The modernization, the declinist, and the inclinist paradigms of the late twentieth century, despite their differences, all tended to frame environmental change in a unilinear Nature-to-Culture fashion, which in turn entailed homogenizing the agency, process, and outcome of environmental change. This article examines the characteristics of each paradigm, as well as some of the paradoxes that have arisen in their wake. Finally, it looks to alternative approaches.

The author recognizes techniques of ideological distortion (i.e., mixing knowledge with beliefs and preferences) in the argumentation of economist Bjørn Lomborg.

For one month, we are able to follow an assistant forester on his daily rounds about the province of Capiz on Panay Island, as the forest was transformed from a resource and a refuge into an arena where state management practices and indigenous customary rights competed alongside those who saw trees as nothing more than a commercial enterprise.