Recent Social Trends in Canada 1960–2000 (review)

These are dark days for Canadian sociology. What passes for empirical research is often barely disguised propaganda designed to further the expansion of government and to thereby increase the power, prestige and profits of sociologists. The new generation seems content to abandon the original purposes of sociology altogether and to function as fourth rate philosophers rehashing ancient debates in a manner reminiscent of today's third rate literary critics. Here and there, however, there are glimpses of hope. The book presently under review is one of them.

The book is part of a major international enterprise, the Comparative Charting of Social Change (CCSC) project. Similar measures of key indicators of social change from 1960 to 2000 have been collected in a number of countries. These are providing trend information over time and are also enabling international comparisons informed by a systematic knowledge of reality. The present volume is one of several already published (The others are on the United States, West Germany, France, Russia, Italy, Bulgaria, Greece and, interestingly, Quebec). Three major comparative studies which utilize the data (on inequality, expansion of government, and convergence/divergence) have already been published as well. One looks forward to future work in this series which is edited by Simon Langlois of Laval University. The intention is to update and backdate the work.

This book, institutionally based at Laval and the University of Manitoba, is the Canadian contribution to the series. It provides trend information 1960–2000 on a wide variety of themes. An incomplete list includes demography, macro economy, macro technology, age groups, kinship networks, voluntary associations, childbearing, women's employment, reproductive technologies, labour market, labour and management, social stratification, conflict, state, education, health, welfare, labour unions, religion, the military, political parties, the mass media, social movements, interest groups, ideologies, household resources, life style, leisure, educational attainment, immigration, ethnic minorities, crime, mental illness, poverty, and popular culture. In sum, there is something here to interest almost anyone. The only topics of general interest that seem to be missing are regional inequality and foreign domination. So far as I can tell by checking out the chapters on areas that I know well, the work is done about as well as one could hope, given the few pages allotted to each section. Thus it could provide an excellent reference book for anyone wishing to prepare lectures on almost any topic. It also provides a good initial starting point for anyone doing research on any of these topics.

If there is any criticism to be made, it might have to do with a failure of the authors to try to put it all together and to provide some sort of sweeping overview and theoretical interpretation of change in Canadian society. While their introduction provides an interesting beginning, this is a task they leave to others. It is enough that they have provided us with some basic factual material with which to inform our innumerable speculations. By providing a solid factual foundation for theory, their work provides a major opportunity for any ambitious young scholar who wishes to make sense of it all.

In sum, this is a book to be recommended as source material for anyone preparing lectures or doing research on almost any topic to do with Canada. In particular it should be especially useful to anyone teaching introductory sociology, Canadian society or social problems. It also is to be recommended for anyone interested in a serious understanding of social change in Canada.