"In this provocative comparative study, Paul R. Josephson asks to what extent the form of a government - colonial or postcolonial - and of its economy - centrally planned or market - determines how politicians, bureaucrats, scientists, engineers, and industrialists address environmental and social problems presented by the human transformation of nature into an inhabited landscape." "In examining the experiences of the industrialized and industrializing world, Resources under Regimes explores the interrelationship of science, technology, and the environment. Josephson considers global responses to deforestation, water pollution, and global warming, to show how different societies bring different values and assumptions to bear on the same problem and arrive at different conclusions about the ideal outcome and the best way of achieving it."--Jacket.