The paper examines the environmental history of Madagascar, focusing on the evolution of human settlement and forest cover in a region in the south-central highlands, and it is grounded in the specifics of one landscape -- the Pays Zafimaniry -- whose settlement in the past two centuries has been posited as an exemplar for the prior transformation of the rest of the highlands. The paper presents the results of a quantitative case study of population pressure and forest cover change in the region, considering these two variables at several spatial scales: the eastern rainforest, the Ambositra Region, and a portion of the Zafimaniry landscape. The case study sets out to explicate the scalar dynamics of land use and land cover change, specifically, to discover how and why the relationship between population and forest cover changes with the grain and extent of observation. The results of the case study and the historical narrative are analyzed with respect to the reliability of estimates of forest cover and population. The analysis identifies limitations and inconsistencies in our understanding of these phenomena and therefore in our ability to theorize the relationship between them. (quoted from author's abstract)
McConnell, W. J. 2001. Human-Environment Relations in Madagascar: The importance of spatial and temporal perspective. Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Association of American Geographers (AAG), New York, NY, February 28 - March 3, 2001.