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Norman Wengert

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Norman Irving Wengert was an American political scientist born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin November 7,1916 to Eugene F. and Lydia Semmann Wengert, and died in Stoughton, Wisconsin on July 28, 2001.[1] He helped establish the doctoral program in Environmental Politics and Policy at Colorado State University; published numerous scholarly books, research monographs, journal articles and chapters in anthologies; served as a consultant to government agencies, and received numerous awards and honors, including a listing in Who’s Who in America.[2]

Norman I Wengert
Born(1916-11-07)November 7, 1916
Milwaukee, WI
DiedJuly 28, 2001(2001-07-28) (aged 84)
Stoughton, WI
NationalityAmerican
OccupationProfessor
Norman I. Wengert

Early life and education

Wengert married Janet Mueller in 1940 and they raised three children--Eugene M., Christine Ann (Davis), and Timothy John. He served as an ensign in the U.S. Navy Reserve (1944-45). Wengert attended Concordia College in Milwaukee (1930-36), received a bachelor’s degree in political science in 1938 and Ph.D. in 1947 from the University of Wisconsin; a J.D. from the University of Wisconsin School of Law in 1942; and a master’s degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in 1939. He was a member of the Wisconsin Bar Association.[1]

Public service and academic career

Wengert was employed in several positions by the Tennessee Valley Authority (1941- 48); as a member of the Program Staff in the Office of the Secretary, U.S. Department of the Interior (1951-52); as a Research Associate for Resources for the Future, Inc., (1956); served as Deputy Director of the National Recreation Survey[3] of the Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission (1959-60), which provided the basis for Interior Secretary Stuart Udall’s successful program for quadrupling the acreage of the National Park System in eight years, and for enactment of the Land and Water Conservation Fund Act of 1965.[4] providing money for land acquisition. [5][6] He also served as a member of the Policy Analysis Staff in the Office of the Chief, U.S. Forest Service, (1978-79).[2]

Wengert began his academic career as a member of the faculty of City College of New York (1948-51); was Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Social Science Department at North Dakota State University, (1952-56); Professor of Public Administration at the University of Maryland (1956-59); Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Wayne State University, (1960-68); Visiting Professor of Public Administration at Pennsylvania State University (1968-69); and Professor of Political Science at Colorado State University, (1969-1987), where with Henry P. Caulfield, Jr. and Phillip O. Foss he helped establish its doctoral program in Environmental Politics and Policy. During this period he also served as Visiting Research Professor at the U.S. Army Engineering Institute for Water Resources (1969-70), was a Summer Fellow at Fonds flir Umweltstudien, in Bonn, Germany (1973), and lectured at the University of Sarajevo (Yugoslavia) in 1978.[2]

Wengert achieved some early renown when his book on Natural Resources and the Political Struggle found some popularity among scholars in 1955,[7] but he is probably best known as coeditor and contributor of a timely anthology about the “energy crisis” that appeared coincidentally during the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973, published by the American Academy of Political and Social Science.[8] However, these publications were eclipsed somewhat later in his career when he advanced a seminal theory of the “politics of getting” in which he asserted: “American politicians will get as much as they can for their constituents, with only casual attention to the merits of the case and to the extent that they are not likely to be held directly accountable for costs.”[9] Never shy about poking holes in other people’s balloons, he also published a research monograph that demonstrated the U.S. Forest Service had substituted its professional values for the legal requirements of their Organic Act of 1897 by allowing timber to be clearcut on the national forests for almost 80 years before they were authorized to do so by the Forest Management Act of 1976.[10][11]

Wengert served for many years on the Board of Directors of the Forest History Society and as Associate Editor of the Water Resources Bulletin (now Journal of the American Water Resources Association).[2]

Consultancies

Wengert served as research consultant on environmental and natural resources issues for the School of Natural Resources, University of Michigan (1968-69); was Special Advisor to the Government of India on food and agriculture (1959); on environmental impact assessment of water projects for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (1968); Thorne Ecological Institute (1972-75), the Federal Aviation Administration (1963); Atlantic Richfield Oil Corporation (1973-74); National Water Quality Commission (1974-1981), Office of Water Resources and Technology, U.S. Department of the Interior (1973-75), the Western Interstate Nuclear Board (1975-76) and for the states of Colorado, Maryland, Georgia, and Michigan on numerous occasions.[2]

Honors and recognition

Wengert was invited to present the prestigious annual Royer Lecture at the Institute for Governmental Studies, University of California, Berkeley in 1975, and was a member of the Order of the Coif, Sigma Xi, and Phi Kappa Phi.[1]

