Mountain settlements are not simply a trace in hinterlands, but a result of a long coexistence between communities and ecosystems. The case of highland areas presents settlement patterns, which carry within them various challenges such as massive depopulation, climate change, resource management, infrastructure, cultural heritage, tourism development pressure, etc.

This session aims to explore the settlement patterns in alpine regions, focusing on spatial organisation, transformation processes over time, as well as their implications for sustainable regional developments.

Proposals can be oriented towards empirical cases, comparative models, as well as different methods from the disciplines/interdisciplines of human geography, regional planning/architecture, environmental history, landscape ecology, landscape archaeology, anthropology and environmental sciences. Topics may include permanent or seasonal settlements (such as huts), settlement morphologies, hazard-aware settlement placement, as well as contemporary transformations driven by industry, agriculture, tourism, climate change, demographic shifts, and policy interventions. The data can be qualitative or quantitative, and the mixed methods include spatial-temporal analysis, ethnography, archeological and historical research, participatory approach, etc.

Depicting the mountain settlements as an outcome of co-living with ecosystems, this session would aim to contribute to a broad debate on sustainable upland development, climate adaptation, and the human presence in those sensitive mountain environments.