Impacts of the European Landscape Convention on national planning systems: A comparative investigation of six case studies

The aim of this paper is to present an assessment of the effects brought by the European Landscape Convention (ELC) on landscape planning a decade after its signature, with special attention to regional planning tools. In spite of the evidence that the ELC has been ratified by thirty three Member States, only a few States have successfully updated their planning tools. In this respect, the author develops a quali-quantitative indicator-based comparative method to study the ongoing institutional and planning contexts in six European countries: Catalonia (Spain), France, Italy, Switzerland, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. A general relevant result of the analysis of the six case studies is that land management is a powerful instrument with respect to landscape policy implementation. Besides, a higher sensibility to landscape issues emerges in policies interesting other sectors, such as environment, cultural heritage, water management, infrastructure, and tourism.