Selected scholarly publications

  • Valley of Tomorrow: TVA and Agriculture. Knoxville: Bureau of Public Administration, University of Tennessee, 1952.
  • Natural Resources and the Political Struggle. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955.
  • "Public Administration and Policy Formation". Southwestern Social Science Quarterly, 39(September): 158-159, 1958.
  • Perspectives on Government and Science. Philadelphia: American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1960.
  • Administration of Natural Resources: The American Experience. New York: Asia Publishing House, 1961.
  • Political Dynamics of Environmental Control, with Dennis C. McElrath and Daniel R. Grant. Bloomington, IN: Institute of Public Administration, Indiana University, 1967.
  • Urban Water Policies and Decision Making, with George M. Walker, Jr. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of the Interior, Office of Water Resources Research, 1970.
  • Urban-Metropolitan Institutions for Water Planning, Development and Management. Fort Collins: Environmental Resources Center, Colorado State University, 1972.
  • Institutions for Urban-Metropolitan Water Management: Essays in Social Theory. Fort Collins: Environmental Resources Center, Colorado State University, 1972.
  • The Energy Crisis: Reality or Myth, with Robert M. Lawrence. Philadelphia: American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1973.
  • Impact on the Human Environment of Proposed Oil Shale Development in Garfield County. Boulder: Thorne Ecological Institute, 1974.
  • Community Development Studies. Denver: Colony Development Corporation, 1974.
  • Property Rights in Land: A Comparative Exploration of German and American Concepts and Problems. Fort Collins: Environmental Resources Center, Colorado State University, 1974.
  • Public Participation in Water Resources Development with a View to the Improvement of the Human Environment. Fort Collins: Environmental Resources Center, Colorado State University, 1974.
  • Patterns, Policies, and Problems in Colorado Land Use and Development: Transferable Development Rights and Land Use Control, with Thomas Graham. Fort Collins: Cooperative Extension Service, Colorado State University, 1975.
  • The Political Allocation of Burdens and Benefits: Externalities and Due Process in Environmental Protection. Berkeley: Institute of Governmental Studies, University of California, 1976.
  • Regional Factors in Siting and Planning Energy Facilities in the Eleven Western States: A Report to the Western Interstate Nuclear Board, with Robert M. Lawrence and Michael S. Hamilton. Lakewood, CO: Western Interstate Nuclear Board, 1976.
  • The Physical and Economic Effects on the Local Agricultural Economy of Water Transfer from Irrigation Companies to Cities in the Northern Denver Metropolitan Area, with Raymond Lloyd Anderson and Robert D. Heil. Fort Collins: Environmental Resources Center, Colorado State University, 1976.
  • "The Energy Boom Town: an Analysis of the Politics of Getting." Policy Studies Journal, 7(Autumn): 17-23, 1978.
  • “The Energy Boom town: An Analysis of the Politics of Getting.” In Robert M. Lawrence and Norman I. Wengert, eds. New Dimensions to Energy Policy. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 17-24.
  • The Purposes of the National Forests: A Historical Re-interpretation of Policy Development, with A. A. Dyer. Fort Collins: Colorado State University, 1979.
  • "Symposium on Land Use Planning." Natural Resources Journal. vol. 19, #1. 1979. (editor).
  • Environmental, Legal, and Political Constraints on Power Plant Siting in the Southwestern United States: A Report to the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, with Michael S. Hamilton.

Fort Collins, CO: Colorado State University Experiment Station, 1980.

  • Summaries of Selected Federal Statutes Affecting Environmental Quality, with Michael S. Hamilton. Fort Collins: Colorado State University, Cooperative Extension Service, 1980.
  • "Land Use Policy." Encyclopedia of Policy Studies, 2d ed, Stuart Nagel, ed. Boca Raton: CRC Press, 1994.

References

  1. ^ a b c “Norman Wengert.” Fort Collins Coloradoan, July 29, 2001.
  2. ^ a b c d e Who’s Who in America 1982-83, 42d ed. Willamette, IL: Who’s Who, 1984, p. 3524.
  3. ^ Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission. Outdoor Recreation for America. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1962.
  4. ^ Land and Water Conservation fund Act of 1965, 78 Statutes at large 897, 16 U.S. Code §§ 460l-4 through 460l-11, [1] Accessed 1-28-09.
  5. ^ Rockefeller, Lawrence. “From the ORRRC chairman - Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission - Brief Article.” [2] Accessed 1-28-09.
  6. ^ Udall, Stewart L. The Quiet Crisis. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York, 1963.
  7. ^ Wengert, Norman I. Natural Resources and the Political Struggle. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955.
  8. ^ Wengert, Norman I., and Robert M. Lawrence, eds. The Energy Crisis: Reality or Myth? Philadelphia: American Academy of Political and Social Science, 1973.
  9. ^ Wengert, Norman I. “The Energy Boom town: An Analysis of the Politics of Getting.” In Robert M. Lawrence and Norman I. Wengert, eds. New Dimensions to Energy Policy. Lexington, MA: Lexington Books, 17-24.
  10. ^ Wengert, Norman I., and A.A. Dyer. The Purposes of the National Forests: A Historical Re-interpretation of Policy Development. Fort Collins: Colorado State University, 1979.
  11. ^ 16 U.S. Code § 1600.
  • Colorado State University, Department of Political Science, Graduate Programs—Environmental Politics and Policy. [3] Accessed 1-28-09.
  • Journal of the American Water Resources Association [4] Accessed 1-29-09.
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