Melville Henry Watkins (May 15, 1932 – April 2, 2020) was a Canadian political economist and activist and professor emeritus of economics and political science at the University of Toronto. He was a founder and co-leader with James Laxer of the Waffle, a left-wing political formation within the New Democratic Party that advocated an "independent socialist Canada" and Canadian nationalism. He was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada in 2019. Life and career Watkins was born on May 15, 1932, on a farm near McKellar, Ontario; one of six children born to Wilmot and Sadie Watkins. At the age of 16, he and his twin brother, Murray, enrolled at the University of Toronto where among his lecturers was Harold Innis, whose staples thesis became a lifelong influence on his thinking. He pursued graduate work as a classical economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He became a professor of economics at the University of Toronto in 1958 and, in 1963, published an academic article, "A Staple Theory of Economic Growth”, which revised and updated Innis's staples thesis and was influential in the growing Canadian economic nationalist movement and also brought him to the attention of Canadian finance minister Walter L. Gordon. His political activity followed his work heading up the federal government's Task Force on Foreign Ownership and the Structure of Canadian Investment, which investigated the impact of growing American control of the Canadian economy. Striking this task force of economists had been urged upon the Pearson government by former Liberal finance minister Walter Gordon. The "Watkins Report", as it was widely known, was issued in 1968 and recommended strict regulation of foreign investment in Canada, particularly foreign ownership of Canadian businesses and resources. Its findings led to the establishment of the Canada Development Corporation to help facilitate greater Canadian ownership as well as the Foreign Investment Review Agency to regulate foreign ownership. His concern for Canadian economic sovereignty led him to join others in 1969 to found the Waffle, which issued a Manifesto for an Independent Socialist Canada calling for increased public ownership of the economy as a means of securing Canadian independence from the United States, as well as establishing social and economic equity. The group was essentially expelled from the New Democratic Party (NDP) in 1972 and while Watkins supported the group's attempt to form a new left-wing political party, the Movement for an Independent