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Book Review
| Rivers by Design: State Power and the Origins of U.S. Flood Control. Karen M. O'Neill. Durham: Duke University Press, 2006. xxi + 278 pp. Tables, maps, appendixes, notes, bibliography, index. Cloth $79.95, paper $22.95.
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| Sociologist Karen M. O'Neill recognizes that the growth of the federal flood control program influenced and mirrored both the nature of American federalism and the character of the nation's democratic process. Her objective in Rivers by Design is to explore this evolution by examining local and state governments and the elites—farmers, merchants, bankers, and others—who, she argues, decisively shaped the federal flood control program. In a generally well-written narrative, O'Neill focuses on the Lower Mississippi and Sacramento valleys, the two areas that first benefited from federal flood control largesse. In so doing, she illuminates the tactics and rhetoric of advocacy groups that spared no effort to bring flood control to the attention of the nation. |
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Unfortunately, a number of shortcomings undermine the author's effort. One problem is reliance on a small number of works. The bibliography ignores numerous important secondary sources, and the endnotes reveal O'Neill's heavy dependence on just a dozen or so authors such as Robert Kelley, Todd Shallat, and John Barry. Primary sources are a few newspapers, government documents, and the printed proceedings of certain lobbying organizations. No archival research is evident. Consequently, the author faces a fundamental dilemma: How can one assess the growing national influence of flood control elites and advocacy groups by referring principally to their own self-aggrandizing literature? O'Neill emphasizes that her book is "neither a history of legislative power politics nor a history of the Army Corps of Engineers flood control program" (p. xiv). Fair enough, but politicians respond to all kinds of pressures, and only an examination of their personal papers and official correspondence allows an accurate assessment of their responsiveness to—or control of—local and regional institutions and groups. Abundant archival material exists. In many cases, it might well be that decisions reflect more internal legislative log-rolling than the power of interest groups. |
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