadiense del bienestar ha sido una poderosa herramienta en los esfuerzos del estado para crear y regular mercados laborales para la extracción de recursos. El período de la posguerra en Canadá no solo marcó el auge de la expansión del estado benefactor sino también la intensificación de la extracción industrial del recurso y un dominante estado de ansiedad acerca de la productividad nacional y el desperdicio. Durante ese tiempo, apareció la política sobre la pobreza como mecanismo clave para la coordinación estatal de excedentes: por una parte, exceso de fuerza laboral; por la otra, sobrantes de tierra y capacidad de producción. Basándome en entrevistas y archivos gubernamentales, ilustro el modo como planificadores y burócratas se aprovecharon de la capacidad de atención social del estado para producir, manejar y movilizar poblaciones periféricas excedentes en relación con las geografías de extracción del recurso dispersas y poco menos que en estado crítico. Ayudando a manejar el desempleo y la pobreza en relación con la producción de bienes, la política de beneficencia del estado ha servido como una herramienta para ampliar la extracción, ahondado la frontera del recurso colonial y consolidando el control del territorio. En este sentido, mi argumento enfatiza el papel del estado benefactor para regular no solo el trabajo sino también, e inseparablemente, la tierra.
Acknowledgments
My gratitude goes to Deborah Cowen, Patrick Vitale, Caitlin Henry, Prasad Khanolkar, Ozlem Aslan, Martin Danyluk, Emily Eaton, and Shiri Pasternak for insightful feedback, conversations, and encouragement throughout the long process of bringing this article into being. Thank you also to the anonymous reviewers for their detailed engagement and to Nik Heynen for his thoughtful direction. Finally, thank you to the archivists in Charlottetown and Ottawa who helped me with this research.
Notes
1 For a closer examination of these reforms, see Porter (Citation2015).
2 Documents obtained by Dean Beeby, CBC News, through Access to Information and Privacy request to HRSDC, No. A-2012-00141, A-2012-00011.
3 In the 1990s, as part of a major neoliberal overhaul of the program, the name was changed from Unemployment Insurance (UI) to Employment Insurance (EI). Depending on context, I alternate between these two names throughout this article.
4 Unemployment Insurance Commission, “Exclusion from coverage of employment in remote areas,” 2 March 1949, 3, file 4-13, vol. 21, RG50, Library and Archives Canada (LAC), Ottawa, Canada.
5 Unemployment Insurance Commission, H. S. Relph to C. A. L. Murchison, 8 July 1948, file 4-13, vol. 21, RG50, LAC.
6 The auditors who had surveyed the logistical difficulties of administering UI in “remote” areas had reported these findings from a trip along the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River. Just inland from their route, elaborate and capital-intensive plans were well underway for the development of the Labrador iron ore reserve, including the construction of a remote rail line that would transport ore from the site of extraction to the port in Sept-Iles, Quebec. The celebration of this project is a jarring contrast to bureaucrats’ claims about the logistical problem of insuring local people. In this case, that reference was, presumably, in large part to the Innu who, as guides, prospectors, and workers, were indispensable to the early stages of iron ore exploration and production taking place in their territory but about which they were not consulted; see Boutet (Citation2014) on the erasure of this history.
7 Wm. McKinstrey, Regional Superintendent (Pacific) to Mr. R. G. Barclay, Director of Unemployment Insurance, 5 November 1948, file 4-13, vol. 21, RG50, LAC; Fred J. White, Regional Superintendent for Winnipeg to Mr. R. G. Barclay, November 5, 1948, file 4-13, vol. 21, RG50, LAC.
8 Unemployment Insurance Commission, “Exclusion from coverage of employment in remote areas.”
9 The National Advisory Council on Manpower, “Suggested approach to the problem of seasonal unemployment and results of research,” file 9244-06-2 (Part 1), vol. 2225, RG19, LAC. In 1952 the Economics and Research Branch of the Department of Labour began a statistical analysis of seasonal employment fluctuations. The same year, an Interdepartmental Committee on Seasonal Unemployment was established under the National Advisory Committee on Manpower to administer a national seasonal unemployment survey among employers and suggest how the government might best deal with the problem of persistent winter unemployment.
