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Land for Americans by Marion Clawson; Land and Water for Recreation by Marion ClawsonReview by: Robert C. LucasEconomic Geography, Vol. 41, No. 1 (Jan., 1965), pp. 89-91Published by: Clark UniversityStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/141862 .

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BOOK REVIEWS 89

carried much farther than the authors have done.

The summation of the development of various aspects of world shipping is brief and to the point. The great increase in shipping tonnage and the even more rapid growth of seaborne trade are depicted clearly. There are short state- ments concerning the major national fleets, types of vessels, nature and seasonality of freight rates, the flow of goods, and government subsidy and intervention. It is well to remember, for example, that the concept "freedom of the seas" has been accepted gradually only since the mid- dle of the 19th century, and that a regression in this freedom has been taking place since World War II as a result of flag discrimination and other governmental restrictive practices. A short survey of passenger and general cargo traffic is followed by an analysis of the major commodities carried in bulk, such as petroleum, coal, ores, and small grains. Generally, the dis- cussion gives an historical perspective of pro- duction, consumption, and trade of the product, and also deals with recent patterns of movement.

Shipbuilding and repair deserve special at- tention. The United Kingdom, the early leader in shipbuilding, had to yield first place to Japan since 1956, and has been competing for second place with Germany. According to the authors, shipbuilding is an international industry which is characteristic of economically advanced states -those with a merchant fleet and navy, a diver- sified industrial base, and a good supply of capital. The United States certainly should qualify under those criteria, but for other reasons she was a large shipbuilder only during the two world wars when mass production techniques could be applied.

In view of the fact that a major portion of the book is devoted to ports, the general dis- cussion of ports is rather w ak and diffuse. Although it is said that "A classification [of ports] according to size and function is obviously what primarily interests the economist . . . , " (p. 118), no such classification emerges clearly here nor in the remainder of the book.

The authors have aimed " . . . at com- plete coverage.' (p. 119), and this they may have achieved. They state that ". small ports are part of the geographic pattern . . "; with this the reviewer certainly agrees. They set the arbitrary lower limit for the inclu- sion of a port in text or on maps as 10,000 metric tons of cargo handled in one year; yet, it is stated that " . . many ports of more than 10,000 cargo tons a year have been ex- cluded due to incomplete breakdown in avail- able statistical sources . . . ," and "iMany ports with an unknown cargo turnover estimated to be more than 10,000 tons have been marked on the maps with a dot and name." Unfortu- nately, the amount of material covered is so great that depth of analysis has had to give way to completeness of coverage.

The major part of the book-the Regional Survey-is divided into seven sections. Atlantic Europe and Anglo America have been allotted nearly half the space in this section; the Mediter- ranean, Africa and Oceania only 32, 27, and 11 pages, respectively; Latin America and Asia each take up about 50 pages of text and illustrations. Each section contains, with varied emphasis, observations as to location, general economic geography, and trade patterns. Ports are treated in groups, or individually, if they are of suffi- cient importance. However, discussions of port development and traffic are mainly in terms of situation, and are necessarily quite brief, even of the larger ports. There are virtually no site analyses, although some port maps have been included.

There is a wealth of excellent maps, charts, and graphs, and many superb and meaningful ground and aerial photographs. The maps are particularly useful because symbolization for cargo handled is uniform throughout, so that their values are comparable.

At the end of the book are a glossary, a list of statistical sources, and indices of authors cited, " persons, vessels and corporations, " " ports and places, " as well as a subject index. The glossary is very brief. It offers only definitions of tonnage measurements, the authors' interpretation of coastwise and coastal shipping, and an explana- tion of "Tidal Basin " and "Wet Dock." Many other terms used in the geography of ports and ocean transport could have been included here. A list of statistical sources by countries (from which data for the port maps were compiled) is most valuable. However, for some reason the authors did not use primary sources for several countries. For example, for Bulgaria an article in the Geographisclhe Rundsclhau is listed; for Iraq and Qatar an issue of World Oil; and for Sierra Leone a 1956 article in ECONOMIc GEOG- RAPHY. Finally, the author index lists all authors of books and articles which have been used as sources and cited in footnotes throughout the text. This represents an important guide to a wealth of material in the shipping literature.

This is a book in which a large amount of important information about the geography of ports and seaborne trade has been compiled. It certainly is a work of reference, but the great- est value of the book will be as a guide toward further study and research.

