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A Centennial History of the AAEA

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A Centennial History of the AAEA A CENTENNIAL HISTORY OFTHEAAEA Copyright 2010 Agricultural & Applied Economics Association. All rights reserved. No part of chis publication is to be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means without prior permission in writing from the copyright holder. Contact [email protected] for permissions and/or more information. TABLE OF CONTENTS FOREWORD .................................................................vii PREFACE .................................................................... ix CHAPTER ONE • The Beginning .................................................. l CHAPTER TWO • From the American Farm Management Association To the American Farm Economics Association: How Mergers Happen .................................. 15 CHAPTER THREE • The Association Finds a Voice: The Journal ofFarm Economics ............25 CHAPTER FOUR• The 1930s: Depression, Dust, and Farm Policy ........................ .35 CHAPTER FIVE• The Inconvenience ofWar ........................................ 51 CHAPTER SIX • The Contest . ................................................ , ...65 CHAPTER SEVEN • Back to Business ..............................................71 CHAPTER EIGHT• Some Major Problems ..........................................87 CHAPTER NINE• Progress - the 1950s . ............................................99 CHAPTER TEN • Celebrating Fifty Years ........................................... 109 CHAPTER ELEVEN • Beginning the Second Fifty Years ................................ 117 CHAPTER TWELVE • Struggling to Serve a Diversity ofInterests ......................... 131 CHAPTER THIRTEEN• Reaching.for Maturity .................................... 143 CHAPTER FOURTEEN• Interactions and Alliances ................................. 159 CHAPTER FIFTEEN • Expanding Boundaries, Fewer Members .......................... l 73 CHAPTER SIXTEEN • Nearing the Century Mark . ................................... 187 CHAPTER SEVENTEEN • Many Acronyms, One Association: AA.EA at One Hundred . ........ l 99 APPENDIX I • Membership Numbers ..............................................209 APPENDIX II• The Constitutions ................................................ .213 APPENDIX III• Presidents ofthe Association . ........................................215 APPENDIX IV• Fellows ofthe Association . ..........................................219 APPENDIX V • Annual Meeting Locations ..........................................223 INDEX .....................................................................225 V To enhance the skills, knowledge, andprofessional contributions ofeconomists who help sociery solve agricultural development, environmental food and consumer, natural resources, regional rural and associated applied economics and business problems. AAEA Mission Statement, 2008 FOREWORD Speaking in 1959 O.B. Jesness, President of the American Farm Economics Association in 1937 and still in 1959 a faculty member at the University of Minnesota, called attention to the importance and relevance of history by saying, "[Before dismissing] what has gone before .. .let us recall that the present would be as impossible without a past as it would be hopeless without a future." Few statements describe the connection between past, present and future in such succinct and eloquent terms. The occasion for Jesness' comment was the Golden Anniversary celebration of the American Farm Economic Association - a forerunner of today's Agricultural and Applied Economics Association. Jesness was concerned that members of the 50-year-old organization had lost touch with their past and as a result would have difficulty divining a future for their work. Now, fifty years later, a related concern is worth contemplating: have we heeded the lessons of our Association's past sufficiently well to more effectively divine our future? The future will always remain uncertain, but the members of the association are fortunate that Paul W. Bar­ kley, longtime faculty member in the Department of Agricultural Economics at Washington State University, has taken time from his retirement to collect the information needed to write a history of the first 100 years of the organization's life. We can all now be satisfied that Barkley's focus on the past has provided insight into the present - into what the Association is today. In doing this he helps fulfill at least a part of Jesness' admonition. Barkley is a leader in our profession in his demand for correctness and his skill in the use of language. In this book, he sets the stage by going back to the time of the American Civil War. He brings us quickly to the formation of the American Economic Association in 1885. He does not shy away from or apologize for the notion that we are related (cousins, perhaps) of the members of that larger and older association. The formation of the American Farm Management Association in 1910 was not a split from a hostile or uninterested group. It was a new alignment designed to accommodate the needs of a growing number of economists interested in agriculture and its related industries. These new economists were a diverse lot. The group included horticulturists, farm crops specialists, mathematicians, and managers who came together at summer schools sponsored by the Association of American Agricultural Colleges and Experiment Stations, forerun­ ner of today's Association of Public Land Grant Universities. In 1910, the participants in the summer schools with interests in the cost and returns side of farming met and agreed to form the American Farm Management Association. This meant that many economists with little interest in farm management but strong interests in other aspects of agriculture were "stranded" in the American Economic Association. They quickly moved to form the American Association of Agricultural Economists and the two organizations lived an arm's­ length existence for nearly a decade until they merged into the American Farm Economics Association in 1919. Vil Barkley uses the 1919 merger to open a dialog on communication that continues (with some interruption) to the end of the book. He reasons that fostering communication is one of the major purposes of the organization. The Journal came immediately after the 1919 merger; an essay contest in 1945 saw the popularity of the Association soar as it communi­ cated ideas to the general public; various strategies were developed to enhance communica­ tions within the membership; but efforts to popularize (to make general use of) the messages emanating from agricultural economics research sometimes failed to reach their intended audiences. Barkley comes back to and explains this theme repeatedly as he works through the decades of the association's life. The lessons of these sections provide lessons as well as a basis for discussions among contemporary AAEA members. Other themes are present. The gradual expansion of the list of publications. The dif­ ficulty that attended finding a method of preserving the literature of the profession. The competition and cooperation with other societies and groups interested in agriculture. All are present and explained. In my opinion, some of Barkley's best work comes near the end of the book. In chapters 15, 16, and 17 Barkley tackles what may be the most difficult aspects of the association's life as it enters its 100th year. Chapter 15 reveals the need for change in some of the governing documents, management practices and organization of the association. It tells of the move to "sections" to satisfy the need to deal with the increased specialization and diversity of the members. It tells of the development of a strategic plan to guide future activities, and it ad­ dresses the fact that many agricultural economists were having difficulty finding a comfort­ able home in the organization. Chapter 16 tells of substantial efforts to change the organization and of the complicated path taken prior to changing the name to the Agricultural and Applied Economics Asso­ ciation. Chapter 17 provides some plausible explanations of why the association had been losing members. These may not be exhaustive but surely, they identify major reasons - and reasons that will require continued attention in the coming years. This last chapter is seri­ ous and daunting business but Barkley does not allow it to become negative or maudlin. I cannot say that the book ends on an entirely happy note, but there are also many positive threads of logic here and readers are challenged to grasp them, learn from history, and be inspired to carry the association forward in a positive and successful way into the next cen­ tury of its life. All things taken, Paul W Barkley has lived up to the dictum established by O.B. Jesness in 1959. The present is possible and it is what history has made. Although difficult to fully contemplate, the future is opportunity, and the understanding of our history facilitated by this book will assist members of the AAEA in avoiding some past pitfalls that could distract us as well as facilitate identifying and exploiting opportunity. Barkley deserves congratula­ tions for a job well done. The book is "advised reading" for anyone who belongs or who may belong to the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association. - Ron Mittelhammer, AAEA President 2009 - 2010 Vlll PREFACE In 1910, the Agricultural and Applied Economics Association came into being as the American Farm Management Association - a society devoted to expanding the extent and usefulness of knowledge related to the efficient use and operation of
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