The LIAISE approach to unite researchers and practitioners in a community of experts on impact assessment

Impact Assessment (IA) intends to collect evidence on the likely impacts of new policies and thereby minimize unwanted side-effects and maximize the benefits to society. Although it is a requirement in the EC and all OECD countries, the scope and methods vary considerably. Governments have invested considerably in research to support the evidence basis of policy making for sustainable development. However, the general picture shows a gap between the proliferation of IA tools from the scientific community and their actual use in the policy process. The FP7 network of excellence LIAISE (www.liaise- noe.eu) is designed to identify the causes for non-use of IA tools and bridge the gaps between researchers with a generally strong orientation towards their (disciplinary) peers and practitioners who tend to focus on their policy domain and policy problems. LIAISE aims at: 1) understanding of the policy process and the resulting needs for IA knowledge and IA tools; 2) description of IA tools and scientific IA expertise in a standardised way; 3) a shared IA toolbox targeted at the needs of both researchers and practitioners; 4) a shared IA research agenda integrating scientific knowledge gaps and the priorities for the development of new IA knowledge that arise from the future policy agenda; and 5) safeguarding the project results beyond the period of project funding, by developing an institutional setting and a business plan that facilitate the extension of the present consortium towards a broad centre of IA expertise with a structural permanence. A lively interaction between the different communities involved, is essential to realize these objectives. The Berlin Conference is an important opportunity to inform external research groups about the LIAISE approach to bridging the gap between science and policy. Their feedback and views on possible next steps in the further integration of the IA research community are highly valued, as well as their interest to become involved in this process

Landscape-based visions as powerful boundary objects in spatial planning : Lessons from three dutch projects

In a context of a rapidly changing livability of towns and countryside, climate change and biodiversity decrease, this paper introduces a landscape-based planning approach to regional spatial policy challenges allowing a regime shift towards a future land system resilient to external pressures. The concept of nature-based solutions and transition theory are combined in this approach, in which co-created normative future visions serve as boundary concepts. Rather than as an object in itself, the landscape is considered as a comprehensive principle, to which all spatial processes are inherently related. We illustrate this approach with three projects in the Netherlands in which landscape-based visions were used to guide the land transition, going beyond the traditional nature-based solutions. The projects studied show that a shared long-term future landscape vision is a powerful boundary concept and a crucial source of inspiration for a coherent design approach to solve today’s spatial planning problems. Further, they show that cherishing abiotic differences in the landscape enhances sustainable and resilient landscapes, that co-creation in the social network is a prerequisite for shared solutions, and that a landscape-based approach enhances future-proof land-use transitions to adaptive, circular, and biodiverse landscapes.</p

Met circulaire landbouw naar circulaire landschappen : naar een rijkere legenda voor het Nederlandse landschap

In dit position paper wordt het concept ‘Circulaire Landbouw Complexen’ geintroduceert. ‘Circulaire Landbouw Complexen’ (CLC): een complex van bedrijven, dat past bij het landschap, de sociale gemeenschap en de ligging ten opzichte van stedelijke kernen en infrastructuur, elkaar grondstoffen en energie leveren, kennis en menskracht delen en kringlopen op een zo laag mogelijk schaalniveau sluiten. Dit concept helpt in de transitie naar een circulaire, natuurpositieve maatschappij door circulariteit en duurzaamheid op gebiedsniveau met lokale actoren vorm te geven. Ook wordt een methode gepresenteerd waarmee met actoren een Circulair Landbouw Complex ontworpen kan worden

Long-Term Visioning for Landscape-Based Spatial Planning—Experiences from Two Regional Cases in The Netherlands

Normative scenarios for long-term (e.g., 100 years) landscape development can be very inspiring to imagine outside the box landscape futures, without being obliged to define concrete policy objectives for the shorter term. However, it remains challenging to translate such long-term visions into clear transition pathways. We draw upon a landscape-based design approach to local spatial planning to foster a transition to a well-functioning landscape, resilient to various external pressures. Inspired by a national visioning exercise for the Netherlands in 2120, two local case studies at municipal level in the Netherlands are analysed, aiming to identify in what ways the setup of a regional landscape-based design study using future visions can optimise the spatial planning process. Therefore, this comparative case study analysed the cases on the landscape-based approach, the design process, and the future visions formulated. The comparison shows that fostering abiotic differences safeguards sustainable and resilient landscapes; moreover, co-creation relying on representative local actors appears fundamental for shared solutions, while a landscape-based approach guarantees transitions to adaptive and biodiverse landscapes. We conclude that a shared long-term future landscape vision is a crucial source of inspiration to solve today’s spatial planning problems. The constellation of the stakeholder group involved and the methodological setup of a visioning process are determinative for the way a long-term vision is suited to informing spatial planning for a sustainable future

Perceived effectiveness of environmental decision support systems in participatory planning: Evidence from small groups of end-users. Environ

a b s t r a c t The challenges associated with evaluating the effectiveness of environmental decision support systems (EDSS) based on the perceptions of only a small sample of end-users are well understood. Although methods adopted from Management Information Systems (MISs) evaluation research have benefited from relatively large (100þ) sample sizes, permitting the use of multi-criteria analysis of users perceptions, there are few examples of methods for quantifying effectiveness based on smaller groups of endusers. Use of environmental decision support systems in Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) has become increasingly prevalent over the passed twenty years, where their potential for facilitating the participatory process has been recognised; however, few quantitative assessments have been reported. This paper reports the application of a quantitative approach to evaluating environmental decision support systems with small groups of end-users in two case studies where the objective was to facilitate the participatory decision-making process in water management projects. The first case study involved nine end-users applying and evaluating a Bayesian network-based tool to facilitate water demand management implementation in Sofia, the capital city of Bulgaria. The second involved eleven end-users applying and evaluating an integrated tool e the Integrated Solution Support System (I3S) -during a water stress mitigation project in a European context. End-users&apos; perceptions of effectiveness were elicited and compared using statistical analysis. The results of the two case studies suggest that end-user&apos;s employment influences their perceptions of EDSS effectiveness. We also show how the applied evaluation method is flexible enough to assess different EDSS types from a range of dimensions