214 Broader Bases for Choice: The Next Key Move 



an experimental and demonstration area. Its physical works and its 

 social programs are well known, yet its net effect upon both the natu- 

 ral and the human resources of its region are difficult to appraise. 

 How much of the change in level of living stemmed from forces which 

 would have been at work in any event both in the region and in the 

 entire southeastern section? Was its soil conservation program more 

 effective in saving soil and building stable homes than the competing 

 Soil Conservation Service program? Did the organization indeed oper- 

 ate at the grass roots in making major decisions? Did it place national 

 interest above local interest? There are rough means of approaching 

 these and other problems. For example, it now appears that the TVA 

 arrived at its more crucial decisions with the local interest uppermost 

 but without grass roots participation.^ But on many other points we 

 must rely upon strictly curbstone opinions. 



Until the recent work of Krutilla and Eckstein,^ and by some of the 

 Harvard group, there have been few even slightly refined means of 

 judging the net impacts upon regional and national economy of alter- 

 native programs of water regulation for hydroelectric power and navi- 

 gation. Thus, a balanced comparison of the probable social results 

 from the Hells Canyon project under federal versus private manage- 

 ment was lacking during the time when political controversy over 

 those rival plans was most intense. 



One of the principal arguments for new irrigation enterprises in the 

 West is their stabilizing effect upon surrounding dry-land agriculture, 

 yet we have only begun to establish the true effects. A recent study of 

 the Uncompaghre project in Colorado indicates that, as a result of 

 division of responsibility among three different agencies, the net result 

 probably was to disrupt rather than stabilize the grazing economy.^ 

 Experience of the Bowaters Southern Paper Corporation in East Ten- 

 nessee suggests that promotion and investment in a new wood-proces- 



^R. G. Tugwell and E. C. Banfield, "Grass Roots Democracy: Myth or 

 Reality?", Public Administration Review, 10, pp. 47-55. 



^ John V. Krutilla and Otto Eckstein, Multiple Purpose River Development 

 (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1958); and Otto Eckstein, Water Re- 

 sources Development: The Economics of Project Evaluation (Cambridge: 

 Harvard University Press, 1958). 



^ Jacqueline L. Beyer, Integration of Grazing and Crop Agriculture (Chicago: 

 University of Chicago, Department of Geography research paper, 1957). 



