| The Missouri River basin underwent a major transformation when the United States Congress approved the Flood Control Act of 1944 and the Bank Stabilization and Navigation Project of 1945. Generations removed from those national policy decisions, the long-term effects are now quantifiable. The Missouri River basin contains a degraded ecosystem, power imbalances among stakeholders, and a conflicting set of management parameters. Using a political ecology approach, this research deconstructs the drivers of river management policy from 1803 to 2013, to understand the connections between economics and policy, the impact on the development of the basin, and consequences for the ecological health of the Missouri River. |
