Integrated landscape approaches are increasingly recognized as a strategy to reconcile competing for socioeconomic and environmental objectives within developing tropical landscapes (Reed et al. 2016). Through enhanced multistakeholder collaborations, proponents of the landscape approach assert that ongoing negotiation can identify where synergies and trade-offs exist between the various stakeholders operating within such landscapes (Sayer et al. 2013; Ros-Tonen et al. 2015). Principles of adaptive management can then be applied to encourage synergies, negotiate for potential trade-offs and seek alternatives for stakeholders whose aspirations are not being fully met – therefore creating an environment in which there are ‘more winners and fewer losers’ (Sayer et al. 2014). This more holistic approach to landscape management represents a welcome departure from previous approaches that maintained focus on sector-based objectives, often without regard for the needs and aspirations of others. As such, the landscape approach concept has been widely embraced by both conservation NGOs and development agencies. Furthermore, the recent formalization of major global commitments toward climate change (UNFCCC 2014) and sustainable development (United Nations 2015) is resulting in burgeoning support for landscape approaches James Reed, Josh van Vianen and Terry Sunderland at governmental and intergovernmental levels. However, despite the applicability of an integrated landscape approach as an organizing framework with which to align globally conceived commitments and more local realities (van Vianen et al. 2015), there is concern that evidence of the effectiveness of the approach in practice is still lacking (Sayer et al. 2016). Our recent review of over 17,000 documents captured just 24 peer-reviewed scientific studies about the tropics, with a further 150 from the gray literature (Reed et al. 2016).
