Abstract

Problem, research strategy, and findings: Wildfires imply greater disaster risk at the urban–rural interface of wildfire-prone areas. Spatial planning systems are now commonly expected to consider wildfire risk management and promote wildfire resilience. However, there is a lack of practical and nuanced understandings about the ways spatial planning instruments can comprehensively integrate wildfire risk management. To address this knowledge gap, I propose a framework for the comprehensive integration of wildfire disaster risk reduction into spatial planning instruments, considering the barriers and facilitators that influence the ability of planning instruments to promote settlements’ resilience to wildfire. This research comprises inductive qualitative research of two case studies (the Chilean and Victorian [Australia] planning systems). I used content analysis of documents, interviews, and cross-case comparisons and synthesis to explore and develop analytic generalizations about spatial planning instruments’ role, abilities, and limitations in wildfire risk management. I propose a framework for the comprehensive integration of wildfire risk management into spatial planning instruments that distinguishes components, roles, and factors for promoting settlements’ resilience to wildfires organized according to three levels of spatial planning instruments: strategic, tactical, and operational. Takeaway for practice: Applied understandings about spatial planning instruments’ ways of dealing with wildfires, such as the one suggested here, provide directions for improving spatial planning systems and can serve as a critical appraisal tool of existing instruments across different contexts. Furthermore, they are essential for translating resilience from a descriptive ideal into useful spatial planning practices. © 2025 American Planning Association, Chicago, IL.