GuIDo G. WEIGEND

Rutgers The State University

Land for Americans, by MARION CLAWSON (Resources for the Future Policy Back- ground Series). ix and 141 pages; maps, diagrs., tables. Rand McNally & Co., Chicago, 1963. $2.00. 812 x 512 inches.

Land and Water for Recreation, by MARION

CLAWSON (Resources for the Future Policy

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90 EcONOMic GEOGRAPHY

Background Series). ix and 144 pages, Rand McNally & Co., Chicago, 1963. $2.00. 812 x 512 inches.

Resources for the Future, Inc., has produced or sponsored many large technical books in the first decade of the research organization's life. They have now launched a new series of small paperbacks, the Policy Background Series, for "intelligent, interested nonspecialists." Marion Clawson has written two of the first three books in this series. Both describe resource use, con- sider forces of change, and pose policy questions, and yet they are quite different.

Land for Americans draws heavily on one lengthy book, Land for the Future (Clawson, Held and Stoddard, 1960). It is a distillation of an abundance of data and an extensive re- search effort by many people over many years. Clawson deals with a wide range of land uses: land for residences, recreation, crops, forests, grazing, transportation, water regulation works, and wildlife. In the last 50 years, land used for recreation (as defined by Clawson) increased most rapidly. Urban areas were the second most expansive type. Other uses were fairly stable. Clawson predicts only modest changes by 2000, generally a continuation of these past trends. But increasing competition for land will make the pattern more rigid and shifts more difficult. The book is a generally well-balanced, smoothly written summary that should serve most of the intended audience well. Clawson poses good questions for public consideration, and relates land policy to broader issues such as democratic government and international responsibilities. Geographers will find little new material in the book, but this is not a criticism of a work aimed at the general public.

Land and Water for Recreation attacks a more limited subject (one chapter in Land for Amer- icans) for which there is a much smaller research base. The book is largely a synthesis of a series of articles by Clawson and the 1962 reports of the Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission (ORRRC). Less knowledge is being stretched farther, and thin spots and internal stresses show tip more often. This is a reflection of the state of understanding of outdoor recrea- tion more than a criticism of the author. The need for public interpretation of even limited findings on recreation is particularly great; policy issues (wilderness bills, federal-state recreation cost-sharing programs, rural zoning and scenic easements for example) are prominent, and misinformation is common.

Clawson considers leisure and recreation, recreational areas and their use, factors related to changes in use, economic values, financing, and needed research. He predicts total United States attendance at outdoor recreation areas will increase five-fold by 2000. Visits have been doubling about every eight years, so this would require a slowing down. Land used for recrea-

tion will increase less rapidly than attendance. Clawson feels that outdoor recreation resources are not scarce in the United States, but manage- ment which will keep quality high as demand grows will require increasing skill. ORRRC reached the same conclusion. Clawson believes social science research has an important role in improving the management of outdoor recreation resources.

Outdoor recreation is a loose term (but with no adequate substitutes), and an early definition of the book's scope would have been useful. Actually, the emphasis throughout is on the public sphere in the United States; resorts and summer homes are omitted. Earlier efforts to project recreational use by multiplying indices of change of four factors (population, income, transportation improvements, and leisure) have been dropped, at least explicitly. Trhe section on factors related to use is generally tighter than in Clawson's earlier articles, although the con- tinued listing of the same four factors as most important (p. 34) seems inconsistent with the importance of education shown later (p. 50) and some other ORRRC findings. He might have mentioned that the correlations of most social and economic variables so far tested against use have been low. (Trhis testing has been cross- section analysis, not time-series).

Trhe discussion of the effect on use of the spatial distribution of population and of alteriia- tive opportunities should stimulate geographers. However, the section on research needs will probably be less useful to professionals than the paper oln research by Clawson and Knetsch in the Natural Resources Journal (Vol. 3, No. 2). Comments such as, "Trhe standard for outdoor recreation areas should not be, how many people came through here, but, rather, how much difference did it make to those who came" (p. 80), and those on the role of education in deepening experiences (p. 79) may cause geog- raphers to ponder their classroom contribution.

Again, most of the intended readers should find the book interesting and useful, and the policy questions pointed and challenging. Stu- dents (of all ages) may also want to read it; they will disagree with parts, but if this provokes thought and leads to research Clawsoni will have made a double contribution.

