At the outset of the ecological movement critisism of the actual landscape development became widespread in the public discussion. The main issue was the destruction of the landscape ; consequently economical land use and the protection of the landscape was demanded. Despite the efforts made in science and politics the problem couldn’t be resolved. Wheras the building development was rather stimulated by the politics, the protection efforts met considerable local resistance and had therefore only limited success. Large parts of the cultural landscape are still undergoing the process of degrading to intensively used land.

This study tries to find a way to a sustainable need-oriented landscape development using a dialectical approach. It is based on the idea that the landscape can be understood as the result a dynamic social process and therefore destruction cannot be avoided by protection measures alone. Moreover it is a crucial requirement that between the local population and the landscape a dialectical exchange of need satisfaction, participation and identification takes place. If this process is disturbed, the local people are alienated from the landscape and judge the development as undesirable. This hypothesis was initially based on theories from environmental psycholgy and sociology and then further developped empirically in a comparing analysis of two rural communities serving as examples. Practical methods of fostering a sustainable landscape development were evaluated as well by organising and observing participatory processes in these two communities.

It was found that the local people are alienated and withdraw from their landscape, because they can’t satisfy their needs there - which habe been proven to be identical with the needs of housing. However, the deeper cause of this alienation lies in the fact that their participation in the development process is blocked. They are not blocked - as often postulated - because they are not interested, but rather because they identify with the village community and ist traditional values and thus submit to the social pressure to adopt the corresponding norms and rules. Obviously this strong identification with the village collective persists although the local people no longer depend on it for their livelihood. To reactivate the blocked dialectical exchange between the local people and their landscape, this need to use the collective norms of the community for orientation must be overcome and at the same time, they must be encouraged to identify with the landscape on an individual basis. To foster the latter, in this climate of collective pressure for adaptation, sheltered frameworks or communicative instruments are needed to allow the local people to exchange their individual wishes and ideas without exposing themselves. When such instruments were applied participation increased in both communities and resulted in a more intense relation between the local population and their landscape. At the same time it became evident that a sustainable landscape development based on the participation of a large part of the local population requires a long learning process.