Forest, sea and farm land in Southeast Asia are discussed from social, cultural, economic and dynamic points of view. The forest was very rich in commercial products like scented wood, but harbored endemic diseases as well. The sea of Southeast Asia provided people with easy access to the forest. Southeast Asia thus became a busy center for extraction of forest products. Many adventurers who came to the area, however, perished under the disease ridden conditions. Deep forest was regarded as the domain of spirits and gods. Cultivation was neglected in traditional land use due to the too vigorous growth of the forest, but has started to expand in the last several decades.

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This essay aims to portray the image of the forest and the sea perceived by the Bugis people in South Sulawesi, Indonesia. In a word the forest and the sea share the same image of ambivalence: both extremely maleficent and beneficent. Avoiding these ambivalent spheres, the people chose to live in an ecotone between the forest and the sea or aquatic areas. Owing to recent exploitation, however, this ecotone seems to have lost its meaning as the most suitable sphere of living for the Bugis. Thus the ambivalence in the forest and the sea have been mostly cleared but its magical part is still in the mind of people.

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The term “maritime world,” which is specifically used in the field of history, may appear to have little connection with such subjects as “agriculture” and “peasant.” However, when we focus on the characteristics of lifestyles in the Southeast Asian maritime world and reconsider the characteristics of peasants in the region in this light, we arrive at a different view from the conventional concepts of agriculture and peasants in the Southeast Asian archipelago.
 Based on research findings on the activities of spontaneous migrants settled in frontier areas in Kabupaten Luwu in South Sulawesi, Indonesia, this article discusses peasants and agriculture in the light of such characteristics as “mobility,” “commercial orientation,” and “good networking” which are common to people living in the Southeast Asian maritime world. The finding that not only Bugis migrants, who are famous for their sea-faring and mobility, but also Javanese peasants migrating to frontier regions from the “agricultural-based” world showed similar “maritime” characteristics suggests that such characteristics provide a useful tool to reconsider the concept of agriculture and peasants in the Southeast Asian archipelago. It is also suggested that such reconsideration may be beneficial in approaching and solving the problems pertaining to the relationship between people and resources in the archipelago.

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This is a comparative study of forest exploitation in Java (Central and East Java in this article) and two mountain villages in Japan, focusing on shifting cultivation. Rapid deforestation in Java, especially from the late nineteenth century, inevitably caused the decline of shifting cultivation in favour of more intensive agriculture on permanent farm land. In contrast to Java, forest still occupies two-third of Japan's area, and shifting cultivation could be seen in many parts of mountain areas until the early 1950s. How should we understand these circumstances? It is easy to attribute the situation in Java to a rapid population increase which forced people to open up forests. However, this is not persuasive when we think that Japan also experienced a rapid population increase but still retains a much larger proportion of forest area. In fact, population increase itself can be considered to be a result of historical processes and natural conditions.
 In the case of Java, three points require special attention. First, in order to increase rice production, the Javanese rulers consistently tried to open up forest as permanent farm land, in part because exportable forest products were not greatly abandant in Java. Second, Dutch colonial policies, especially the Cultivation System and the subsquent Liberal Policy, were directed to the use of land in Java in the form of permanent farm land, not as forest. Third, and perhaps most importantly, the high fertility of soil in Java has made it possible for peasants to convert forests into more productive farm land without causing serious erosion provided water would be secured. This natural condition supported the population increase.
 Japan has quite different historical and natural conditions from Java. Mountain villages in Japan have much less favourable natural conditions than those in Java: poorer soil, lower temperature, and often steep slopes. Under these conditions, there were two alternatives open for forest exploitation. One was shifting cultivation coupled with hunting and gathering activities. The other was to set up artificial forests for timber. Because of the constantly high demand for timber for housing in Japan, this latter course was also advantageous. In neither case did people in mountain areas in Japan convert forests into permanent farm land like in Java, but preserved them for shifting cultivation and growing trees for timber. We will examine these two mountain villages as examples of these two types of exploitation.

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