Landscape Policies and Practices in Europes. Approaches, Methods, Tools

The landscape valorisation is a central objective in Europe, since the approbation of the European Landscape Convention, which gives centrality to the sustainability strategy, stimulated the development of an innovative system of policies aimed at protecting natural and cultural heritage of the landscape, managing and planning the landscape as a framework of the population lifestyles, as an expression of regional and local identity and diversity, and as an important resource of social-economic and territorial development. The paper discusses the legislative innovations, policies, plans, design methodologies which were developed by various countries during the ten-year period following the approval of the ELC (as The Netherlands, Great Britain, Germany, Austria, Denmark, France, Spain and Italy). The initiatives are aimed in diverse ways and results at improving landscape quality, sharing effects of policies with social actors and integrating the landscape governance at different territorial level.