The rapidly evolving inter-disciplinary field of Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is a vital means of evaluating the likely significant environmental consequences of implementing land use plan proposals. The European SEA directive, which came into effect in 2004, requires member states to implement SEA requirements. This book provides an authoritative, international evaluation of the SEA of land use plans and provides context using a variety of case studies in which the uniquely qualified contributors evaluate systems in Canada, Denmark, Germany, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Portugal, South Africa, Sweden, The UK, and the USA. Each SEA system is evaluated against a set of generic criteria specially designed to analyse different aspects of SEA. Numerous figures and tables are used to summarize the evaluative findings.