Not all parts of Canada have enjoyed continuous economic rewards from the land or the sea. From eastern Nova Scotia came a response to regional poverty and the Great Depression that grew to define a method of community visioning in many Third World countries. Father Moses Michael Coady, co-founded, with Father J.J. (“Jimmy”) Tompkins, the Antigonish Movement as an outgrowth of an extension department of St. Francis Xavier University. It articulated a social and economic message that had profound implications. In a dominantly Scottish Catholic community in Antigonish County and parts of Cape Breton Island, Coady challenged Catholicism to respond to a liberal call for action, responsi bility, and social self-understanding.

Father Moses M. Coady was born at North East Margaree, Nova Scotia, on January 3, 1882. Before undertaking studies in philosophy and theology in Rome, he studied at the Provincial Normal College, Truro, Nova Scotia, and received his B.A. at St. Francis Xavier University (1905). In 1939 he wrote Masters of Their Own Destiny, a book which is still in print in seven languages. In this Canadian classic, Coady outlined his perception of cooperative action and consciousness raising among the traditionally powerless and poorly educated.
 

First Director of the Extension Department at St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Father Moses Michael Coady (1882 - 1959), viewed at microphone addressing a convention in the 1940s, conducted a remarkable program of adult education for the fishermen of Canada’s maritime provinces. While pioneering the organization and expansion of cooperatives and credit unions, his work contributed greatly to the well-being of outreach communities and hundreds of isolated families. “Self-help” could easily have been the motto of this giving, caring priest. The “Antigonish Movement” which he co-founded is carried on today in the Third World by the Coady International Institute. [Photo, courtesy St. Francis Xavier University/Angus L. Macdonald Library]

As founding director of the extension department in 1928, Coady and others organized study groups among farmers, fishermen, and industrial workers to give them a sense of practical empowerment to set up cooperative stores, factories, and credit unions. He articulated a new vision of social organization and a radical analysis of a malfunctioning economy. As a grass roots movement, it was both a call to action that had an unprecedented impact on local communities and a means of effectual organization both at home and abroad. Coady helped to organize the Nova Scotia’s Teachers’ Union, the United Maritime Fishermen, and what loosely became known as the Antigonish Movement. From the 1930s this movement combined social and economic approaches that, by the 1940s, were readily adapted to situations in Europe, Latin America, and Asia.

Father Coady was careful to present his ideas within the context of Catholic social teaching and he kept the Antigonish Movement politically neutral. Although he distanced himself from socialist movements then active in North America, he did oppose "the bourgeoisie" who, at the expense of primary producers and workers, lived by dividends, rent, and interest. Some of his followers contributed to the electoral success in Cape Breton of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation.

By stressing the idea of beginning small and of amalgamating to become more powerful, Coady eschewed head-on challenges with larger economic, religious, and political institutions. His movement dovetailed with other national and regional cooperative movements, but, disputatiously, its impetus had as great an influence beyond Canada’s borders, especially in areas of underdevelopment where the vision had practical and immediate application.
 

Premier Joey Smallwood was active in Newfoundland’s cooperative movement in the 1920s. This view captures him, left, with M.M. Coady, centre, and Angus Bernard MacDonald, right, at the Congress of Nova Scotia cooperatives held at St. Francis Xavier University, July 1951. MacDonald joined St. Francis Xavier’s Extension Department in 1930 as associate director. At the time of this picture, he was national secretary of the Co-operative Union of Canada. His devoted work made Canada a sponsor of CARE, the international aid program. [Photo, courtesy St. Francis Xavier University/Angus L. Macdonald Library]

The Antigonish Movement developed into multimillion dollar enterprises that revived a region and influenced the entire cooperative movement both in Canada and portions of the United States. As a liberal Catholic movement focusing on adult education, it was an exciting and innovative concept. The Antigonish Movement, a pioneer of distance learning and cooperative management, was a significant national and international force for responsibility, awareness, and change. In 1959, the year of his death, the Coady International Institute in Nova Scotia’s St. Francis Xavier University was opened to continue his goal of self-awareness, social action, and cooperative management in the Third World. This institute, in educating community organizers around the world and advising Canadian foreign aid programs, has made a significant contribution.

Moses M. Coady will be remembered as a practical visionary who, through the Antigonish Movement, offered individuals and communities, frustrated by social and economic despair, an applied and successful alternative.

Larry Turner