Transitions in European land-management regimes between 1800 and 2010

Abstract

Land use is a cornerstone of human civilization, but also intrinsically linked to many global sustainabilitychallenges—from climate change to food security to the ongoing biodiversity crisis. Understanding theunderlying technological, institutional and economic drivers of land-use change, and how they play outin different environmental, socio-economic and cultural contexts, is therefore important for identify-ing effective policies to successfully address these challenges. In this regard, much can be learned fromstudying long-term land-use change. We examined the evolution of European land management overthe past 200 years with the aim of identifying (1) key episodes of changes in land management, and(2) their underlying technological, institutional and economic drivers. To do so, we generated narrativeselaborating on the drivers of land use-change at the country level for 28 countries in Europe. We qualita-tively grouped drivers into land-management regimes, and compared changes in management regimesacross Europe. Our results allowed discerning seven land-management regimes, and highlighted markedheterogeneity regarding the types of management regimes occurring in a particular country, the timingand prevalence of regimes, and the conditions that result in observed bifurcations. However, we alsofound strong similarities across countries in the timing of certain land-management regime shifts, oftenin relation to institutional reforms (e.g., changes in EU agrarian policies or the emergence and collapseof the Soviet land management paradigm) or to technological innovations (e.g., drainage pipes, tillageand harvesting machinery, motorization, and synthetic fertilizers). Land reforms frequently triggeredchanges in land management, and the location and timing of reforms had substantial impacts on land-use outcomes. Finally, forest protection policies and voluntary cooperatives were important drivers ofland-management changes. Overall, our results demonstrate that land-system changes should not be con-ceived as unidirectional developments following predefined trajectories, but rather as path-dependentprocesses that may be affected by various drivers, including sudden events.