10 National Employment Committee, “Seasonal unemployment,” file 9244-06-2 (Part 1), vol. 4425, RG19, LAC. In December 1952 the Interdepartmental Committee on Seasonal Unemployment had brought a proposal to the National Advisory Council on Manpower that a letter and questionnaire on seasonal unemployment be sent to a sample of employers. The Council asked the National Employment Committee (NEC) to consider the proposal. The NEC had appointed a subcommittee that had compiled and, through the regional and local employment committees, distributed the letters and questionnaires to more than 1,000 employers in nineteen industries.
11 National Employment Committee, “Seasonal unemployment.”
12 Unemployment Insurance Commission to the Unemployment Insurance Advisory Committee, “Seasonal regulations,” 27 June 1950, file 4-37-1, vol. 21, RG50, LAC.
13 Unemployment Insurance Commission to the Unemployment Insurance Advisory Committee, “Seasonal regulations.”
14 File “Background Papers,” Department of Regional Industrial Expansion Fonds, Atlantic Development Board—Planning Division, vol. 75, RG 124, LAC; Tough (Citation2014, 187).
15 Most famously through The Things I Cannot Change, a film produced in collaboration with the National Film Board (see Longfellow Citation2010).
16 “A preliminary report on rural poverty in four selected areas: Highlights of a study prepared for ARDA by the Canadian Welfare Council,” Ottawa, 1965, file 1-3, Department of Regional Industrial Expansion Fonds, Atlantic Development Board—Planning Division, vol. 75, RG124, LAC.
17 “The profile of poverty,” 1 December 1965, 11–12, file “Background Papers,” Department of Regional Industrial Expansion Fonds, Atlantic Development Board—Planning Division, vol. 75, RG124, LAC. See also other papers in this collection from the December 1965 SPS Federal—Provincial Conference on Poverty and Opportunity.
18 “Prince Edward Island commercial farm questionnaire,” n.d., file 127202—Agriculture 1965–67 (Part 1) [labeled “Background material—Agricultural Sector (Acres)”], Box 30, Deputy Minister’s Files, Acres Files, Incl. Correspondence, Department of Development, RG33, Public Archives and Records Office of Prince Edward Island (PARO), Charlottetown, PEI, Canada.
19 “Second annual report: The Economic Improvement Corporation,” for the year ending 31 March 1969, file 501—EIC Board—Minutes, etc. Box 21, first Department of Development Series, to 1970, RG33, Department of Development, PARO.
20 “Agriculture sector plan (draft),” n.d., 28, file 1.2.1—Agriculture Sector Plan, Box 3, RG40, Cabinet Office, Records of the Department of Development Comprehensive Development Plan, PARO. Of the island’s 6,357 farming units in 1966 only 2,500 were regarded as “viable for planning purposes” (Milne Citation1982, 70, note 19).
21 “The implications of rationalization,” 2, file 705—Cape Breton Development Corporation, Box 21, First DoD Series, to 1970, RG 33, Department of Development, PARO.
22 Mining Association of Canada to Prime Minister, Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys, Minister of Labour, and Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, “Manpower and immigration policy,” 17 January 1966, 2, file 8-41-1—Mining Industry—General File, vol. 150, RG26, LAC.
23 As Grundy (Citation2014) noted, in 1961 and 1962 the Senate Committee on Manpower and Employment and the Committee of Inquiry into the Unemployment Insurance Act, respectively, raised concerns about this issue. The first two reports (Economic Council of Canada Citation1964, Citation1965) of the newly formed Economic Council of Canada would also flag this concern, and, at the international level, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (Citation1966) would do the same the following year (as referenced in Grundy Citation2014).
24 “Submission by the National Employment Committee to the Minister of Labour on manpower policy and the National Employment Service,” 24 March 1965, 1, file 8-18-2 (part 1), vol. 86, RG26, LAC.
