Book Reviews : Resources Development: Frontiers for Research. Edited by FRANKLIN S. POLLAK. (Boulder: University of Colorado Press, 1960. Pp. xvi, 333. $3.75.)
| DOI | 10.1177/106591296101400334 |
| Published date | 01 September 1961 |
| Author | Ross R. Rice |
| Date | 01 September 1961 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
795
His
criteria
for
these
value
judgments
are
undefined
and
he
notes
the
ab-
sence
of
data
on
which
comparisons
with
the
results
of
partisan
election
can
be
made.
Although
a
subjective
judgment
based
on
his
observations
has
more
value
than
the
subjective
judgments
of
those
with
a
narrower
perspective,
it
would
have
been
useful
if
the
author
had
stated
his
basis
of
measurement
explicitly
enough
to
permit
subsequent
comparisons
-
when
the
data
is
available.
There
are,
as
has
been
noted,
several
useful
sections
of
the
book:
the
bibli-
ography ;
the
capsule
history
of
nonpartisanship
in
the
United
States;
the
review
of
the
arguments
about
it;
the
raw
data;
and
the
vignettes
of
local
politics.
These
make
the
book
of
value
despite
the
unfulfilled
wish
that
the
book
would
do
more
than
the
author
set
out
to
do.
Salem,
Oregon
FREEMAN
HOLMER
Resources
Development:
Frontiers
for
Research.
Edited
by
FRANKLIN
S.
POLLAK.
(Boulder:
University
of
Colorado
Press,
1960.
Pp.
xvi,
333.
$3.75.)
This
thick
paperback
is
a
symposium
of
papers
presented
at
the
Western
Resources
Conference
held
at
the
University
of
Colorado
the
summer
of
1959.
Built
around
the
theme
of
resource
development
in
the
areas
of
land
policy
and
use,
atomic
energy,
water
and
river
basin
development,
minerals
and
energy,
recreation,
and
research,
the
conference
brought
together
an
interdisciplinary
array
of
economists,
political
scientists,
legal
experts,
engineers,
and
government
officials.
The
reviewer
concurs
with
the
volume’s
editor
that
Charles
M.
Hardin’s
paper
on
land
policy
and
western
development
is
one
of
the
most
challenging
in
the
entire
symposium.
Hardin
points
up
such
shortcomings
in
land
policies
as
the
subsidization
of
wool
and
sugar
beets,
overinvestment
in
irrigation
in
regard
to
other
water
uses,
speculation
and
abuses
in
minerals
development,
and
de-
ficiencies
in
research.
His
analysis
of
the
land
policy
formation
process
strikes
at
a
tendency
to
overemphasize
local
and
particular
interests,
division
in
policy-
making
in
the
congressional
committee
system
which
leads
to
logrolling
and
failure
to
weigh
alternative
policies.
To
overcome
this
fractionalized
policy-
making
he
recommends
&dquo;national,
centralized,
disciplined,
and
policy-oriented
political
parties - parties
membership
in
which
can
stiffen
the
resistance
of
congressmen
against
the
often
irresistible
constituent
interests;
and
parties
with
which
citizens
can
identify
and
find
both
an
empowering
and
a
restraining
experience.&dquo;
Over
three-fourths
of
the
volume’s
space
is
devoted
to
water
problems.
New
sources
for
additional
water
are
weighed;
the
South
Platte
River
is
used
as
a
case
study
of
the
development
of
a
master
water
plan;
aspects
of
water
law
are
analyzed;
the
Colorado
River
lower
basin
controversy
is
handled
by
giving
the
California
side
twenty-five
pages
to
one
page
for
the
Arizona
stand
(an
imbal-
ance
particularly
dubious
to
this
biased
reviewer
in
light
of
the
1960
preliminary
finding
by
the
United
States
Supreme
Court’s
special
master
Simon
Rifkind,
in
which
he
upheld
the
Arizona
position
over
that
of
California) .
Arthur
Maass
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