Why the TVA remains unique: interest groups and the defeat of New Deal river planning.

摘要

This paper describes the reason why the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), which aims to provide electricity, promote rural development, and conserve natural resources through different policies, still remains unique in the USA. The failure of the New Deal planners to make the valley authority the model for river development in the USA is used to evaluate the TVA's programmes. It is suggested that the signing of the national 'Flood Control Act of 1936', which empowered the Corps of Engineers to build projects throughout the country, ended the nationwide comprehensive planning for natural resources at the federal level. This and other decisions made during the New Deal ensured that decisions made about water resources would be divided between programmes in the TVA, the Army Corps of Engineers, the Soil Conservation Service, and the Bureau of Reclamation.