Strikes in Canada, 1891-1950: III. The Data

This three-part report presents the results of a major research project underdertaken in the early 1980s. The project aimed to establish a new statistical time series for strikes in Canada. The final results of this work will appear in 1990 in volume three of the Historical Atlas of Canada which will contain a series of four plates on Canadian labour in the years 1891-1961. In this report we shall focus on the data concerning the years 1891-1950. An essay on method and sources is published here as Part II of this report and the data set is presented fully in Part III. In addition, we want to state at the outset that the more we work on this data, the more fully we agree with David Montgomery's assertion that "any attempt to formulate a positivistic 'natural history of strikes* is doomed to failure. Strikes can only be understood in the context of the changing totality of class conflicts, of which they are a part." --From authors' introduction