TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F.—PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 458 
Section F.—ECONOMIC SCIENCE AND STATISTICS. 
PRESIDENT OF THE SecTion.—Professor EK. C. K. Gonner, M.A. 
MELBOURNE. 
FRIDAY, AUGUST 14. 
The President delivered the following Address :— 
Tux subject which I wish to discuss to-day has been determined for me by the 
circumstances of the present meeting of the British Association and by the trend 
of modern economic study and research. We are meeting for the first time here 
gathered together from distant and diverse parts of the world, and in this 
Section at any rate we shall be discussing problems similar in certain respects in 
our various countries but unlike in other respects owing to the differences between 
those countries. It is a fortunate circumstance, because it is largely by means of 
an interchange of views and experience acquired in such different environments 
that true knowledge can be surely attained. On the other hand, it can be said, I 
think, without any exaggeration that of the economic studies of the last twenty 
years none have been more fruitful in result than those which have dealt with 
economic development as it has taken place in the past and as it is taking place 
in the present. Economic laws, which, after all, are but generalisations of the 
relations between different factors or of the relations which exist between 
certain causes and certain consequences, are studied increasingly in connection 
with particular periods, movements, and countries. New forces and new 
features present themselves, and with their introduction we perceive a change in 
results. This at once teaches the relativity of many economic maxims and 
statements and disproves the assumption, which at times some have been prone 
to make, that all nations and all countries undergo a-uniform process of develop- 
ment and respond in a uniform way to any given action or policy. It throws 
some light, too, upon the nature of these laws. Economic !aws are not invali- 
dated because conclusions alter as premises alter. But, on the other hand, such 
changes necessarily bring with them alterations in the rules laid down for 
practical guidance. 
We come then to consider the particular economic features which characterise 
countries passing through the early stages of economic evolution during modern 
or recent times. Such countries, it need hardly be said, stand in a marked con- 
trast to the older countries which surround and confront them and which have 
all already passed into further and more advanced stages. They differ also in 
their economic circumstances—and this is what needs special emphasis—from 
those same countries when in the primary stage of growth in the past. 
But to bring the matter within the limits of an address it is necessary at the 
very outset to define a little carefully the scope of the investigation. New 
countries differ greatly among themselves. Speaking broadly, they fall into three 
chief groups. There are tropical countries unfitted for white settlement and 
marked out by their characteristics for a very specialised development. Again, 
there are countries like some of the States of South America where, owing to 
particular features attending settlement, or to climatic and other causes, a 
growth at all comparable to that which has taken place in Western Kurope is 
