Eighty-year review of the evolution of landscape ecology: from a spatial planning perspective

Context Sustainable spatial development requires the establishment of a balance between rational land use and the protection of nature, ecosystems and biodiversity on various spatial levels and temporal horizons. The integration of landscape ecology and spatial development planning can help overcome the complex problems of managing landscapes and natural resources and increase the chances of reaching sustainable spatial development. Objectives The main goal of this research is to provide insight into the development of landscape ecology from the spatial planning perspective. Methods A chronological systematization and categorization were made of relevant papers, authors and events that are important for an understanding of the discipline’s development. An analysis of their content and interrelationships in the integral chronological overview enabled the identification of landscape ecology’s developmental periods. Results Research resulted in the elaboration of an integral chronological overview of the scholarly and professional communities’ key activities and achievements, making it possible to monitor the development of theory, key developmental concepts and their corresponding methodological procedures, methods and techniques. The overview enabled the identification of (a) types of “arenas” for professional dialogue, (b) key authors and works, (c) relationships among components within the same, but also between different, categories of components of the chronological overview, and on the basis of all this (d) the establishment of developmental periods. Five developmental periods of the discipline have been established: (1) Landscape Ecology Foundation Period 1939–1979, (2) Landscape Ecology Establishment Period 1980–1987, (3) Landscape Ecology Solidification Period 1988–1991, (4) Period of Retrospection and New Articulation 1992–2005, and (5) Period of Stable Development 2006- present. Conclusions Research indicated continued development of the theoretical–methodological framework of landscape ecology and its links with spatial planning through the constant reexamination of existing perspectives and the establishment of new ones. The numerous conceptual frameworks selected in the paper unequivocally illustrate a strong conditionality between landscape ecology and spatial planning. However, the systematization of written sources revealed that few papers present a review or perspectives with regard to the link with spatial planning, which is why this research has become an important basis for future research in a form of a curriculum for initial research on the relationship between landscape ecology and spatial planning