Land use is a cornerstone of human civilization, but also intrinsically linked to many global sustainability challenges-from climate change to food security to the ongoing biodiversity crisis. Understanding the underlying technological, institutional and economic drivers of land-use change, and how they play out in different environmental, socio-economic and cultural contexts, is therefore important for identifying effective policies to successfully address these challenges. In this regard, much can be learned from studying long-term land-use change. We examined the evolution of European land management over the 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 narratives elaborating on the drivers of land use-change at the country level for 28 countries in Europe. We qualitatively grouped drivers into land-management regimes, and compared changes in management regimes across Europe. Our results allowed discerning seven land-management regimes, and highlighted marked heterogeneity regarding the types of management regimes occurring in a particular country, the timing and prevalence of regimes, and the conditions that result in observed bifurcations. However, we also found strong similarities across countries in the timing of certain landmanagement regime shifts, often in relation to institutional reforms (e.g., changes in EU agrarian policies or the emergence and collapse of the Soviet land management paradigm) or to technological innovations (e.g., drainage pipes, tillage and harvesting machinery, motorization, and synthetic fertilizers). Land reforms frequently triggered changes 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 of land-management changes. Overall, our results demonstrate that land-system changes should not be conceived as unidirectional developments following predefined trajectories, but rather as path-dependent processes that may be affected by various drivers, including sudden events.

Jason W. 2013 Multi-generational longdistance migration of insects: studying the painted lady butterfly in the Western Palaearctic. Ecography, 36 (4). 474-486. 10.1111/j.1600-0587.2012.07738.x Contact CEH NORA team at noraceh@ceh.ac.ukThe NERC and CEH trademarks and logos ('the Trademarks') are registered trademarks of NERC in the UK and other countries, and may not be used without the prior written consent of the Trademark owner. (up to 60 degrees of latitude). The cycle comprises an annual poleward advance of the 73 populations in spring followed by an equatorward return movement in autumn, with returning 74 individuals potentially flying thousands of kilometres. We show that many long-distance 75 migrants take advantage of favourable winds, moving downwind at high elevation (from 76 some tens of metres from the ground to altitudes over 1,000 m), pointing at strong similarities 77 in the flight strategies used by V. cardui and other migrant Lepidoptera. Our results reveal the 78 highly successful strategy that has evolved in these insects, and provide a useful framework 79 for a better understanding of long-distance seasonal migration in the temperate regions 80 worldwide. 81 82 5

Conrad, E., Cassar, L. F., Jones, M., Eiter, S., Izaovicova, Z., Barankova, Z., Christie, M., Fazey, I. (2011). Rhetoric and Reporting of Public Participation in Landscape Policy. Journal of Environmental Policy & Planning, 13 (1), 23-47, Article Number: PII 935334210.The involvement of the public in decision-making is established as a key feature of many planning policies. However, there is evidence from the literature of a prevailing gap between participation rhetoric on paper and participation at the operational level. We assess whether this is also the case with landscape policy and review landscape characterization and assessment initiatives in England, Norway, Slovakia and Malta, focusing on five dimensions of good practice: (i) scope of public participation, (ii) representativeness of those involved, (iii) timeliness of public involvement, (iv) extent to which participation is rendered comfortable and convenient for the public, and (v) eventual influence of public input on decisions. Reviewed reporting results indicate weaknesses in the implementation of public participation, with public involvement largely limited to consultation, with few efforts to ensure representativeness of participants, with predominantly late involvement of the public, and with limited influence of the public on outputs. Furthermore, few efforts appear to be made to facilitate participation for the public. Although the cases studied differ, none of them are fully satisfactory in relation to the European Landscape Convention's participatory targets. The reporting of public participation processes thus suggests that practices may fail to match the rhetoricPeer reviewe

AcknowledgmentsThanks are due to Dr. Liberato Camilleri (University of Malta) for guidance concerning the use of statistical tests. We would also like to thank all workshop participants and interview respondents. We also gratefully acknowledge the feedback of four anonymous referees on an earlier draft of this paper.

This paper considers the challenge of decoupling economic growth from environmental degradation; in contrast to several large-scale cross-country analyses that focus on limited indicators of environmental degradation, we analyze in some depth the experience of a single small-scale island state setting (Malta). We use available statistical data to derive decoupling factors, in order to consider the extent to which decoupling has been achieved in four sectors: (i) energy intensity, climate change, and air quality; (ii) water; (iii) waste; and (iv) land. Results indicate relative decoupling between economic growth and several indicators considered, and to a lesser extent, relative decoupling between population growth and the same indicators of environmental pressure. Absolute decoupling has been achieved in at least one instance but there has been no decoupling of land development from either economic or population growth. Land use and population thus appear to be notable sources of pressure. The results suggest that decoupling analyses that present environmental degradation in terms of single variables (e.g., carbon emissions) may misrepresent somewhat the state of the environment at local level. Furthermore, the study highlights the need for methodologies that factor in the "embedding" of small-scale settings within much larger trade networks, for a more accurate estimation of environmental impact, and points to some limitations of solely quantitative analyses of environment-ecology relationships.