Curriculum Vitae
Prof. Dr. Tobias Plieninger is Professor of Social-Ecological Interactions at the Universities of Kassel and Göttingen.
He was Associate Professor at the Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management at the University of Copenhagen from 2013 to 2017. Before he was leader of a Junior Research Group on “Ecosystem Services in Cultural Landscapes“ at the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities.
Research Foci
Tobias Plieninger is a sustainability scientist with a commitment to inter- and transdisciplinary research at the social-ecological interface. In particular, he studies rural landscape change, ecosystem services, and sustainability transformations. His research focuses on the complex relationships between agriculture, forestry, nature conservation, and other sectors of natural resource management. Tobias Plieninger is co-editor of three academic books: „The Science and Practice of Landscape Stewardship“ (Cambridge University Press), „European Wood-Pastures in Transitions“ (Routledge), and „Resilience and the Cultural Landscape“ (Cambridge University Press).Academic distinctions
- Since 2023 Member of Academia Europaea
- Since 2022 Henriette Herz Scout, Alexander von Humboldt-Foundation
- 2019-2025 Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher
Board memberships and reviews (selection)
- Lead Editor, People and Nature (since 2024)
- Editor for Ecological Economics, Landscape and Urban Planning, Landscape Ecology, and Sustainability Science
- Lead Author, Transformative Change Assessment, Intergovernmental Panel on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES; 2022-2025)
- Work group on “Changing Wildfires: Policy Options for a Fire-literate and Fire-adapted Europe”, European Academies Science Advisories Council (EASAC) (2023-2025)
- Scientific Advisory Board Member, Earth Systems Science, Austrian Academy of Sciences (since 2022)
- Work group on “Biodiversity in Agricultural Landscapes”, German National Academy of Sciences – Leopoldina (2018-2020)
- Ad-hoc referee for DFG, BMBF, EU-Research Framework Programmes, Swiss National Fund (SNF), Research Council for Norway and others
Publications (selection)
- Jay, M. & Plieninger, T. (2025). Addressing landscape multifunctionality in conservation and restoration. Nature Reviews Biodiversity.
- Plieninger, T., Bogadóttir, R., Fagerholm, N., Magnussen, E., Olafsson, A.S., Raymond, C.M. & Verbrugge, L.N.H. (2025). Exploring values, rules, and knowledge around traditional hunting in a rapidly developing society. People and Nature 7, 777-789.
- Heindorf, C., Schüler, S. & Plieninger, T. (2024). Poetic inquiry to explore the relational values of a transforming peat landscape. People and Nature 6, 1189-1205.
- Plieninger, T., Abunnasr, Y., D’Ambrosio, U., Guo, T., Kizos, T., Kmoch, L., Topp, E. & Varela, E. (2023). Biocultural conservation systems in the Mediterranean region: the role of values, rules, and knowledge. Sustainability Science 18: 823-838.
- Plieninger, T., Shamohamadi, S., García-Martín, M., Quintas-Soriano, C., Shakeri, Z. & Valipour, A. (2023). Community, pastoralism, landscape: Eliciting values and human-nature connectedness of forest-related people. Landscape and Urban Planning 233: 104706.
- Torralba, M., Nishi, M., Cebrián-Piqueras, M.A., Quintas-Soriano, C., García-Martín, M., & Plieninger, T. (2023). Disentangling the practice of landscape approaches: A Q-method analysis on experiences in socio-ecological production landscapes and seascapes. Sustainability Science 18, 18931906.
- García-Martín, M., Huntsinger, L., Ibarrola-Rivas, M.J., Penker, M., D’Ambrosio, U., Dimopoulos, T., Fernández-Giménez, M.E., Kizos, T., Muñoz-Rojas, J., Saito, O., Zimmerer, K.S., Abson, D.J., Liu, J., Quintas-Soriano, C., Sørensen, I.H., Verburg, P.H. & Plieninger, T. (2022). Landscape products for sustainable agricultural landscapes. Nature Food 3: 814-821.
- García-Martín, M., Torralba, M., Quintas-Soriano, C., Kahl, J. & Plieninger, T. (2021): Linking food systems and landscape sustainability in the Mediterranean region. Landscape Ecology 36, 2259-2275.
- Fagerholm, N., Martín-López, B., Torralba, M., Oteros-Rozas, E., Lechner, A., Bieling, C., Stahl Olafsson, A., Albert, C., Raymond, C., García Martín, M., Gulsrud, N. & Plieninger, T. (2020): Perceived contributions of multifunctional landscapes to human wellbeing: Evidence from 13 European sites. People and Nature 2: 217-234.
- Flinzberger, L., Zinngrebe, Y. & Plieninger, T. (2020): Labelling in Mediterranean agroforestry landscapes: a Delphi study on relevant sustainability indicators. Sustainability Science 15: 1369-1382.