Scenarios for european coastal areas, a promising tool for making decisions at various levels?

Natural coasts, especially soft coasts, in Europe are valuable landscapes, but they are under great pressure. Trends and threats have various causes of both physico-ecological and socio-economic origin. Examples of large-scale processes are given, such as sea level rise and regional processes (reclamation, urbanization, land use changes). Regional scenarios can help to support policy making. The pros and cons of forecasting and backcasting scenarios are discussed, as well as the need of data