| Summary: | This study was undertaken to explore the attitudes
and actions of the small businessman in Saskatchewan, as
represented by independent merchants and operators of
retail service businesses. While many generalizations
have been made about the petite bourgeoisie in the history
of the Canadian prairies, little detailed research has
been done. This thesis is an attempt at understanding the
petit-bourgeois mentality of small businessmen in
Saskatchewan and how that motivated their actions in the
years between the first and second world wars. The
principal sources for research on this topic were those
trade journals still extant, the records of the Retail
Merchants' Association in Saskatchewan, and records of
boards of trade in the province.
The 1920s were a time of transition within the retail
distribution industry. New technology, the introduction
of corporate merchandising, and fluctuations in general
economic conditions created considerable uncertainty for
independent merchants. The severe conditions during the
Depression in the 1930s only exacerbated an already
difficult situation.
The effect of these developments was to weaken the
traditional attitude of self-sufficiency among small
businessmen. Initially they attempted internal reforms
within their respective trades to resolve the problems
they encountered. The encroachments of mail order houses
and chain stores into the Saskatchewan market tended to
undermine those efforts, so that by the early 1930s
independent merchants were preoccupied with exposing the
"abuses" of big business. In the mid- and late-thirties
they turned to demands for greater government control over
business and the economy as a whole in order to ensure
their independent livelihood. As economic conditions
further deteriorated many small businessmen also took a
more active part in the political and economic protests
prevalent in western Canada at the time.
The response of small businessmen in Saskatchewan to
the challenges they faced in the inter-war period was in
many ways typical of the petite bourgeoisie. Threatened
by increased competition from corporate retailers, they
were forced to abandom their traditional conservatism and
to call for government intervention and regional economic
reforms as part of their struggle against the big business
interests.
|
|---|
