ABSTRACT
The investigation of Tennessee Valley Authority's (TVA's) experience over some sixty years seems to support the views outlined by Derthick. The strength of the original TVA mission was that it outlined specific duties that were sharply focused on the Tennessee River Basin. The original board also seemed to understand, by instinct or by consideration of the options, that not all problems could be solved by limiting TVA activity to the Tennessee River watershed. TVA seems to have been the only regional agency to recognize the importance of using different regions for different type of regional problems. The many reorganizations of TVA undertaken without first defining the agency mission did not solve the problems of employee morale or of the nuclear program. As TVA completed its original mission it did make an effort to redefine a new mission for its regional development program. TVA's budget for regional development was justified in part by its support of the river improvement program.
