Nations with a predominately Protestant heritage are more likely
to embrace environmentalism, according to a University of
California at Berkeley study. As Religion Watch
(Aug. 2002) reports, political science professor David Vogel ranked
21 of the world?s richest nations based on their environmental
policies and found that all but one of the countries with a high
level of environmental awareness (Austria) boast a Protestant
heritage. But it?s not church doctrine that makes these countries
so green, Vogel maintains. It?s the fact that Protestants and
environmentalists tend to share a pessimistic view of the world and
a romantic view of nature.
