From landscape as collective asset to the ecomuseum as instrument of territorial valorisation. Comparative experiences of diffuse cultural heritage regeneration

The European Landscape Convention (Florence, 2000) marked an epistemological change shift in the concept of heritage, redefining it as a collective asset and a site for identity-forming practices. Despite growing scholarly interest in ecomuseums as participatory heritage tools, the literature lacks integrated frameworks capable of assessing their contribution to urban and territorial regeneration across structurally different contexts. This paper addresses this gap by developing and applying an original four-dimensional analytical framework — encompassing typological-spatial relations, participatory governance, urban planning instruments, and impact assessment — to two contrasting Italian case studies: the Casilino Ecomuseum, in the south-eastern periphery of Rome, which recovers traces of peri-urban rurality embedded in multicultural housing practices; the Freidano Ecomuseum in Settimo Torinese, which valorises the industrial and riverine landscape by intertwining working-class identity and local biodiversity. The comparative analysis demonstrates that, despite their structural differences, both ecomuseums function as effective devices for implementing the Convention's principles through bottom-up processes of heritage recognition, civic participation and territorial regeneration. The study contributes a replicable interpretative and operational model. for ecomuseum-based landscape governance, with direct implications for urban planning policy and diffuse cultural heritage management.