The Role of the Evaluation in Designing Ecosystem Services. A Literature Review

Starting from the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment several research domains have focused on the complex relationship that persists between environmental system and human well-being according to their own theoretical as well as operational paradigms. Few are the cross-sectorial researches aimed at analyzing the ecosystems, their services and performances at different scales according to an integrated approach. The combination of different approaches and research methodologies represents a promising perspective both for framing the analysis and for landscape designing. Furthermore, the development of integrated and cross-disciplinary studies on the identification, measurement and evaluation of Ecosystem Services (ESs) appears relevant for its practical consequences on urban planning decisions with special respect to the construction of innovative strategies for metropolitan agricultural systems, urban open spaces and green areas. Given these premises, the contribution provides a systematic review and a citation network analysis to understand the relationship between the role of the design and the importance of evaluation in the ESs’ field of research.