COMMUNITIES ON THE EDGE - AN ECONOMIC-GEOGRAPHY OF RESOURCE-DEPENDENTCOMMUNITIES IN CANADA

Our impressions of Canadian resource-dependent communities are often s till influenced by the classic works of Innis, Robinson, Lucas, Siemen s, and others. Although this research has proven to be valuable, it ha s also established several generalizations regarding these settings, i ncluding the perceptions that community labour forces and economic str uctures are relatively homogenous, that nonresource sectors play an in significant role in the communities, and that these communities a re f ound primarily in isolated northern regions. These generalizations are now beginning to be questioned given the rapid economic and social ch anges taking place in these communities and the recent theoretical and empirical contributions of geographers and other social scientists. T his paper summarizes this classic research, then challenges these gene ralizations by discussing recent applications of the concepts of econo mic restructuring and labour-market segmentation theory to the context of resource-dependent communities. To further illustrate these charac teristics, the paper then presents an empirical analysis of 220 Canadi an resource-dependent communities across six resource sectors, focusin g specifically on their labour-market characteristics and the relation ship between resource dependence and spatial isolation.