Historical biogeography: A review of its basic concepts and critical issues

Biogeography (the study of the geographical distribution of organisms) ranges from descriptive to interpretative studies. Interpretative biogeography developed two research traditions named historical and ecological biogeography, respectively. The main difference between these research traditions is the time-scale one. The objective of this paper is to summarize the current state of historical biogeography. We present a brief summary of the evolution of ideas in historical biogeography since its beginnings over two centuries ago. Also, we introduce the basic concepts of each of nine historical biogeographic approaches. Finally, we discuss the need for a new conceptual framework to solve some of the current critical issues in historical biogeography (i.e. the historical and ecological binary opposition in biogeography; the problem of methods; the inclusion of time in historical biogeography analysis; and the role of biogeography in biodiversity conservation).