The Policy Background Series as a whole is clearly aimed at an important target. The use is quite different from the conventional growing social science literature on resource " conservationist" view of land management problems, but the newer ideas have not reached most of the public-nor most teachers. Docu- mentation and bibliographies are eliminated in the series. This decision may have increased the public appeal of the books, but it limits their usefulness for college teaching (one of the intended uses) and makes their contribution somewhat isolated. Al "intelligent non-special- ist " interested enough to read one of these books

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BOOK REVIEWS 91

might often be interested enough to welcome some keys to further exploration down this or that pathway. In contrast to this rather severe simplification, ratio-scale graphs are widely used without explanation of their characteristics.

All of us concerned for public understanding of resource management will wish Resources for the Future well in their new venture.

ROBERT C. LUCAS

Lake States Forest Exp. Sta., U.S. Forest Service and University of Minnesota

The Economic Pattern of Modern Germany, by NORMAN J. G. POUNDS. viii and 133 pp.; maps, tables, ills., index. John Murray, London, 1963. 18s 8Y4 x 6 inches.

The focus of this book is the effect of the Iron Curtain on the economic pattern of postwar Germany. The author assesses the fundamental aspects of this division with particular emphasis on the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). Such a task is difficult to accomplish in 125 pages; no German geographer has attempted it and the only important work by an English- speaking geographer runs to six times this length. However, the book is aimed at a wider audience than professional geographers, and the clarity of writing should enable most readers, regardless of background, to better understand the economic changes in Mitteleuropa.

A topical approach is utilized although various regions are covered in several of the chapters. An introductory chapter describes the historical aspects of the division of prewar Germany into the Federal Republic, the Soviet Zone, and the portions under Polish and Russian administra- tion. Succeeding chapters treat land and popula- tion, agriculture, industry, and transportation and communications. The final section makes an assessment of " Germany and Europe, " outlining the steps by which fears of West German revival were overcome through an awareness of the economic and political need for a healthy state in central Europe. A very brief analysis is made of the ties of East Germany to the Soviet Bloc.

Postwar changes in the economic pattern of the Federal Republic are clearly described. The contrast between the poor competitive position of West German agriculture in Europe and the industrial situation is emphasized. Short but clear tables illustrate the changes in both fields since the war. The reader may be surprised at the degree of self-sufficiency of West Germany in food production. It is in industry, however, that the author is at his best, and his original research on this topic in Europe is apparent. By the end of the book one has a feeling for the changed orientation of this part of Germany, both internally and in its ties to the Common

Market and to other countries of Western Europe.

The reviewer was surprised to find little em- phasis on the effects of the federal administrative structure-a contrast to the prewar situation- which is fundamental to postwar political, eco- nomic, and cultural development in the FRG. German concern with urban sprawl is also evi- dent in the press and the book might have in- cluded an evaluation of the inequities between population and space for housing, recreation, and agriculture together with some mention of attempts at regional planning (Landesplanung and Raumforschung). The problem of transporta- tion is also critical. For example, an estimated three million Germans created a mammoth traffic jam in the Netherlands this spring by visiting the annual tulip festival. What will happen when the affluent Germans begin to purchase a second car?

Reference to significant German source ma- terial is absent. There is no bibliography or reading list, and the most frequently cited source is the Overseas Economic Survey of HMSO for 1955. Material from the 1961 census is available and German planning atlases exist for most of the Ldnder, but such information is not used or mentioned.

The most serious defect of the book is the lack of parallel treatment of the three portions of divided Germany. Material exists on East Ger- many, but since the author chose not to use it, the reader may wonder why he didn't limit him- self to West Germany alone. The brief remarks pertaining to the Soviet Zone only leave many questions unanswered. One would like to know more of the trends in agriculture and industry. The significance of collectivization is mentioned, but to what extent has this program changed t'ie population structure and created labor for industry? Utilization and evaluation of material, including maps, from Beitrdge zur 5konomischen Geographie der Deutschen Demokratischen Repub- lik (Kramm, 1962) or Wirtschaftsterritorium der DDR (Schmidt-Renner, 1960) might have helped to fill these gaps. The lack of specific information on trade is especially apparent. What exactly are the interconnections between the Soviet Zone and the Polish-administered parts of Germany and the other Soviet Bloc states?

Several mistakes are unexpected in so short a book: the former French Zone of Germany (now Baden and Rheinland-Pfalz) has not been particularly important as a refugee settlement area when compared with other parts of Ger- many; the fragmentation of agricultural holdings is not only a result of Realerbteilung (divided inheritance), as Pfeifer has shown that Aner- benrecht (undivided inheritance rights) has been predominant in much of the western portion of Germany; it is somewhat misleading to refer to the salt resources of Saxony since these deposits are not located in the area of the old Kingdom

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