Land use change is caused by integrated processes arriving from several time-, space- and institutional levels. Investigating why these changes are happening by departing from the theoretical concept of driving forces is promising as the concept integrates the complexity of the changes. This study aims to create a wider understanding about what is affecting the peri-urban land use changes and which possibilities spatial planning has to regulate the peri-urban landscape.

The complexity of driving forces to land use changes are investigated by focusing on peri-urban agricultural lands, using interviews among stakeholders on several spatial levels and a document study of municipal and regional plans. Two case areas characterized by a fast urbanization and high valued agricultural land in Norway are chosen. The Norwegian case areas are interesting e.g. because of the particular national regulations about protection of agricultural land (no:jordvern).

The results of the study indicate that maintenance of agricultural land in the urban areas is strongly connected to political decisions in spatial planning. Even though regulations about maintaining an active agricultural land use is working as a strong friction in the Norwegian context high prices for the land in the urban areas creates a strong pressure to sell land for development. The selling is in turn strongly regulated by development decisions in the spatial planning. The study concludes that the municipal spatial planning in the urban hinterland is challenged by conflicting national goals and the separated legislation controlling the different land uses. This implies that a holistic place perspective is of great importance for a deeper understanding of land use changes. The result of the study also points to the need of a process analysis in order to investigate the physical planning’s institutional relationships, power relations and their importance for the outcome in the physical landscape.