Is not the broad, environmentally oriented ideology of historic preservation, to which we all subscribe, a new culture in the old world of non-Western societies? This question is based on the observation that in many such countries the safeguard of highly symbolic monuments is indeed attended to in the name of cultural nationalism and identity but that preservation of the historic built environment remains very limited. The broader notions of conservation, themselves of relatively recent origin in the West, are rarely found in the Third World beyond small specialized segments of the national intelligentsias. Is not this hiatus yet another sign of the deep cultural divisions between traditional and modern subcultures and of the reliance of the latter on models, norms, and procedures whose applicability in non-Western contexts is increasingly open to question? This contribution attempts to pose some questions that are pertinent to better resource mobilization for historic preservation in these countries. It seeks to trace the development of conservation as a salient social value in the West and to contrast it with popular sentiments in the Third World. Here, historic preservation appears to be based on the transfer of an imported vocabulary of values. Until the search for an alternative vocabulary of values is seriously begun, is the cause of conservation not destined to be pursued in an uneasy cultural limbo between two worlds?