Focusing on the changing economic situation in the North and the involvement of the indigenous population, the speech deals only with Alaska. In common with the rest of the North, the Alaskan past has been characterized by economic fluctuations in highly specialized periods. Subjects treated are Alaska's total economic development translated into population trends, and measures of the degree to which the Native population has been identified or involved in these developments. The objective is not to penetrate deeply into the subject but, possibly for the first time, to suggest its magnitude. Section I reviews population trends as indices of social and economic trends, using the decennial census data and earlier estimates for the analysis from 1740 to 1960. Section II takes an overall view of the response of all of Alaska's Natives to economic development since 1939, the same time period that Alaska emerged from its pre-World War II colonial phase of economic development. The study found that a regional comparison of Native population projections solely on the basis of net natural increase with population based upon employment projections indicated that the 2 regions with the largest Native populations and prospects for future growth (Southwest and Northwest) are also the regions with the lowest employment growth potential. It was anticipated that Alaska and the North in general will move even further than at present from forms of employment and ways of living which are compatible with the traditional ways of the indigenous people. (KM)