25 “Submission by the National Employment Committee to the Minister of Labour on manpower policy and the National Employment Service,” 2.
26 W. R. Dymond, A.D.M., Program Development to Tom Kent, Deputy Minister of Manpower, “National Employment Committee minute 943—Background paper,” 10 June 1966, file 8-18-2 (part 1), vol. 86, RG26, LAC.
27 W. R. Dymond, A.D.M., Program Development to Tom Kent, Deputy Minister of Manpower, “National Employment Committee minute 943—Background paper.”
28 W. R. Dymond, A.D.M., Program Development to Tom Kent, Deputy Minister of Manpower, “National Employment Committee minute 943—Background paper.” Including Bissett, Manitoba, and Bell Island, Newfoundland on account of gold and iron ore mine closures, respectively.
29 W. R. Dymond, A.D.M., Program Development to Tom Kent, Deputy Minister of Manpower, “National Employment Committee minute 943—Background paper”; Department of Manpower and Immigration—Manpower Division—Secretariat, “Current Manpower Situation and Operations Report,” prepared for the Meeting of the National Employment Committee, 6–7 December 1966, 5, file 8-37-4—Operational Highlight Report (General File), vol. 149, RG26, LAC.
30 W. R. Dymond, A.D.M., Program Development to Tom Kent, Deputy Minister of Manpower, “National Employment Committee minute 943—Background paper”; Department of Manpower and Immigration—Manpower Division—Secretariat, “Current Manpower Situation and Operations Report.” This report from the following December also anticipates this amendment to include people rendered unemployed through ARDA and FRED programs.
31 Memorandum from The Mining Association of Canada, “Experience of mining companies in their recruitment efforts at Wabana Mine, Bell Island, Newfoundland,” July 1966, file 8-41-1—Mining Industry—General File, vol. 150, RG26, LAC; V. C. Wanabrough, Managing Director of the Mining Association of Canada to Jean-Luc Pépin, Minister of Mines and Technical Surveys, 11 July 1966, file 8-41-1—Mining Industry—General File, vol. 150, RG26, LAC.
32 Arthur Liang, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development to Lester B. Pearson, Prime Minister of Canada, 1 November 1966, file 8-41-1—Mining Industry—General File, vol. 150, RG26, LAC. The United Keno Hill Mines had threatened to close, in part because of these industry-wide manpower problems.
33 R. A. Jennes, Planning & Evaluations Branch, Program Development Service, “Factors associated with successful and less successful moves under the Manpower Mobility Program,” April–June 1967, 5–6, file 8-35-13-5—Manpower Mobility Program—Statistics, vol. 149, RG26, LAC.
34 R. A. Jennes, Planning & Evaluations Branch, Program Development Service, “Factors associated with successful and less successful moves under the Manpower Mobility Program,” Appendix 1, 4. In certain parts of this report, analysis of relocation grantees selectively excluded relocations to Inco operations in Sudbury for the reason that many of these moves were unsuccessful and, therefore, understood to skew the data.
35 R. A. Jennes, Planning & Evaluations Branch, Program Development Service, “Factors associated with successful and less successful moves under the Manpower Mobility Program,” 6–7; J. P. Francis, Acting Director of the Research Branch to W. R. Dymond, Assistant Deputy Minister of Program Development, “Program Development Service—Report of activities,” 8 December 1966, file 8-37-2—Reports—Program Development Service, vol. 149, RG26, LAC.
36 R. A. Jennes, Planning & Evaluations Branch, Program Development Service, “Factors associated with successful and less successful moves under the Manpower Mobility Program,” 7.
37 R. A. Jennes, Planning & Evaluations Branch, Program Development Service, “Factors associated with successful and less successful moves under the Manpower Mobility Program,” 12.
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Katie Mazer
KATIE MAZER is a PhD Candidate in the Department of Geography and Planning at the University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 3G3, Canada. E-mail: [email protected]. Her doctoral research examines the politics of poverty and labor flexibility in Canadian resource extraction.
