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The Influence of the Tennessee Valley Authority on Government in the South

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Joseph M. Ray
Joseph M. Ray
Affiliation:
University of Maryland
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Extract

Recent observers have offered evidence that social and economic change is coming to the South more rapidly than to other sections of the country. There can be little doubt in the minds of those who know the region that TVA has played a prominent part in effecting the transformation. The effect of the operations and activities of TVA has been quite as marked upon the governments as upon the society and economy of the region.

We should not lose sight of the fact that TVA has had substantial effect upon government throughout the country, and indeed throughout the world. This effect is not restricted to its power, engineering, and atomic energy achievements. TVA's resource-use activities, while designed primarily for the Valley region, are in many respects transferable to other areas. For present purposes, however, we are concerned only with the effect of TVA on Southern governments.

Much has been written about TVA, and especially about its “grass roots” approach to the problems entrusted to its stewardship. The writings of Clapp, Durisch, Lilienthal, and Satterfield have copiously documented this aspect of the Authority's influence upon the nation's governmental establishments. There yet remains, however, the task of a forthright assessment of the effect of TVA upon governmental institutions and processes. What changes have come to Valley governments which might not have come had there been no TVA? What are those governments now, in matters of structure, program, techniques, competence, vision, and relationships, that they might not have become if the great Valley experiment had never been undertaken?

Type
American Government and Politics
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 43 , Issue 5 , October 1949 , pp. 922 - 932
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1949

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References

1 Odum, Howard W., “Social Change in the South,” Journal of Politics, Vol. 10 (May, 1948), pp. 242–258CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at p. 244.

2 Clapp, Gordon R., “TVA: A Democratic Method for the Development of a Region's Resources,” Vanderbilt Law Review, Vol. 10 (Feb., 1948), pp. 183–193Google Scholar, at p. 191.

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6 Quoted in Durisch, Lawrence L., “Regional Research—The Experience of the Tennessee Valley Authority,” Public Affairs, Vol. 4 (Summer, 1945), pp. 234–238Google Scholar, at p. 235. See also Lilienthal, David E., The TVA: A Step Toward Decentralization (Washington, 1941), p. 6Google Scholar; same author, TVA—Democracy on the March, p. 125 ff; M. H. Satterfield, op. cit., p. 936; same author, Tennessee Valley Resources; Their Development and Use (Knoxville, 1947), p. 9Google Scholar; Kull, Donald C., Budget Administration in the Tennessee Valley Authority (Knoxville, 1948), p. 5Google Scholar; Gordon R. Clapp, op. cit., p. 185; same author, “The Administrative Resources of a Region; The Example of the Tennessee Valley,” New Horizons in Public Administration (University, Alabama, 1945), pp. 79–95Google Scholar; same author, “Public Administration in an Advancing South,” Public Administration Review, Vol. 8 (Summer, 1948), pp. 169–175CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at p. 171; Herman Finer, op. cit., pp. 114–120; Johnson, Hayden B., “Federal-State-Local Coöperation: The Tennessee Valley,” State Government, Vol. 10 (Oct. 1948), pp. 214–218Google Scholar.

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26 Issued by the Tennessee Valley Authority, United States Government Printing Office, Washington, 1940.

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