Growth and decline in the Canadian urban system: the impact of emerging economic, policy and demographic trends

Abstract

The Canadian urban system was first shaped by exogenous demand for staples and, subsequently, by the dichotomy between an industrial heartland and a resource based hinterland. Presently, transformations affecting the economy, policy-making and demography herald profound changes in the future configuration of the Canadian urban system. One possible scenario is a revival of the staples economy as economic globalization raises demand for commodities. Another scenario would entail a concentration of growth in large urban centres, by virtue of their attractiveness to specialized and high-order service occupations, two rapidly expanding economic sectors, and their strong pull on immigrants. In the case of either scenario, we can expect further polarization between growing and shrinking portions of the urban system (parts of the heartland in the first case and small urban areas in the second) in a neo-liberal policy context that is unfavourable to regional economic development interventions. The evolution of the Canadian urban system between 1971 and 2006 and present distributions of factors of growth and decline point to the second scenario, a growing large city-small city dichotomy. The article closes by discussing likely consequences of the resulting urban system configuration on labour market adjustments and public sector expenditure.