Land and life in the Anthropocene: Landscape reform (LAND)
How can we learn to live on earth in new ways? This is the challenge of the Anthropocene. We propose a novel 4Ps framework to investigate land–life dynamics, which, for the first time, will connect perspectives on human–nonhuman relations (Partners), property-making (Property), land regimes (Profit) and land–climate systems (Planet). We draw on critical perspectives from both environmental humanities and agrarian studies, bringing together diverse traditions from human–nonhuman anthropology, geography, political ecology and economy, ecological economics and complex systems thinking in a unique interdisciplinary synthesis.
Connecting land and life, this project addresses four Anthropocene challenges – climate, biodiversity, food and infrastructure/investment – through four exemplar landscape cases in the Colombian Amazon, southern African savannas, Spanish Mediterranean plains and coastal Southeast Asia. We bring a range of expertise and experience that can form the foundation for radically rethinking how we conceptualise land–life relations in the Anthropocene. Engaging with policymakers, social movements and local communities, our public action work will lead to practical approaches to ‘landscape reform’, where new ways of living in the Anthropocene are imagined and elaborated.
Funding:
The LAND project (grant #101224056 ERC-2025-SYG) is funded by the European Union. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or European Research Council. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.