Specifically, the proposal to maintain or restore landscape connectivity through corridors comes from observations made on the islands. Since the 1960s the Theory of Island Biogeography (by Robert MacArthur, 1930-1972, and Edward O. Wilson, 1929) noted that small and/or remote islands have far fewer species than larger islands and/or those closer to the mainland. During the 1970s it was proposed that protected areas (national parks, biological reserves) that were isolated within the countryside and surrounded by agricultural, livestock or urban developments, could also lose species and that there was therefore a need to maintain their connectivity. This concept began to be used substantially following the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in 1992.

Corridors maintain the continuity of biological processes. One of the most important of these, in terms of conservation, is the process of dispersal of individuals. Generation after generation, populations disperse and successfully colonize locations far removed from the site where they were born. In plants, seeds perform this dispersal while in animals it is usually the young who migrate. Corridors allow colonization and movement of individuals which prevents the local extinction of populations, maintains gene flow, reduces incidence of inbreeding and preserves the diversity of species within the fragments.

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