While the significance and need of landscape assessment for rural area has been recognised, an appropriate method has not been established due to the lack of statutory ground and policy status in Korea. For that reason, current studies have been limited to dominantly amenity field survey in specific rural areas and stayed in academic. In particular, the majority of research on rural landscape amenity or character assessment methodologies so far has been attempted with quantitative processes. Such quantitative methods produced sometimes, heavily overlapped, conflicted, and not much meaningful characterisation and classification. Moreover, such results could not only have been reflected to policy implementation but provide vision for rural areas. Therefore, this study offers new facets for landscape character assessment methods through the lens of practitioners’ qualitative survey methods and moreover, seek a policy implementation of newly developed methodologies. In order to carry out such analysis, the study employed a case study of England’s Landscape Character Assessment and survey location was Gateshead Council, Northeast of England. The study suggests meaningful qualitative landscape character assessment method and review of its policy implementation.

For rural landscape management to run in virtuous circle, the present study has paid attention to the roles and activities of local residents and administration, which are the main sectors of managing landscape. In this respect, this study is aimed to arrange the roles of local residents and administration for landscape management and propose the basic data necessary to develope evaluation index for effectiveness of rural landscape policy. Key findings and implications are as follows. First, literature reviews of 18 landscape management studies found 37 administrative roles and 7 roles of local residents. And those roles were classified into 3 factors by similar concept: 'local government support system', 'landscape management planning', and 'promoting the participation of residents'. Second, two Delphi surveys were conducted with landscape experts to verify the validity of those evaluation items by sector. Third, factor analysis was carried out to analyze the hierarchical structure of those evaluation items. 3 sub-factors were extracted from 'local government support system' sector; 2 sub-factors from the 'landscape management planning' sector; and 4 sub-factors from the 'promoting participation of residents' sector. Fourth, the hierarchy of those evaluation factors was divided into high and low classes and sub-indexes were structured to examine the relative importance of each class and assign a relative weight on each index. The most important sub-factors were turned out as follows: 'local residents' will to practice landscape activities (0.112)', 'local government budget for rural landscape management (0.088), and 'restriction on buildings by village regulation (0.068). It indicates the viewpoints of the landscape experts that local residents' voluntary participation in landscape activities and agreement of local residents on landscape management by village, e.g. village regulation, are preconditions for successful landscape management. In addition, it is significant for a local government to secure the budget of landscape management to support local residents support.

The purpose of this study is to propose the policies for preservation, formation and management of Korean rural landscape. For this, the current rural landscape policies are examined and recent legislative changes are also surveyed. The Landscape Law and the Comprehensive Countermeasures for Rural Landscape Improvement are the most significant changes. The proposed issues are as follows: 1. the establishment of rural landscape planning system, 2. the arrangement of the criteria and guideline for rural landscape planning and design, 3. the re-arrangement of the rural landscape index and landscape map, 4. the survey and management of the rural landscape amenity, 5. the revitalization of the landscape projects for rural area, 6. the pragmatic connection with other law and system(especially the Landscape Law), 7. the education and cultivation of the rural landscape expert groups.