Priority questions for the science, policy and practice of cultural landscapes in Europe

Landscape Ecology

pp 1–14

• Authors
• Authors and affiliations

• Mónica Hernández-MorcilloEmail author
• Claudia Bieling
• Matthias Bürgi
• Juraj Lieskovský
• Hannes Palang
• Anu Printsmann
• Catharina J. E. Schulp
• Peter H. Verburg
• Tobias Plieninger

• Mónica Hernández-Morcillo
  • 1
  Email author
• Claudia Bieling
  • 2
• Matthias Bürgi
  • 3
• Juraj Lieskovský
  • 4
• Hannes Palang
  • 5
• Anu Printsmann
  • 5
• Catharina J. E. Schulp
  • 6
• Peter H. Verburg
  • 6
• Tobias Plieninger
  • 1

1. 1.Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource ManagementUniversity of CopenhagenFrederiksberg CDenmark
2. 2.Chair of Societal Transition and AgricultureUniversity of HohenheimStuttgartGermany
3. 3.Swiss Federal Research Institute WSLBirmensdorfSwitzerland
4. 4.Institute of Landscape EcologySlovak Academy of ScienceNitraSlovakia
5. 5.Tallinn UniversityTallinnEstonia
6. 6.Institute for Environmental Studies (IVM)VU University AmsterdamAmsterdamThe Netherlands

Research Article

First Online:

13 May 2017

DOI: 10.1007/s10980-017-0524-9

Cite this article as:

Hernández-Morcillo, M., Bieling, C., Bürgi, M. et al. Landscape Ecol (2017). doi:10.1007/s10980-017-0524-9

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Abstract

Context

The design of effective responses to safeguard cultural landscape values in Europe needs collaborative action among the stakeholders involved. Despite considerable progress triggered by the European Landscape Convention (ELC) and other initiatives to link landscape science, policy and practice, a joint research–action agenda is still lacking.

Objectives and methods

We respond to this challenge by identifying common priority questions for the sustainable management of cultural landscapes in Europe. To this end, we gathered, in a first phase, the most relevant research questions through a Delphi-like process with the research community in this field. In a second phase, the questions were prioritized by three stakeholder groups: scientists (Ss), policy-makers (PMs) and practitioners (Ps). The importance ranks and the similarity between groups’ priorities were calculated and analyzed.

Results

We found that the research question that addressed the issue of how to secure sustainable cultural landscapes where they are not economically profitable was the most important, with high level of agreement among all stakeholders. Alignment among the three groups was generally high; being higher between Ps–Ss and Ps–PMs than between Ss and PMs.

Conclusions

Our exercise can assist the implementation of the ELC by outlining the potential direction of future applied research and by strengthening the ties between the multiple stakeholders involved in the stewardship of European cultural landscapes.

Keywords

European Landscape Convention (ELC) Joint action–research agenda Research questions Landscape stakeholders Science–policy interface Transdisciplinarity 

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10980-017-0524-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Supplementary material

10980_2017_524_MOESM1_ESM.docx (15 kb)

Supplementary material 1 (DOCX 14 kb)

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