ABSTRACT
Destruction of forests is nowadays associated with tropical areas in South America, Central Africa and Southeast Asia. At the same time, however, many people seem to equate forest destruction with capitalism, a western (Christian) invention. These statements are not necessarily contradictory. Non-western people, so this argument runs, have always been much more careful with their environment than westerners, and the onslaught on tropical forests is a recent phenomenon, related to the penetration of capitalism. Forests are now being destroyed in areas where there is anything left to be destroyed, i.e. in tropical areas. The West has destroyed its own forests long ago (cf. White 1967).
