Evolution of concepts and tools for landscape protection and nature conservation

Abstract

Three laws, dealing with landscape, in Italy represent a significant field of study for the analysis of the relationships between landscape policies and nature policies. Although other acts treated the same topic, these are the most important ones since they started the territorial policies on landscape protection (and nature protection) and set landscape planning as an operative tool of protection. These laws, issued in 1939, 1985, and 2004, offered an overall and coherent vision of the subject; this is why I have analyzed them taking different aspects into account: the meaning of the word landscape, the system of values according to which the quality of a landscape is assessed, and the relationship between landscape and nature and the form and structure of the landscape planning tools. Throughout the years, there has been a considerable evolution of the meanings, the relationships, and the operative tools for the protection of the landscape, but at the same time, there has been a relative independence of the meanings and values from landscape planning. Since meanings, values, and relationships are not always expressed explicitly, the laws have been analyzed through methods borrowed from the cognitive sciences, particularly from the theory of conceptualization.