IALE 2021 European Congress: The Call for Symposia

The call for symposia is now open for the IALE 2021 European Landscape Ecology Congress, taking place July 5-9, 2021 in Warsaw, Poland. Congress is organised by Institute of Geography and Spatial Organization, Polish Academy of Sciences and Faculty of Geography and Regional Studies, University of Warsaw in partnership with European and Polish Associations for Landscape Ecology (IALE-Europe and PAEK).

Goal of the IALE 2021 European Congress

Congress aims to highlight landscape ecology as the transdisciplinary platform linking past, present and future. This approach is especially needed now when the world is facing global challenges such as climate crisis, biodiversity loss, environmental pollution, mass migration and urbanization. A holistic, landscape approach to the complex cultural-environmental systems – which is the essence of landscape ecology – provides the perfect framework for combining transdisciplinary tools and perspectives to better understand the diverse phenomena and processes around us and to predict and properly manage them. That is why we want to learn from past experience and knowledge to take responsibility for shaping sustainable landscapes and societies of the future.

To achieve this aim we invite both researchers and practitioners from all landscape-related disciplines, including environmental and social perspectives, to share their experience and interact within the broad, international community of all those interested in landscape related issues. We believe that landscape ecology – as the study of multifaceted interactions in geographical space – has the potential to integrate not only natural sciences and humanities but also researchers and policy-makers, which is the key to implement the Congress theme into practice.

Themes of the IALE 2021 European Congress

The general congress theme – making the future, learning from the past – will be discussed through the four interconnected thematic groups covering the whole range of issues relevant for landscape ecology:

  • Past… Heritage, Reconstructing, Understanding, Drivers and actors of change, Transformations, Nature restoration, Mapping, Paleoecology, History, Memories, Legacies, Identity, Connectivity…
  • Learning… Communication/transferring knowledge, Coproduction of knowledge, Multi-/inter-/trans-disciplinarity, Dialogue, Education and awareness, Going to dialogue with landscape, Perception, Learning by doing, Monitoring, Multi-perspectivism, Evaluation of policies/measures…
  • Future… Modelling and scenarios, Transitions, Facing/meeting challenges, Aspirations, Expectations, Technology/new tools, Virtual, Artificial intelligence/big data, Social media, Landscape genetics, Solutions, Novel (eco)systems, Innovation, Regeneration, Sustainability, Resilience, Security, Measuring landscape…
  • Making… Practice, Policy, Design, Identity, Place making, Governance, Management (natural/heritage), Co-benefits, Stewardship, Protection, Conservation, Ecosystem services, Impact assessment, Impact and effect, Conflict solving, Mitigation, Well-being, Valuation, Implementation…

For submission of Symposia

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on IALE 2021 European Congress

Organizers have already received requests to extend the deadline for proposals. Hence, the call for symposia has been extended until September 15, 2020. Taking into account the current situation with the pandemic of COVID-19
and the related health and wellbeing concerns, organizers are already thinking about the possibilities of a mixed organisation of life and online activities, including measures for a safe organisation, to give all the participants the possibility to join the congress as much as possible.