Skip to main content
81 votes

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

I don't believe the answer to this is known objectively. However, it may be worth looking at the different settlement histories of the two areas you are comparing. Most of the American possessions, ...
T.E.D.'s user avatar
  • 122k
54 votes
Accepted

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

T.E.D.'s answer is very good, and points to the most important issue: the difference between colonisation methods in North America vs Latin America. There are a few missing nexus that I feel could be ...
Luís Henrique's user avatar
48 votes

When did Canada become truly independent?

There have been several stages in the history of Canadian independence. Canada became a self-governing dominion within the British empire on 1 July 1867 when the British North America Act was passed ...
sempaiscuba's user avatar
  • 77.2k
35 votes
Accepted

How much materiel was shipped to Continental Europe per month, after D-Day?

In the second volume of his series Logistical Support of the Armies, Roland Ruppenthal provides a table of materials shipped into Europe from June 1944 to April 1945, broken down by port (including ...
sempaiscuba's user avatar
  • 77.2k
32 votes

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

A large factor in the advancement/financial disparity between the U.S./Canada and its neighbors to the south is the difficulty of colonizing areas in tropical/subtropical climates vs. colonizing ...
JackArbiter's user avatar
31 votes

Why did Loyalists go to Canada during the American Revolution

Loyalists who lived in the 13 colonies fled to Canada because Canada was part of the British Empire. In Canada they could still be British. If they stayed in the colonies they would be traitors to ...
MCW's user avatar
  • 34k
27 votes
Accepted

Have there been any plausible reports of killing polar bears with a bone spring?

Yes. Looking for 19th century sources this comes up in the Bulletin of the United States National Museum, Volume 27, 1884: 21 SPRING TRAPS- ANIMAL TRAPS BEAR TRAPS Made of whalebone strips bent and ...
justCal's user avatar
  • 41.5k
25 votes
Accepted

Who was Chief Poking Fire?

Chief Poking Fire's main claims to fame are probably owning and running an Indian museum, and founding and running a tourist village. He also apparently presented Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie ...
Lars Bosteen's user avatar
22 votes
Accepted

Why did Canada retain the rank of Brigadier General? But not Australia, New Zealand, or UK?

TL;DR: The Canadians did not retain that rank, but re-created it in 1968. The difference between use of "Brigadier" and "Brigadier-General" in armies seems to depend on the way ...
John Dallman's user avatar
21 votes
Accepted

Why does Sugar Island belong to USA?

In short, the British agreed to the US having Sugar Island in exchange for the right of British subjects to have access to certain American waters. They felt that land, which was abundant at the time, ...
Lars Bosteen's user avatar
19 votes

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

Of course there were many factors. But the Spanish/Portugal scheme was a rural patron/peon arrangement that had not reached the bourgeoisie stage, i.e. an educated third estate. The British and ...
TomO's user avatar
  • 199
19 votes

In World War 1, why were the Australian and Canadian troops so good?

The Australian historian and journalist LA Carlyon in his book Gallipoli reports Australian troops, a higher proportion of whom at that date had grown up in a rural, outdoor life (the same was ...
Timothy's user avatar
  • 5,631
17 votes

When did Canada become truly independent?

The subject isn't nearly as simple as it is for the USA. The event in the 1980s was Patriation of the Canadian constitution, which removed the power of the UK parliament to amend the Canadian ...
John Dallman's user avatar
16 votes
Accepted

What, if anything, did Hitler think of the Canadian government's treatment of the Native Americans?

That source is pretty dubious, given that it's a wiki about TV tropes, and that the page no longer contains the content you quote, for starters. For finishers, Germans speak German, rather than [...
HopelessN00b's user avatar
  • 1,475
15 votes
Accepted

Why is Killiniq island divided between Nunavut and Labrador?

Of course it didn't start out as a border with Nunavut, but instead a murky border with Rupert's Land, which "belonged" to the Hudson's Bay Company. Much later, a more precise border between ...
Spencer's user avatar
  • 5,400
14 votes
Accepted

Was it really illegal to trade gypsum from Canada to the United States in 1820? Why?

Entering your question into google results in the Plaster War The problem persisted for years and in 1816-17, the New Brunswick and Nova Scotia colonial governments passed complementary laws that ...
MCW's user avatar
  • 34k
13 votes

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

TED's answer is fantastic; it covers the root causes of the problems. I'd like to add one more cause, specifically, US military and economic intervention in Central and South America have acted to ...
Astor Florida's user avatar
11 votes

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

The most important reasons go back to the differences between the English colonial heritage in North America, and the Spanish/Portuguese colonial heritage in South America. Although England, Spain ...
Tom Au's user avatar
  • 104k
11 votes
Accepted

Who sold this book in London in the 1930s?

The position of "Limited" in relation to "Smallman &" does resemble the "Smallman and Ingram" logo, for example on their catalog. While John Smallman and Lemuel Ingram started their retail store ...
called2voyage's user avatar
10 votes
Accepted

Why is/was the world's expo 1967 so important to Montreal, Canada?

Being from Montreal but born in the seventies, I have not visited Expo 67, but I’ve heard a lot about it. Yes, my parents and their peers have always talked about this event with great pleasure and it ...
Brac's user avatar
  • 216
10 votes
Accepted

The US founding fathers and Canada

From the Declaration of Independence: He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of ...
Pieter Geerkens's user avatar
9 votes

Were discrepancies from the 45th parallel in the US-Canadian border ratified?

CGPGrey covered this in his video Canada & The United States (Bizarre Borders Part 2). You're basically correct. There's been a series of treaties about the US-Canada border. Rather than go into ...
Schwern's user avatar
  • 56k
9 votes
Accepted

Why did the maple leaf become associated with Canada?

According to this research the symbolism was developed by Canadiens living along the St Lawrence River by the early 1700s. The coats of arms for Quebec and Ontario (est. 1867) each feature a triple ...
kabulykos's user avatar
  • 106
9 votes

Is it legit to say that allied forces in Market Garden were: USA, British and Polish?

It was often the case that Canadian forces during WWII were included in formations described as "British," because they were under British command. However, there don't seem to have been any ...
John Dallman's user avatar
9 votes
Accepted

Why does the Canadian Air Force name its ranks like its Army, whilst the Australian and New Zealand Air Forces use the Royal Air Force's?

This can be explained by organisational history, but for different reasons in the US and Canadian contexts. The British system, where the RAF has distinct names, arises from the origins of the RAF in ...
Andrew is gone's user avatar
8 votes

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

I think this discussion must involve Max Weber's The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Weber argued that Protestantism induces a mindset in its followers which aligns well with and ...
Peter - Reinstate Monica's user avatar
8 votes

In World War 1, why were the Australian and Canadian troops so good?

One can make much of the prairie and frontier background of the Canadian troops - and one should, as they were 8 cm (3") taller, 5'7" (178cm) at age 21 compared to just 5'4" (170cm) for Brits of the ...
Pieter Geerkens's user avatar
7 votes

Why did North America economically prosper, and maintain stable government and South/Central America didn't?

Argentina was actually ranked one in the top 10 economies of the world in the late 1800ds. Infrastructure engineering with torrential rain in the tropics is more difficult, and the jungle was endless,...
bandybabboon's user avatar

Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible